In ftoutln.c there is a function called FT_Outline_Embolden(). This is used to create artificial emboldening, and is used when fontconfig requests emboldening for fonts that don't have a bold face available. Near the end of this function are these two lines, which actually perform the emboldening, in the x and y directions:

outline->points[n].x = v_cur.x + strength + in.x;
outline->points[n].y = v_cur.y + strength + in.y;

Emboldening in the y direction can happen in fractions of a pixel, and this ends up being only in the "up" direction. The result of this is a blurry fringe on the tops of letters. While this may be technically correct, I'm wondering if *anyone* actually thinks this looks nice. In my patches, I disable the y direction completely, and the aesthetic improvements are dramatic, in my opinion. Is this something that can be done in Freetype instead? Or perhaps can the function be split into two?

See this link for a comparison. The left side is with y-emboldening. The right is without y-emboldening.
http://www.infinality.net/files/y-emboldening.png


Thanks,
Erik



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