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Sunday, May 4, 2014

Too Much Fun

I indicated that I will be updating this blog with posts showing off my own font creations that I have made.  I do love to blog, but as I have so little spare time, I find that I prefer to spend it designing logos, menus, websites and fonts.

I now have a long list of fonts that I am working on.  Once in a while, if truly inspired with a simple design, I can create a simple, basic font with a pretty full character set in just a day.  But then, I have to document it. I write about how I made the font, what may have inspired it, any little challenges on the way.  I then add an appropriate license, trying to get the wording right right so that it is clear and easily understood.  I also make a couple of graphics.  One with the full character set, one just as a preview of what the font is capable of doing.  After a few rewrites, and sometimes a few font edits after checking it out in Photoshop, I'm done, but packaging-up a font really adds a whole 'nother day to the process.  Then I can upload it to my Font-Journal.

Once it is available at Font-Journal, I have to check it out and make sure it displays, that at least most of the characters in the preview page actually display.  Then, I have to edit it and add a couple of links to the font info page.  Sometimes I can approve it before I edit its information, but usually I wait until everything looks good and then go ahead and approve it in my administration control panel so that everyone else can see it.

Supposedly, I should then announce it in a few places the next day (in a couple of Twitter feeds, other social networks  like Facebook, BeHance, LinkedIn, WordPress, Blogger) and then I am done for the moment.

The thing is that I would rather be creating stuff than promoting it.  So I'm not marketing my stuff much, because I have more fun creating it.

I also have lots of other stuff going on, mind you.  Right now I am trying to recover my wife's laptop, and trying to get my son to get his homework done.  So there are always little things keeping me from what I ant to do, what I should be doing.

There is the problem that not many believe in Me the way I do.  Oh well.

But, rather than have you all wait for a post about each font that I have made in the past year, I'll just give you the link to the fonts I have already uploaded to Font-Journal

http://www.font-journal.com/search.php?d=1&q=Doug+Peters

Don't get me wrong, I will get around to posting little preview articles about most of my decent fonts, anyway.  But I am have way too much fun creating these fonts at the moment.  And I am actually excited to get these out and available to the public.

My fonts aren't usually met with the warmest receptions, as I like some obviously quirky styles.  But hey, they are freeware TTF PC fonts.  Although the license varies from font to font, I generally try to keep them free for personal, public or commercial use.

With some fonts I allow others to make their own derivatives, and yet with some fonts I want to be the exclusive developer.  With some fonts I allow redistribution.  With other fonts my Font-Journal will be the exclusive font archive distribution center.

So, please read the associated ReadMe.txt and License.txt included with each font archive.  I will protect my  intellectual property and all my rights to it (as that's all an artist ever has).  After all, I want to keep creating more art, and for my art to spread and influence the world as it has Me.  I sure as heck don't want to spend my time in the courts (but I will if I have to).

So, just pay attention to the license and we will both be happier, ok?  ;)

Thanks!  (Back to having too muck fun!...) -Doug

Thursday, April 17, 2014

Struck Freeware TTF Font

Struck is a freeware TrueType font for the PC I did.  The font Struck is Copyright 2013 Douglas Peters.


You are allowed to use the Struck font as-is for free for personal, professional and commercial use.  However, you may not modify, append or change the font other than porting the font over to another platform, such as the Macintosh.  No further distribution, or redistribution is allowed, as it is available officially from the author at:
http://www.font-journal.com/fonts/13104/struck.php

The only other online archive is intended for development purposes.

Struck was the second font that I had ever created.

This is a black sans serif minimalistic block font with a couple of repeating themes in the ends and such. I consider this freeware, but maintain my copyright and only allow distribution through FontStruct and my own journaled catalog of freeware fonts (@ font-journal.com).

Struck was created on Monday, the 22nd of July, 2013.

August 2-3, 2013:
Added the trade/service marks, TEL symbol, a few more currency signs and revamped many of the characters. The old K was cute, but I decided to opt with a style that would allow more consistent spacing.  I did make certain letters a bit more whimsical in an effort to keep that feeling.

I think this version has a more complete character set, but it is still kept basic to allow for fast downloads and low memory usage.  But if you are interested in seeing any particular character, or would like to see one corrected, get  a hold of me.  ;)

August 4th, 2013:
That small s was bothering Me all night at work.  It was the one thing I didn't get done right.  Taken care of, today.

Below is a simple example of the Struck character set:



The replacement characters exist as my logos (the joined DP, presented in the style of the font).

I hope it can be of use to some of you.  And again, I will consider requests for special characters.

My website:
http://www.Doug-Peters.com

My fonts portfolio:
http://www.font-journal.com/search.php?q=Doug+Peters

Contact me:
http://www.doug-peters.com/contact/
http://www.font-journal.com/contact.php

My business website (I sell the most competitively priced domains and hosting/servers on the net):
http://www.DomainHostmaster.com

Wednesday, April 16, 2014

Experimentation...

Over the past few years, things have become quite a challenge for me.  Back in 2008, the economy tanked and many stopped investing in new media marketing.  Most of those that did are doing well, now.  Everybody else is running to catch-up as the economy shifts back into high gear, again.

There had been less demand for my website design services and I took advantage of that to allow myself the ability to develop some of my own websites.  I even took a part time job to help with expenses and stay out of trouble.  But I feel that that decision has cost me a great deal.

Nevertheless, a couple of years ago I got hurt at my part time job.  That had me laying up for over a year and a half, tired and in pain.  I couldn't get much done, because I was still unloading trucks, still coming home tired, and on top of being so tired, I was in more and more pain.

After a year and a half, I finally received the surgery I needed and my hip is a lot better, now.  But I still experience pain (though now I have pain meds) and the clicking noise hasn't completely gone away.

This situation has made it ever increasingly hard to sit at a computer for long periods at a time, and in order to do some things that I enjoyed, like continuing to design, I have been experimenting with designing fonts.  For the most part, I find it a lot of fun, though it always seems that no one notices my work, as I am just getting started with this and have a lot to learn.

Right now I have been just trying to create a few unique fonts with my own take that might be useful for others.  I have also been checking out other people's fonts and changing them up, or adding a few characters that I think were needed.  But I am always playing with fonts that allow me to create derivatives of their their work and I always give the original artists credit.

But I have been playing and experimenting around with fonts for quite some time now.  And although I have made my works available to the public in one form or another (freeware or shareware), I haven't been promoting them very much.  So how would anyone know about them anyway, right?

So now I'm going to document my experimentation, and I'll probably start at near the beginning.  I probably won't post the few first fonts that I have done, as they were not noteworthy.  But I find that my hip is not doing as well as I thought it was, all of my old websites have been destroyed, and it is hard for me to stay at my computer for extended  lengths of time.  So working on fonts a little here and there is easy, where designing search optimized websites complete with both mobile and web oriented interfaces on a Content Manangement System such as MODx, PLD, WordPress or Typo3 takes great concentration and a lot of time to get them just right.

So, that's what I will be posting about for the next few days, documenting my successes in font making.  I hope someone will find some use out of what I have done.