We are updating a project which has used Windows wglUseFontOutLines to generate a 3D font. I need a more modern way of managing a 3D font and we don’t want to use Textures.
As a test I have captured the outputs of the glCallLists to a transformation buffer for each character in the generated font file and converted it to a set of triangles. I can the store the triangle data and reuse to build a string from the base triangle set. There is a bit of manipulation needed to get the characters right from the data (there is a rotation that each character has and the forward/backward facing of each triangle needs to be managed). Once done the font is a very nice smooth edged font.
My question is… Is there any legal issue in using this generated font from a Microsoft True Type font??
Well, this isn’t a legal forum and I’m not a lawyer, but …
The set of triangles is a derivative work of the original font, so copyright belongs the creator of that font. You can’t distribute that data without permission from the font’s creator (or possibly a licensee). Even storing it on disk on the system where it was generated isn’t necessarily allowed.
Thanks.
If the font used to generate the data were on another machine (licenced) now using the “generated” data then you are just side stepping the wglUseFontOutline to generate characters which could be generated using the licenced font/wglUseFontOutline/glCallList combination.
Also, if a font glyph (bitmap) is created from a font and then reused isn’t it also a sort of derived data??
Is this the reason why now one talks about this type of font management? I think I need a lawyer.