Re: [ft-devel] Autohinter: stem darkening, first rough prototype

[Nikolaus Waxweiler]

I was going to write a long mail and moan about how complicated FreeType 
is and how my stem darkening just wasn't pleasing to look at.

Then I fiddled around some to prove a point and suddenly LOOK AT THIS:

http://postimg.org/image/el0egghrl/full (no emboldening)
http://postimg.org/image/jbkphgh6p/full (emboldening)

http://postimg.org/image/yyd7ck41b/full (no emboldening)
http://postimg.org/image/65np7mx6t/full (emboldening)

(all screenshots with gamma correction)

Now THIS is it! This is exactly the high-quality, smooth darkened glyph 
I always wished for. The nice thing: this makes glyphs look much better 
even without gamma correction. And, it solves an annoying problem the 
autohinter had with certain typefaces like Open Sans, Droid Serif and 
Droid Sans:

http://postimg.org/image/gaa1iu5x3/
http://postimg.org/image/7tf4lnqlz/

Open Sans, note the "i". The autohinter has long been at war with the 
dot on the "i" at certain sizes, emboldening brings peace.

I spotted a few minor glitches already, will test more.

And all I did was to move the emboldening code to before any hints are 
applied and apply emboldening also on the Y axis. I'll get myself a 
bigger dunce cap.