
Show HN: Create font in your own handwriting style - swechha1605
https://copymonkey.xyz/
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asdfman123
I did this in high school (albeit in a much simpler way) by writing every
letter on the keyboard on a sheet of paper, scanning it, and using a free
program to make a font out of each character.

I calibrated my MS Word settings so that I could print directly onto a sheet
of notebook paper, saving me from having to hand-write a bunch of drafts in
English class.

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debaserab2
How could your teachers not notice that you were clearly using printer ink
instead of pen ink or graphite? The materials are pretty easily
distinguishable in how they dry and smear.

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asdfman123
Either they were too busy shuffling through other papers to care, or they
didn't care because I was their best student.

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imglorp
Screw my handwriting. Go straight to EWD font and skip the intermediate steps.
[https://joshldavis.com/2013/05/20/the-path-to-dijkstras-
hand...](https://joshldavis.com/2013/05/20/the-path-to-dijkstras-handwriting/)

~~~
mcbuilder
It's a bit ironic linking to that font in a blog post based on the topic of
how improving your handwriting can be done through time and practice.

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zmix
Doesn't make sense. My handwriting looks completely different when done with a
pen on paper, as it is, when done with the mouse on the screen.

This app needs an upload functionality, where I can upload scans of my
handwriting.

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salutonmundo
Haven't tried it yet, but I assume one can get better results using a drawing
tablet.

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katzgrau
Used the pen with my galaxy note and the results aren't bad, but barely
legible for the most part

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jshawl
I absolutely love this idea, but was surprised to see a digital input for
handwriting style. I was expecting something along the lines of "take an image
of your handwriting and upload it".

Where does the machine learning fit in? First guess is connection between
letters but ill have to wait till I'm not at a keyboard to test this out.

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noteness
You take picture of your handwriting and upload it, for this site:
[https://www.calligraphr.com/](https://www.calligraphr.com/)

They used to be myscriptfont.com and didn't have those premium features
though. Don't know if it is better or worse.

~~~
prawn
I've used this to create a font for an app and it works well, given the effort
it asks of you (not much!). It gives you a grid to print and then scrawl each
letter. I brought the grid into my iPad, wrote over the top with an Apple
Pencil, and then uploaded that. Here's what the grid with my handwriting looks
like:

[https://imgur.com/a/urulzby](https://imgur.com/a/urulzby)

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cerberusss
I found it actually quite hard to write exactly between the lines. I used an
iPad, like you. When I upload the resulting PDF, it doesn't look great because
the letters not on the same horizontal line. I tried to correct them and ran
the procedure a second time, but it's going to take, in my estimation, at
least an hour to get them just right. Not much for such a great tool, though.

But in general, I find it a bit hard to neatly write on the iPad. It doesn't
matter much, I just use it to keep track of notes while programming and
designing software. And I can read it myself just fine.

I think it's because the Pencil (version 1) feels more slippery than pen/paper
while writing.

The advantage of writing on the iPad though: no more paper.

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ghostbrainalpha
I work in a Museum, and I would LOVE to be able to upload the letters of
J.F.K. or Abraham Lincoln to create a fonts based on historic personages.

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baud147258
My handwriting is illegible (except by me for two weeks at most), I don't want
to make a font that's just as impossible to read.

~~~
Diederich
Could it be used as a source of entropy for cryptographic purposes?

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JoshTriplett
I've often described my "signature" as "more of a one-time pad than a
signature".

I honestly find it shocking that anything in the modern world still considers
a signature as any form of authentication whatsoever. (Nobody _actually_
compares the signatures, and yet somehow people see signing as meaningful.)

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penagwin
When you sign for a credit card it's so the company can show you the signature
if you think it might be fraud (forgot but recognize your signature)

They're also useful for acknowledgements in paper work.

They aren't for authenticating that you're you, they're just extra
information.

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yboris
Awesome! Direct GitHub link: [https://github.com/swechhachoudhary/Handwriting-
synthesis](https://github.com/swechhachoudhary/Handwriting-synthesis)

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sbdmmg
A bit off-topic...is there any project to create one's own OCR engine
customized to one's own handwriting?

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sahaskatta
I've tried Microsoft Font Maker in the past to create my own font with a
Surface Pro. [https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/microsoft-font-
maker/9n920...](https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/microsoft-font-
maker/9n9209f8s3vc)

Curious to see if this one works better!

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errantspark
Unsurprisingly much like all ML things this (presumably) only works well if
you're close to the training set. Even writing out pangrams the generated text
only looks a little like my handwriting.

I specifically wrote double-decker As and Gs yet the the generated data has
single story ones.

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jamestimmins
This is an awesome idea and a great learning project! It could be a cool tool
for illustrating how different pieces of machine learning work together.

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yellowapple
I noticed that it seemed to entirely ignore that I use small caps instead of
lowercase in my (non-cursive) handwriting. Pretty neat, though.

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RandomNick
Why would I want a font that nobody but me can read?

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andai
You just gave me an idea.. a font that starts out normal, but every day is
updated to be slightly more deformed, until nobody but me can read it.

~~~
yellowapple
Sounds like my signature in a nutshell. Started out quite legible back in,
what, middle school? Now it's basically a scribble.

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soyyo
This reminds me that I can't recall the last time I wrote something by hand.

I don't even have a pen now on my desk.

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clord
Would like a tool like this that finds ligatures too. I combine certain
letters when writing.

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d--b
The font that was generated is much nicer than mine. In fact it’s _very_
different

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jonbronson
I wonder what impact the commoditization of this will have on forgies and
fraud.

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kraftman
Doesn't seem to work with a pen input unfortunately.

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bossnayamoss
This is pretty dope

