This add-on allows the user to render text using stroke font. Stroke fonts have glyphs that can have open paths, so they can be used e.g. in writing animation. The add-on comes bundled with a set of 26 stroke fonts.
Supported Blender version: 2.8x
- Click on the Code button above the repository list
- Select Download Zip option and save the zip file to a local folder
- Click install Add-ons tab and then Install Add-on from File
- Select the downloaded zip file
- Check the 'Add Stroke Font Text' option in the add-ons dialog
After installation, a new 'Add Stroke Font Text' panel is displayed in 'Active Tool and Workspace settings' area when Blender is in object mode.
Select 'Add Input Text' option in the 'Action' drop-down, input the text to be rendered in the text box, select the font and click 'Add Stroke Font Text'. To render text from a file choose 'Add Text from File' action.
With 'Confine Area' checkbox selected, you can choose horizontal and vertical alignment for text rendering.
When the Clone Glyphs option is selected, all glyphs pertaining to the same characters share the data block.
The introductory video provides a detailed overview of the add-on functionality
There is also a demo video about the various options available.
The custom stroke fonts are derived from: Square Grotesk and Pinyon Script available under Open Font License on https://fontlibrary.org/
The data of Hershey Fonts is ported from Hershey Text Inkscape Extension (hersheydata.py) from Windell H. Oskay.
Here's the acknowledgement:
- The Hershey Fonts were originally created by Dr. A. V. Hershey while working at the U. S. National Bureau of Standards.
- The format of the Font data in this distribution was originally created by
James Hurt
Cognition, Inc.
900 Technology Park Drive
Billerica, MA 01821
(mit-eddie!ci-dandelion!hurt)
The add-on includes python converted a2c js function (Copyright (C) 2013-2015 by Vitaly Puzrin)
and SVG parser imported from svgpathtools (Copyright (c) 2015 Andrew Allan Port, Copyright (c) 2013-2014 Lennart Regebro)
Creating Custom Fonts
This add-on does not support stroke font creation. However, I have published a set of Inkscape extensions for creating and editing stroke fonts. Here are the related video tutorials:
Part1: https://youtu.be/iCsnYlVjWA0
Part2: https://youtu.be/-7BjfxpUAfU
Part3: https://youtu.be/3YBaZfPpNjc
Known Issues
If you undo the add text operation, the eye dropper selections made previously in 'Properties of' option may not function consistently. So after undoing, even if this option shows a non-blank object, you will have to select the corresponding object once again (if there was a selection before undoing).
The tool is in alpha stage, so please exercise caution while using it; save your work, before invoking the add-on.
You may report the issues and defects on the Issues page here or in the comments section on the video tutorial.
Feedback and suggestions are most welcome!