Re: [Freetype] metafont fonts for screen display

[Tom Kacvinsky]

> 
> > I realize that there's a set of postscript type 1 versions of
> > computer modern available.  Are they regarded as being "as good as"
> > the original metafont version(s)?
> 
> Well, the conversion has been done very carefully, and I think that
> the results can't be improved further.  It now depends on the quality
> of the Type 1 rasterizer how well glyphs are displayed at small sizes,
> since the conversion MF->Type 1 looses information.
> 

Oh, there are some gotchas.  You won't see them unless using the fonts
at a large point size.  One reasons for this is artefacts from tracing
high resolution GF fonts (that is what Projective Solutions did for
Bluesky Research/Y&Y).  The problem boils down to the fact that the CM
fonts are made by stroking elliptical pens along paths.  Some weirds
things happen where such stroked paths intersect.  Tracing such outlines
results in these oddities making it into the Bezier curves.

And, finding the envelopes of such stroked paths is hard, can result in 
poor approximations, and leaves one with the onerous task of removing
the overlap of such paths.  Ask Taco Hoekwater and Richard Kinch about
this sometime, Werner.  You might catch up with Taco at the next EuroTeX
or BachoTeX.  Bugoslaw Jackowski would also have some interesting things to 
say, as would Adam Twardoch (Polski Antiqua is one such font that was
done with MF -> Type 1 conversion).