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I always had the opposite experience with font rendering. I always have to disable all hinting and turn on subpixel rendering to get results I like, since I pre

I always had the opposite experience with font rendering. I always have to disable all hinting and turn on subpixel rendering to get results I like, since I prefer thicker glyphs that have more consistent forms, kerning and spacing at all sizes, even in print (ala Mac OS X) rather than having glyphs that have been forced into pixel boundaries and smushed closer together at smaller sizes for maximum glyph readability (ala Windows). To me, the spacing and kerning of the fonts matter much more than the clarity of the individual glyphs. Seeing letters smashed together or with wide gaps between letters drives me insane...

windsurfer 15y ago
May I ask how subpixel smoothing is not a form of hinting?
- deleted 15y ago
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- jodoherty 15y ago
  How do you see it as a form of hinting unless we have different definitions of what hinting is? As I would define it, hinting is the modification of the appearance of the font at smaller sizes, usually away from the actual outline design of the font and the original spacing, in order to make it fit into pixel boundaries for the purpose of clarity and readability. Used with subpixel rendering, you can get sharp, punchy text that is even more readable, but I wouldn't consider subpixel rendering by itself to be hinting. If anything, unhinted subpixel rendering (where any auto-hinting has been disabled and all font hints are ignored) allows the font to look more like the intended outline design in spite of being rendered at a small size on a low resolution screen by boosting the horizontal resolution and interpolating the values between points where the outline crosses partial pixel boundaries. That is, it allows all the glyph metrics to remain intact at smaller sizes while improving readability, whereas the very notion of hinting implies that those properties have been intentionally modified for the purpose of readability.

windsurfer 15y ago

May I ask how subpixel smoothing is not a form of hinting?

deleted 15y ago
[deleted]
jodoherty 15y ago
How do you see it as a form of hinting unless we have different definitions of what hinting is? As I would define it, hinting is the modification of the appearance of the font at smaller sizes, usually away from the actual outline design of the font and the original spacing, in order to make it fit into pixel boundaries for the purpose of clarity and readability. Used with subpixel rendering, you can get sharp, punchy text that is even more readable, but I wouldn't consider subpixel rendering by itself to be hinting. If anything, unhinted subpixel rendering (where any auto-hinting has been disabled and all font hints are ignored) allows the font to look more like the intended outline design in spite of being rendered at a small size on a low resolution screen by boosting the horizontal resolution and interpolating the values between points where the outline crosses partial pixel boundaries. That is, it allows all the glyph metrics to remain intact at smaller sizes while improving readability, whereas the very notion of hinting implies that those properties have been intentionally modified for the purpose of readability.