Building a local handwriting font workshop with editable glyphs

Description and use

Creating a local handwriting font subset with per‑glyph editing using GlyphSprout, covering scanning, rectification, tracing, tuning, and export to TTF/WOFF2.

Problem

Creating a small, editable subset of a handwritten font from scanned pages

Outcome

A 3,284‑byte TTF containing six letters was produced from public domain NIST samples, verified with Fontconfig, LibreOffice, and Poppler

Workflow

• 1. Scan an A4 page as a flat PNG or JPEG
• 2. Assign page number and confirm visible ID
• 3. Place four registration corners by hand
• 4. GlyphSprout rectifies preview and confirms page
• 5. Tracing thresholds each cell, removes specks, and follows ink contours
• 6. Tune threshold, speck filtering, crop, scale, offsets, and spacing per glyph
• 7. Draw or erase corrections if scan is unsuitable
• 8. Load live specimen with generated font
• 9. Export finished project as TTF or WOFF2, or export a completed subset if incomplete
• 10. Download project JSON for backup

Evidence

I built GlyphSprout for projects that need a small set of personal characters. It turns a handwritten page into a font subset that I can inspect and adjust one glyph at a time.

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The workflow begins with an A4 template. Each page has 35 cells, and a project can use up to 512 supported BMP characters across 15 pages.

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I assign the page, confirm its visible ID, and place four registration corners by hand. GlyphSprout shows a rectified preview and asks me to confirm the page before worker processing starts.

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The tracing step thresholds each cell and removes small connected specks. It follows the black ink as independent contours, so counters and detached dots remain part of the glyph.

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I can also draw and erase when a scan is not the right input.

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The live specimen loads the generated font rather than a simulated rendering.

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Finished projects export as TTF or WOFF2. If some selected characters are incomplete, I must choose an explicitly labeled completed subset export.

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Paper Bloom is the first visit example. It contains six real letter crops from public domain NIST SD19 form f1002_33. The TTF measures 3,284 bytes.

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I checked its family and character map with Fontconfig, used it in LibreOffice, and confirmed the PDF text and embedded font with Poppler.

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Project data stays in browser storage. IndexedDB keeps current and previous recovery snapshots and warns about a write from another tab.

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I still recommend downloading the project JSON because browser storage can be cleared.

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