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Home AI News Create Custom Fonts: A FontLab Studio Workflow Tutorial

Create Custom Fonts: A FontLab Studio Workflow Tutorial

Updated on Apr 25,2025

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Creating your own fonts allows you to infuse your projects with a unique sense of style and personality. While many software options exist for font design, FontLab Studio provides a comprehensive set of tools and features for professional-grade typography creation. This tutorial will guide you through a font creation workflow using FontLab Studio, covering crucial steps like letter design, preparing your SVG files, baseline adjustments, and kerning. Learn how to make fonts that truly stand out!

Key Points

Design all letters using vector-based software like Adobe Illustrator, Procreate, or FontLab.

Set up artboards for each letter with consistent dimensions (e.g., 1000x1000 px).

Export letters as SVG files, ensuring 'Use Artboards' is selected.

Rename SVG files to match glyph names in FontLab Studio.

Import SVG files into FontLab and adjust character positions for baseline alignment.

Utilize FontLab's metrics and kerning tools for optimal spacing and readability.

Export the final font in OTF format.

Designing Your Letters

Choosing Your Design Software

The first step in creating a custom Font is designing each letter, number, and symbol. Fortunately, there are multiple programs that can be useful. You could use Adobe Illustrator, Procreate, or even FontLab Studio. The program that you pick is up to you, depending on which program you are more familiar with or simply prefer.

Adobe Illustrator, a popular choice in the industry, is favored for its precision and vector-based tools. This ensures your letters remain crisp and scalable, regardless of size. Procreate, on the other HAND, provides a more intuitive and hands-on approach, ideal if you enjoy sketching and refining your designs directly on a tablet. Alternatively, FontLab Studio also has tools to create your letters inside the software itself, eliminating the need to use any other program. All of the programs can be used to get the job done, so experiment and find the best option for you.

Setting Up Artboards for Each Character

Proper artboard setup is essential for consistent letter sizing and proportions across the font. In this Tutorial, we'll create artboards for each letter, with dimensions of 1000x1000 pixels. Ensure consistent Dimensions for each artboard.

Within your design software, create individual artboards (or canvases) for every character you plan to include in your font – uppercase and lowercase letters, numbers, punctuation, and any special symbols. The size you choose will depend on the desired resolution of your final font, but a standard size like 1000x1000 pixels provides ample space for detailed design. A GRID setup for designing the individual letters will also be needed. This allows for consistency and will make the process easier when importing the letters into FontLab Studio later.

Arranging and Scaling Individual Artboards

After setting up the grid and artboards, arrange the characters to match a keyboard layout. It can be difficult to determine what each artboard represents if the artboards aren’t labeled and ordered appropriately. Scaling each letter with the grid can be done in your program of choice and will help ensure that the letters work well together when imported into FontLab Studio later. Properly scaling the letters and artboards will make font creation easier in the later stages.

Preparing and Importing SVG Files

Exporting Your Letters as SVGs

The next step is exporting the character designs you have made for your font into SVG files that will be used with FontLab Studio.

Once your letters are designed and properly sized on their respective artboards, export each one as an SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics) file. When exporting, be absolutely certain that you select the 'Use Artboards' option.

This ensures that each letter is exported individually, cropped to the bounds of its artboard. This step is absolutely crucial for proper font creation in FontLab Studio. The resulting individual svg files will be named based on their artboard, so be sure to name each artboard with the appropriate character designation. This is one of the most important steps in the SVG exporting process, so take your time and be careful.

Renaming SVG Files for FontLab Studio

Naming your SVG files is a very important aspect of the SVG export process. The names that you choose are what will determine the characters that your letters represent when you import them into FontLab Studio. This means that when you name your SVG files, you must ensure that the names match the glyph names recognized by FontLab Studio. This may sound confusing, but all you need to do is ensure you are using the correct names. A list of these glyph names can be found in FontLab Studio.

Make sure each uppercase letter is named correctly, each lowercase letter is named correctly, each number is named correctly, and each special character is named correctly.

Importing SVG Files Into FontLab Studio

After renaming the SVG files, it's time to import them into FontLab Studio. Once you launch the program and make a new font, you will be presented with a window containing spaces for your letters. All you need to do now is drag and drop the SVG files you previously created into their appropriate spaces. Once they are in the program, there are still a few adjustments you must make, so make sure you follow the next steps closely.

Finalizing the Font in FontLab Studio

Adjusting the Baseline

After importing your characters, you must adjust the baseline. The baseline is the imaginary line upon which most letters rest. Some programs do not automatically set it, so you must do so yourself to make the font work correctly. To do this:

  1. Double-click a letter to open it.

  2. In the top-left, select ‘Tool’.

  3. Then, select ‘Commands and Shortcuts’.

  4. A window will pop up that allows you to search for commands. In this window, type ‘make SVG editable’ and click ‘Go’ when it appears.

  5. After doing this, select ‘window’ in the top-left. Then, go to ‘panels’ and select ‘elements’ and ‘transform panel’.

  6. When the transform panel appears, you will have to check the Y coordination in the element panel.

  7. Then, move the character to meet the baseline to that number. The specific number to use depends on the character set you are using.

  8. After this, go back to the main workspace. Then, select all the characters by holding down shift and selecting the glyphs (except for the character you already moved). In the transform panel, put -160 in the Y box and click apply. This will move all the letters to the same place as the first character, saving you from having to do them one by one.

Adjusting Metrics and Kerning

Metrics and kerning are important aspects of your font’s design because they greatly affect readability and visual appeal. To accomplish this, you will need to adjust the spacing between characters. The space between the characters should be visually pleasing and balanced. To do this:

  1. Select all the characters again.
  2. Then, select ‘edit metrics’.
  3. Click on each character and then hit the diamond button for the automatic adjustment of tracking. This will help space the characters appropriately.
  4. After this, select ‘window’, and then select ‘new kerning tab’. This opens the kerning tab, allowing you to see the font in action.
  5. After this, select ‘window’ again, then ‘panels’ and then find ‘pairs and phrases’. This will allow you to select what text is shown so that you can better preview your font.

Finally, in the bottom of the ‘pairs and phrases panel’ there are options of kerning pairs or Texts to select. You can adjust the distances individually or adjust all the pairs with the same letter simultaneously to make your letter easier to read.

Exporting Your Font

Once you have finalized all the steps for your font creation, you can export your font for use. To do this:

  1. Select ‘file’ and then ‘export font as’.
  2. Select ‘OTF’ (OpenType Font) for broad compatibility, and choose Where To save the exported file. Then, click ‘export button’. hree. Congratulations! Your custom font is now ready to be used in various design applications.

FAQ

What is FontLab Studio?
FontLab Studio is a professional font editor used for designing, creating, and modifying typefaces. It provides a comprehensive set of tools for drawing, spacing, kerning, and hinting fonts, making it a popular choice among typographers and font designers. With FontLab Studio, users can create fonts from scratch, refine existing typefaces, and generate font files in various formats.
What are the benefits of using vector-based software for designing letters?
Using vector-based software ensures that the letters remain crisp and scalable regardless of size, which is crucial for maintaining legibility across different applications and media. Vector graphics are defined by mathematical equations, allowing them to be resized without losing quality or becoming pixelated.
Why is the baseline so important for fonts?
The baseline is the imaginary line upon which most letters sit, providing a consistent alignment reference for text. Proper baseline alignment ensures that the text appears balanced and uniform, greatly enhancing readability and aesthetic appeal. Adjusting the baseline ensures your font works with other fonts on a computer and is therefore very important.
What does kerning achieve in typography?
Kerning involves adjusting the spacing between individual pairs of letters to achieve a visually harmonious and balanced text appearance. By fine-tuning the kerning, designers can correct uneven letter spacing, improving overall legibility and creating a polished, professional look. Adjusting kerning can turn a nice-looking font into a professional font, so it's important to consider when font-making.

Related Questions

What other software can I use to create fonts?
While FontLab Studio is a powerful option, other software choices include Adobe Illustrator, Procreate, Glyphs, RoboFont, and Birdfont, each offering unique features and interfaces to suit different design preferences and skill levels. Adobe Illustrator is useful as an additional program to use with FontLab Studio, offering precision and vector-based tools. Procreate, on the other hand, provides a more intuitive and hands-on approach, ideal if you enjoy sketching and refining your designs directly on a tablet.
How can I improve the legibility of my font?
Improving font legibility involves careful attention to letter spacing, stroke thickness, x-height (the height of lowercase letters), and overall design consistency. Ensure that the counters (the enclosed spaces within letters) are sufficiently open, adjust the kerning to eliminate any awkward gaps between letter pairs, and test the font at various sizes to identify and address any legibility issues. When making and scaling the letters, make sure the lines you draw are thick enough to see at all scales. Also, remember to properly adjust kerning so that letters and words are easy to read. All of these tips will help you make a more legible font.
What file formats are best for exporting fonts?
Common font file formats include OTF (OpenType Font) and TTF (TrueType Font), both widely supported across different operating systems and design software. OTF offers advanced typographic features and is generally preferred for professional use, while TTF remains a reliable option with broad compatibility. OTF also is more compact and can contain both vector and bitmap data. For these reasons, it's generally the better option for designing fonts.
How do I test my custom font effectively?
Testing your font involves using it in various real-world scenarios, such as in different design applications, at multiple sizes, and with diverse text layouts. By evaluating the font's performance across different contexts, you can identify any issues related to legibility, spacing, or rendering and refine your design accordingly. To make your evaluation process easier, create test cases using common sentence structures, phrases, and letters.
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