Typography books

Very often people send me emails asking about fonts and typography. Many times they have simple questions more related to font styles and usages, but I don't have time to answer everybody.

So I decided to give here a more general tip: I will suggest the best introductory books about typography I have read so far. Usually they focus on a design point of view.

Here is the book list in random order:

* The Complete Manual of Typography - James Felici;
* The Elements of Typographic Style - Robert Bringhurst;
* Thinking with Type: A Critical Guide for Designers, Writers, Editors, & Students (Design Briefs) - Ellen Lupton;
* Designing with Type: The Essential Guide to Typography - James Craig, William Bevington, Irene Korol Scala;

Hope you enjoy.

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3D text effects

Now Picture to People has a tool to draw "true" 3D texts. The effects you get using this renderer are really created using three-dimensional modeling and rendering algorithms and not 2D tricks.

This new feature has some rendering styles and several 3D models to choose from. It is really easy to use and prevents you from dealing with angles, axis, coordinates and other Math concepts you don't want to care about.

Below I show you two examples about what you can get there:

Get your own 3D texts using this 3D text effects tool.

I have been developing complex Computer Graphics tools for a long time. I'm really very exhausted. I need some time to rest.

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New text effects

I have just released 12 new text effects in Picture to People project.

There are new features for:
- metallic text effects;
- silver text effects;
- wood text effects.

The new Picture to People text renderer already has more than 150 easy to use, professional text effects. You can use all of them starting from this text generator catalog.

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Turning photos into text

The new Picture to People tool doesn't work only for simple images. You can even draw your favorite photos with text.

Usually it's a good idea use high contrast pictures. If you need, pre-process your photos before applying the effect. The pre-processing can be made using the Picture to People image editor.

Below I show an example about what the Typographic Photo effect can make.

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Drawing images using text

Since I started releasing Picture to People tools online, people have been asking for a tool to draw pictures with text.

I have finally created this renderer and it's already online. It tries to keep the original image information as much as possible, and there is a configuration parameter to inform if you want prioritize the input image contours or the font rendering.

There are many font faces to choose from and you can draw even complex photos. It's a good idea to use good contrast input images.

Below I show an example of an input image and its drawing made of text.

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A tool to mix photos and typography

I stopped developing my light library for a while.

I have seen some artworks a couple days ago that inspired me to create a new cool effect. This new one involves photos and typography too.

I'm developing it nowadays and I'm really excited about that. I'm sure this new Picture to People tool will be useful for a lot of people in many situations.

As the programming evolves, I will show here some results and examples.

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Turning photos into light drawings

Have you ever tried the new Picture to People tool? Now you can transform your photos into nice drawings made of light.

This tool have some good configuration level. I have been using that to make neon effects as well.

Below I show you an example concerning what I'm talking about. You can use this tool by yourself in this light effects page of Picture to People site.

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Drawing lights 2

As promised, here I show some more lights I could already draw.

There are many variables to regard when drawing a good light source and I'm trying to get a versatile software here. It's not an easy subject, is it?

I'm doing a preliminary development yet, but I'm happy I could already show some screenshots.

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Drawing lights

I'm not posting very often. I have been spending a lot of time developing a new library for Picture to People project.

I'm trying to create a library focused on drawing lights. I would like this library could be generic and powerful enough to open new possibilities concerning effects.

In some preliminary tests, I was able to generate some light styles. I show some of them here and I will show the other ones in a next post.

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Talking about Text Effects

Since I released the new Picture to People Text Generator, people have been asking a lot about text effects.

Now I have a place to talk specially about artistic texts. There I will show, discuss, give examples, tips e suggestions, always concerning easy and smart ways to get great text results. This way, I can let this blog to go back to its origins: post mainly about my new Computer Graphics developments.

By now, this new text effects corner is only showing some examples about what you can have from the new Text Generator with no design skills. It's just to prepare your mood. Soon I will post there many tips and ideas to help you getting awesome texts with very few effort.

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