Viewing Glyphs in full size

[Corniger]

Hi guys,

I have the same problem in InDesign (both CS4) and was wondering, if it were possible to view glyphs as a whole somehow.

When I, for example, use certain script fonts, I never get to see the swashes or anything outside their tiny little glyph box. Is it possible to adjust that? Or any other workaround? Creating a character map doesn't really help, doesn't make finding/swapping alternates easier.

Thanks!

[Mike_Gondek]

While there are no settings in the Illustrator glyphs panel to add additional canvas for characters, there may be a system utility such as pop char to do this. What OS are you on, and can you name some fonts you are having most trouble with?

This is buffet script form Sudtipos

CC2017 has added a feature to contextual menu click and get glyphs alternates which you might like, though they are still chopped off when the descenders/ascenders go beyond. Other issues though make 2017 undesirable to upgrade to.

[Corniger]

Mike and Jeff, I've read about thos new features. I just wonder if the problem isn't just going to persist, just shaped differently.

I'm doing lots of wedding typography, where I have to rely on heavy use of alternates etc. Seeing only half - 1/10th of the letter isn't really working for me with scripts such as Mozart, Desire, The Secret, CandleScript etc.

Mike, I'm running Win 8.1 and PopChar is available for it. I just wonder, seeing another matrix of tiny squares, if this may help solve my problem. To demonstrate what I'm struggling with:

many of the letters have varying swashes of different/varying length to accomodate better fitting them with the text. Swashes for beginning/ending text, or even swashes ONLY. After showing you the milder forms of desaster, here's an even more obvious:

I just have no chance to work with this. All I can do is click around like an idiot, and at some point I'll remember the succession of the glyphs by heart. And I won't upgrade until such issues are resolved - which is precisely why I haven't yet. But maybe I'm just looking at it wrong, maybe I'm missing something, because, honestly, I can't imagine being the first.

[Jeff Witchel, ACI]

As you can see in Mike's screenshot above, in InDesign, you will see the alternates for just that one selected character. And if there are too many alternates for the popup, it will automatically open the Glyphs panel showing ALL the alternates for just that selected character. It's a very cool feature!

Take a look at my video tutorial about InDesign Popup Glyphs: http://www.jeffwitchel.net/2016/06/the-power-of-popup-glyphs/

[Corniger]

Jeff, thanks for sharing the video. But this still won't solve the issue.

I'm shown all the alternates in the huge glyphs panel covering my entire 2nd screen. Gut I can only see 50-10% of certain glyphs. I wonder if the glyph popup will solve that problem or just - again - show me a fraction of certain glyphs.
Also, there are fonts who have swashes separated from the letters, which makes this even harder. I can only guess and click around. I soemeone shows me a screenshot of a huge glyph shown in its entirety in whichever software, this will be the/a solution to my problem 🙂

For further clarification: The "P" plus the entire swash before and after are all ONE glyph:

This is, of course, an extreme example, but I hope you'll get my point!

[Jeff Witchel, ACI]

It may not solve your problem entirely, but would be a major improvement.

[Corniger]

How, if I still can't see the characters in their entirety? Of course it would be nice to have the alternates pop up right there in place, but not for an eternity of yearly subscription with no real solution. I'm happy with my CS4 for now, unless there's a significant reason to switch.
I could imagine it should be possible to adjust the grid to the largest glyph there is. Of course that would use up a whole lot of screen estate, but that's why I have several displays here, on of which is filled with chaotic mumbo-jumbo

[Mike_Gondek]

Being able to view the full glyph in the glyphs palette in Illustrator is  not possible. Most fonts only have  few alternates per letter (please correct me if you use a font that has dozens) so should not take too long to try them. Only additional help I can offer is to suggest using if you already are not the

• Alternates for Selection
• OPentyep palette >> Stylistic Alternates button

[Corniger]

Mike,

"Being able to view the full glyph in the glyphs palette in Illustrator is  not possible." is an answer I can live with.

To further illustrate:

the glyphs for "O" in the panel vs. reality, plus the not-so-small amount of completely unrecognizable alternates for an "f".

I think we all can agree on this being utterly unusable!

@Monika Gause

Thanks for the typography forum. There must be something that ends my pain Other than that, it could be an option to adjust all character boxes to the largest one. I have LOTS of space. LOTS. All filled with junk. I'd rather have a working character map to fully display 20 glyphs fully instead 500 unrecognizably!

[Monika Gause]

M_Schloegl schrieb:

Other than that, it could be an option to adjust all character boxes to the largest one. I have LOTS of space. LOTS. All filled with junk. I'd rather have a working character map to fully display 20 glyphs fully instead 500 unrecognizably!

You have lots of space, many people nowadays work from their notebook.

But the problem is to calculate the "largest one". Software has to first sort through the complete font (up to 64,000 glyphs) in order to find the largest one. Then calculate the grid. And it has to do this everytime you open the panel and for each font you want to view. Might take some time to pop up the panel then.

[Corniger]

That's why I say it could be an optional feature. I don't switch fonts that often during one project, so I wouldn't mind pushing that button. Also, those values could be calculated and stored for later use. Flickr does a similar process within seconds, so why not.

I think, no excuse can be good enough to evade a more than apparent lack

[Mike_Gondek]

In the current 2017 version this is not possible is what I am saying.

You can file a feature request

Feature Request/Bug Report Form

I agree with you and would better if for example hovering over the glyph gave the entire glyphs, or choosing alternates for selection gave the entire glyphs.

[Corniger]

Thank you, Mike. I'll post that feature request

I got you right, don't worry - it must be possible. It is, in freeware, though not very cleanly, so it must be doable perfectly in the Creative Suite!

[Monika Gause]

Looks like the Glyphs panel contains the shoulder of a letter "m". The question would be if it is technically possible to show the face of each letter. Even more so when this has to happen in a grid system. Imagine a grid where each cell has to be wide enogh to contain that P you show there. On top of that the required space would need to calculated each time when you open the panel by taking into account all the thousands of letters a huge font might have. And then it would require a lot of scrolling by the user in order to go through most OpenType fonts.

Maybe you want to ask in this forum. There are more typography people over there:

Type & Typography

[Jeff Witchel, ACI]

If you upgrade to Creative Cloud, there's an InDesign feature that will allow you see and select Opentype alternates to a selected character in text, simply by hovering over that character.

In Illustrator you can use the Opentype panel to turn on or off various Opentype options.