Re: [ft-devel] Freetype controls for glyph brightness/contrast/weight?

[Werner LEMBERG]

> I support controls to determine font weight.

Making the user control the font weight is against everything a font
designer wants!  What you really mean is controlling the display
gamma, and this is, together with linear blending, a job to be done at
a higher level than FreeType.

> With freetype2.7.1 my fonts appear heavier and less crisp.  Setting
> FREETYPE_PROPERTIES to use the 35 interpreter fixes the problem.  I
> just compiled freetype-2.8 in hopes my fonts would revert to
> pre-freetype-2.7.1 form. Unfortunately, I still have to set the
> FREETYPE_PROPERTIES.

It is a matter of fact that v35 rendering is different to v40.  Due to
lack of hinting along the x axis, you automatically get a more blurred
look, which is heavily pronounced unfortunately if your environment
doesn't do linear blending.

> Perhaps I don't understand the reason for the change.

We basically do what Microsoft did more than 10 years ago.  There
exist many fonts that no longer render correctly with v35 – hinting
for v40 is far easier (and much cheaper) to create.

> I do see I now need an extra step for acceptable fonts.  So I'd be
> happy to see freetype revert to a form not requiring setting the
> FREETYPE_PROPERTIES variable.

This won't happen.  As mentioned above, you are basically barking the
wrong tree.

> If not, an option to determine font weight could accomplish the
> same, and perhaps even better, result.

This won't happen either.


    Werner