As a graphic designer, you are probably obsessed with fonts, and who can blame you; after all, it’s your job. You work with fonts daily, you can identify them at a glance, and you’ve accumulated a mental list of go-tos and favorites. If this describes you, then you have, at some point, definitely wondered how to make a personal font from scratch for yourself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Font creation is a long and tedious process, but typing in a font you designed can be incredibly rewarding. However, it\u2019s important to note that you\u2019re not only learning how to make a \u201cfont,\u201d you\u2019re also making a typeface. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
What\u2019s the difference? A typeface is a whole group of text styles you can use, often referred to as the \u201cfont family.\u201d Arial, Helvetica, and Times New Roman are typefaces because you can use multiple styles (Regular, italic, bold, bold italic, etc). A font is just one of those text styles. Technically, Arial Bold is a font, but Arial is a typeface. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Read on to learn how to make a font from scratch.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The word font refers to a set of printable or displayable typography or text characters in a specific style and size. Font styles are used in both print and digital text. While typographic font styles have custom spacing and design, once determined, this style will apply to both lowercase and uppercase letters as well as punctuation marks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The type design for a set of fonts is the typeface, and variations of this design form the font family.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For example, Helvetica is a font family, while Helvetica italic is a typeface, and Helvetica italic 10-point is a font. In practice, font and typeface are often used as synonyms even though they represent slightly different aspects of a specific font.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There are a variety of font file formats that can be used on both Windows and Mac computers. Some of the most common file formats are highlighted below:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The process below involves using Adobe Illustrator, but can also apply to other graphic design programs:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Start by setting the task and determining the set, style, and nature of the font. For the first font, it is better to choose the minimal character set. Answer the following questions in your notepad or a text editor:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Also, do\u00a0your research. At\u00a0this stage, it\u00a0is\u00a0worth choosing from 3\u00a0to\u00a010\u00a0typefaces that are close to\u00a0what you plan to\u00a0design. Of\u00a0course, you should not copy them in\u00a0your project, but it\u00a0is\u00a0useful to\u00a0study the graphic features, sizes, and other font parameters in\u00a0order to understand the construction logic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You also need to decide on\u00a0the character set. This should already be\u00a0done at\u00a0the first stage, but this time you need to\u00a0select in\u00a0detail all the characters that you plan to\u00a0draw. It\u00a0can be\u00a0one language, for example, basic Latin, numbers, and a\u00a0punctuation set.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The first step in creating custom fonts is to sketch your ideas on paper. You can use a pencil, a pen, a marker, or any other tool that you prefer. You can draw inspiration from existing fonts, shapes, symbols, or your own imagination. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Try to experiment with different styles, weights, widths, and angles. You can also think about how your font will look in different contexts, such as headlines, body text, or logos. Sketching your ideas will help you refine your vision and prepare for the next step.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This goes hand-in-hand with sketching your ideas. The two most basic typeface classifications are serif and sans serif. The \u201cserif\u201d category contains any typeface with small \u201cfeet\u201d at the end of letters. Times New Roman, Georgia, and Cambria are serif fonts. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sans serif, on the other hand, has no feet. Arial, Helvetica, Calibri, and Comic Sans are sans-serif typefaces.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
After that, the classifications get far more complicated. You can create display typefaces, script typefaces, and retro typefaces\u2014check out font sites like Adobe Typekit or Dafont to see all of the different categories and get inspired.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The next step is to scan your sketches and convert them into digital files. You can use a scanner, a camera, or a smartphone app to capture your drawings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Adobe Illustrator is one of the best programs to use for font creation because you need to work with vectors. Photoshop and InDesign store information in pixels, which means that any image has the opportunity to lose quality when scaled down or become pixelated when scaled up. Vectors, on the other hand, store information in a series of geometric shapes and points.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You can resize a vector to any size and it will never lose quality\u2014which is how fonts are built, too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In Illustrator, create a new document. You\u2019re going to need a ton of artboards, but they can be pretty small and you can use any square-shaped size. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Create one artboard for every character you will need to create. If you want to design just uppercase letters, you will only need 26 artboards. For both upper and lowercase, use 52. However, for a basic set of letters and numbers and common punctuation symbols, create 80 artboards. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
You\u2019ll need more if you want to create accented letters, special characters, or a full set of symbols. Most typefaces you find on Google Docs or Adobe Typekit have around 1,500 characters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Once you have your artboards and dimensions set, click \u201cok\u201d and create your document.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If you started with step two instead, you can then move to drawing rectangles and circles and using the Pathfinder tool from font creator software to create customized shapes for each letter. You can use the pen tool to draw complex letterforms, and you can copy and paste similar characters. (A lowercase d and b are often the same but flipped. An exclamation point can be your lowercase \u201ci,\u201d upside down.) <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Pay attention to letterforms that look similar\u2014you might want to differentiate your lowercase \u201cL\u201d and uppercase \u201cI\u201d to keep them from looking exactly the same; your zero and uppercase \u201cO\u201d as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A font is not just a set of rendered characters, it is a product that can be used in software.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
After the design-centered part of the work, the technical stage begins. It is this stage that determines how well the created font will work. For your first font, you can team up with a more experienced specialist to help with the technical part of the job.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Conventionally, this stage consists of three stages: mastering, kerning and TrueType hinting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mastering\u00a0is\u00a0the checking and editing of\u00a0contours, components, diacritics, and other elements of\u00a0a\u00a0font. At\u00a0this stage, OpenType features are created, and meta-information inside the font is\u00a0filled.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Kerning is\u00a0the process in\u00a0which the spacing between letters is\u00a0brought to\u00a0perfection. Simply put, at\u00a0this time, the instances in\u00a0which there is\u00a0too much white space between the letters are corrected. This stage occurs after the spacing work is\u00a0completed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Hinting is the visual markup of a font for the correct display of small sizes in various operating systems.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Once you’re done with your letterforms, go to File > Export for Screens. Make sure you have all of your artboards selected and choose \u201c.svg\u201d as the output file type. No need to resize the boards\u2014this file type retains the vector form, so they can be enlarged or shrunk later without losing quality. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Press \u201cexport artboards\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There are several different options for font creation software, so feel free to browse the web. Most programs will allow you to import your letterforms into a small file for each letter, customizing the spacing and placement of each.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At the end of the process, export your typeface design in one of the two common file types\u2014.ttf or .otf. Once this file is created, anyone can install the font you made on their computer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
On a Mac, double-click any typeface file to open Font Book. Simply click \u201cinstall.\u201d If you have Windows 10, you can do the same thing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There is\u00a0a\u00a0lot of\u00a0software for working with fonts; here are the ones type designers use often:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Glyphs and Fontlab stand out since most specialists use them. This is\u00a0due to\u00a0the convenience of\u00a0the interface, a\u00a0variety of\u00a0tools, and adaptability to\u00a0the user. We\u00a0recommend that you get acquainted with 2-3 different software, study their functionality, and understand which is\u00a0most comfortable to\u00a0work\u00a0in. Many provide a\u00a0trial period, so\u00a0it\u00a0won\u2019t require a\u00a0lot of\u00a0resources.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Later, you should choose one software and work in it, increasing your experience and improving your type design skills.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Making a\u00a0font from scratch for the first time can cause fear of\u00a0the unknown, as\u00a0it is a very difficult process and lots of beginners feel like they can\u2019t do\u00a0it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Dare to\u00a0create your first font, because in\u00a0the future you will remember it\u00a0with warm nostalgia. Make mistakes, experiment, create imperfect fonts, and make changes to\u00a0them\u00a0\u2014 over time, you will understand in\u00a0which direction to\u00a0continue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n