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I thought this was a genius idea. I wanted to have one for myself. So I've been trying to do a "journal printer" a few years now, using the Chinese mass produc

I thought this was a genius idea. I wanted to have one for myself. So I've been trying to do a "journal printer" a few years now, using the Chinese mass produced version of the diy pen plotter. The goal is simple, to "print" text to an arbitrary piece of paper inside a journal, with an arbitrary font and size. Perhaps a future stretch goal would be to ad basic line art printing skills. Why? So I can copy to permanent pages dozens of 2fa codes, car vins, whatever I want to capture in digital form and have it persisted in analog form in a known volume of works that is much less likely to be lost vs a single piece of paper. Couple that with dictation and a handwriting font and I can write an entire letter using on the right voice, and yet have the results come out looking like the entire letter was handwritten, or at least a neater handwriting than I can actually produce. One copy goes in the journal, one copy goes on a single sheet of paper to be mailed. So far I have found that it is incredibly difficult to make a pen plotter draw arbitrary text files or anything more than a single image with the basic software that came with the pain Potter I have. I'm not certain if buying a nicer pen plotter would make this process easier or not, but frankly I haven't seen anyone else trying to do when I'm trying to do, they seem to want to make random line fractals or arbitrary images, which is fine but just not my use case.

nerdponx 6y ago
This is fun and all but what's wrong with a regular inkjet printer and a 3-ring binder?
- Multicomp 6y ago
  Stuff written to a bound journal is more permanent and much more difficult to edit or alter without someone noticing. 3 ring binders are bulkier and can be raided for pages or have inserted pages. The goal of writing this is for 30 years later or so that the pages are still bound and readable. My grandmother gave me a 3 ring binder based cookbook recently. It had the first 4 pages falling out of it and all it had done since the 70s was sit on the shelf (was her backup cookbook). If that can happen to the cookbook with professional paper, my cheap no name paper certainly would do worse. From another angle if I could cheaply hardbound some printer paper with glue or some sort of press then that would also work for the first case present in my original post, if not the second one.
  - bondarchuk 6y ago
    Perhaps some sort of transfer printing could also work?
    - Multicomp 6y ago
      I'm not familiar with that, is that something that prints directly to a book?
      - banana_giraffe 6y ago
        Transfer printing is basically printing on an object then transferring that print to another. Historically it's how patterns get applied to pottery and the like, though in today's world the term is used to describe is how iron-on inkjet print paper works so people at home can "print" on t-shirts. Another option might be the hand-held ink jet printers. Though, the one's I've seen used are about printing the same thing a whole bunch (barcodes and other labels on boxes coming off a production line). They'd probably not have a great UI for single use messages. I've never looked, but given that they're a niche product, they're probably also very expensive.
IgorPartola 6y ago
I am surprised you are having so much trouble with the software. What you might want to look into is how 3D printers and hobby CNC machines are controlled. GRBL for example is a standard CNC firmware that can run on an Arduino Uno and can control a 2.5 axis machine like a plotter easily. Combine that with some cheap stepper motors, GT2 timing belts and pulleys, a couple of endstop switches, and mounted on a 2020 aluminum frame and you got yourself a plotter that can do pretty much anything. Depending on the plotter you already have it could be as simple as reflashing the firmware on its controller. Another option is Marlin which runs on slightly beefier ATMega Arduinos. This is what’s used in most 3D printers. And of course you could just buy a 3D printer and mount a pen on it. The beauty of this approach is that you use a slicer to plan all the moves of the plotter on a much more powerful computer and the plotter just gets the GCode instructions of where to move each axis. The software you want is something that can generate an SVG out of your handwriting font, then convert that GCode. Inkscape can do that and I suspect it might be able to be driven from the command line. You’d need to script up a way to feed it speech to text, and for it to fit stuff onto pages, but that just sounds like a good weekend. Check this out for inspiration: https://medium.com/@urish/how-to-turn-your-3d-printer-into-a-plotter-in-one-hour-d6fe14559f1a https://medium.com/@urish/how-to-turn-your-3d-printer-into-a... Edit: second Google link for “3D printer plotter” has a reference to a stand-alone Python script that can take in any path-only SVG and spit out GCode. https://www.instructables.com/id/Use-3D-Printer-As-a-Plottercutter/ https://www.instructables.com/id/Use-3D-Printer-As-a-Plotter...
- londons_explore 6y ago
  I think OP is saying "without writing my own code and scripts to tie a bunch of tools together, I can't seem to do what I want". Which is true. There is no software I can see today which you can open a text file, select a font, choose a page size, and click "Print" and have a plotter do the drawing, just like Microsoft Word can do with a regular printer. In a way this is because 3D printers and plotters decided to have their own custom tooling and protocols (GCode isn't really a standard, since it is so machine specific), unlike printers where a PDF file will print on any printer pretty much.
  - 6y ago
jasonhansel 6y ago
I've been interested in buying an ID card printer for the same purpose--it would be interesting to just record arbitrary information (again, like 2FA codes) onto blank ID cards. But even the used ones are expensive (and don't have Linux support).
- vageli 6y ago
  Seems like Magicard offers linux drivers [0], found a cheapish used printer on ebay too. [0]: https://support.magicard.com/solution/linux-driver/ https://support.magicard.com/solution/linux-driver/ [1]: https://www.ebay.com/itm/Magicard-Enduro-Color-ID-Badge-Card-Printer-w-Power-Supply/114260845873?epid=92186414&hash=item1a9a7a2531:g:J88AAOSwja5e1YCu https://www.ebay.com/itm/Magicard-Enduro-Color-ID-Badge-Card...
romwell 6y ago
I am working on software to do just that. Complete with handwritten font and basic line art capabilities. Here's how writing on a book looks like: https://photos.app.goo.gl/kMXsfEjgqM3hkckR6 https://photos.app.goo.gl/kMXsfEjgqM3hkckR6 Here's a video of it in action: https://youtube.com/watch?v=V45cj0-GQyQ https://youtube.com/watch?v=V45cj0-GQyQ Fountain pen calligraphy: https://photos.app.goo.gl/xuTMvpcujwzspKmFA https://photos.app.goo.gl/xuTMvpcujwzspKmFA This is a work-in-progress, so would love to hear more thoughts on this!
- Multicomp 6y ago
  So how do I send things to it? Text? Svg files? This looks amazing and is love to hear more.

nerdponx 6y ago

This is fun and all but what's wrong with a regular inkjet printer and a 3-ring binder?

Multicomp 6y ago
Stuff written to a bound journal is more permanent and much more difficult to edit or alter without someone noticing. 3 ring binders are bulkier and can be raided for pages or have inserted pages. The goal of writing this is for 30 years later or so that the pages are still bound and readable. My grandmother gave me a 3 ring binder based cookbook recently. It had the first 4 pages falling out of it and all it had done since the 70s was sit on the shelf (was her backup cookbook). If that can happen to the cookbook with professional paper, my cheap no name paper certainly would do worse. From another angle if I could cheaply hardbound some printer paper with glue or some sort of press then that would also work for the first case present in my original post, if not the second one.
- bondarchuk 6y ago
  Perhaps some sort of transfer printing could also work?
  - Multicomp 6y ago
    I'm not familiar with that, is that something that prints directly to a book?
    - banana_giraffe 6y ago
      Transfer printing is basically printing on an object then transferring that print to another. Historically it's how patterns get applied to pottery and the like, though in today's world the term is used to describe is how iron-on inkjet print paper works so people at home can "print" on t-shirts. Another option might be the hand-held ink jet printers. Though, the one's I've seen used are about printing the same thing a whole bunch (barcodes and other labels on boxes coming off a production line). They'd probably not have a great UI for single use messages. I've never looked, but given that they're a niche product, they're probably also very expensive.

IgorPartola 6y ago

I am surprised you are having so much trouble with the software. What you might want to look into is how 3D printers and hobby CNC machines are controlled. GRBL for example is a standard CNC firmware that can run on an Arduino Uno and can control a 2.5 axis machine like a plotter easily. Combine that with some cheap stepper motors, GT2 timing belts and pulleys, a couple of endstop switches, and mounted on a 2020 aluminum frame and you got yourself a plotter that can do pretty much anything. Depending on the plotter you already have it could be as simple as reflashing the firmware on its controller. Another option is Marlin which runs on slightly beefier ATMega Arduinos. This is what’s used in most 3D printers. And of course you could just buy a 3D printer and mount a pen on it. The beauty of this approach is that you use a slicer to plan all the moves of the plotter on a much more powerful computer and the plotter just gets the GCode instructions of where to move each axis. The software you want is something that can generate an SVG out of your handwriting font, then convert that GCode. Inkscape can do that and I suspect it might be able to be driven from the command line. You’d need to script up a way to feed it speech to text, and for it to fit stuff onto pages, but that just sounds like a good weekend. Check this out for inspiration: https://medium.com/@urish/how-to-turn-your-3d-printer-into-a-plotter-in-one-hour-d6fe14559f1a https://medium.com/@urish/how-to-turn-your-3d-printer-into-a... Edit: second Google link for “3D printer plotter” has a reference to a stand-alone Python script that can take in any path-only SVG and spit out GCode. https://www.instructables.com/id/Use-3D-Printer-As-a-Plottercutter/ https://www.instructables.com/id/Use-3D-Printer-As-a-Plotter...

londons_explore 6y ago
I think OP is saying "without writing my own code and scripts to tie a bunch of tools together, I can't seem to do what I want". Which is true. There is no software I can see today which you can open a text file, select a font, choose a page size, and click "Print" and have a plotter do the drawing, just like Microsoft Word can do with a regular printer. In a way this is because 3D printers and plotters decided to have their own custom tooling and protocols (GCode isn't really a standard, since it is so machine specific), unlike printers where a PDF file will print on any printer pretty much.
- 6y ago

jasonhansel 6y ago

I've been interested in buying an ID card printer for the same purpose--it would be interesting to just record arbitrary information (again, like 2FA codes) onto blank ID cards. But even the used ones are expensive (and don't have Linux support).

vageli 6y ago
Seems like Magicard offers linux drivers [0], found a cheapish used printer on ebay too. [0]: https://support.magicard.com/solution/linux-driver/ https://support.magicard.com/solution/linux-driver/ [1]: https://www.ebay.com/itm/Magicard-Enduro-Color-ID-Badge-Card-Printer-w-Power-Supply/114260845873?epid=92186414&hash=item1a9a7a2531:g:J88AAOSwja5e1YCu https://www.ebay.com/itm/Magicard-Enduro-Color-ID-Badge-Card...

romwell 6y ago

I am working on software to do just that. Complete with handwritten font and basic line art capabilities. Here's how writing on a book looks like: https://photos.app.goo.gl/kMXsfEjgqM3hkckR6 https://photos.app.goo.gl/kMXsfEjgqM3hkckR6 Here's a video of it in action: https://youtube.com/watch?v=V45cj0-GQyQ https://youtube.com/watch?v=V45cj0-GQyQ Fountain pen calligraphy: https://photos.app.goo.gl/xuTMvpcujwzspKmFA https://photos.app.goo.gl/xuTMvpcujwzspKmFA This is a work-in-progress, so would love to hear more thoughts on this!

Multicomp 6y ago
So how do I send things to it? Text? Svg files? This looks amazing and is love to hear more.