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Tech Help: When SVG files show up as HTML files on your Windows 10 computer!

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Tech help: what to do when SVG files show up as HTML files in Windows

  Updated for 2020!  This post is an update to my years-old article at Medium.  It’s refreshed to include Cricut Design Space users! Computers are weird, am I right? Sometimes they want to open up files with the strangest programs. One that I see come up a lot is SVG files, which are graphics … but Windows computers want to open them up with a web browser. The SVG files will even have a browser icon (Internet Explorer, Chrome, Firefox, etc.) on them. So what’s going on? Well, Windows likes to. . . Read More!

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Trademarks: searching TESS with a little more finesse!

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Trademarks - searching TESS with a little more finesse

If you’ve ever gone to the USPTO’s search system, TESS, and looked to see if something is a registered trademark, you’ve probably discovered that it’s a terrible search system that is difficult to use and looks like something straight out of 1998. So I’ve put together a guide on how to search with TESS, and some hints on how to vastly improve your search results. (NOTE: I am not an attorney, nor am I an IP professional. This guide is geared toward artists who create text designs of words and. . . Read More!

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Installing and Using Hairline Fonts on an iPad/iPhone with the Cricut App

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Installing hairline fonts for the ipad and the cricut app

  I’ve had a couple of folks ask for assistance with using my hairline fonts on the iPad with the Cricut App, because it’s a bit tricky.  The iPad still doesn’t handle fonts particularly well, though I keep hoping it will get better.  And hairline fonts appear to be an especially tricky thing, because they’re so thin that the iPad doesn’t like to show them. I’ve gone through the process of downloading a hairline font to the iPad using the AnyFont app, and going through the weirdly long installation process. . . . Read More!

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Registering the Copyright for Your Fonts (USA)

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Registering the Copyright for Your Fonts

  I promised a few font designers that I would create a tutorial on how to register fonts with the copyright office, once I had it all figured out and had successfully completed some of my own registrations. Standard disclaimer: I’m not a lawyer or intellectual property professional; this is not legal or professional advice. This post won’t get into why you’d want to register your copyright; there are dozens of articles that cover why registering with the government is an extra helpful step above and beyond the automatic basic. . . Read More!

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Creating a Font from Geometric Shapes: Part 4

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Creating a font from geometric shapes part 4

I’ve been slacking like mad on getting this final blog post written; you get near the end of making a font, and you just wanna get the dang font made, you know?! When last we spoke about this process, we’d finished constructing the letters, and it was time to move to spacing and kerning. Spacing is first – setting the optimum left and right margins for each letter. Fortunately, at least for the uppercase, you can figure out the best spacing for rounded letters like O and straight-sided letters like. . . Read More!

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Creating a Font from Geometric Shapes: Part 3

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Creating a font from geometric shapes, part 3

Character construction continues! I’m not going to get into every single character to show how it’s made from either the basic geometric shapes, or from parts of previously made characters, but I do have a few to share that I thought were the more interesting items. First off, let’s not forget that there’s punctuation to create as well! Some seem easy (for the pound/hashtag, it’s just two wide strokes and two narrow strokes), but some are more of a challenge. Here I made the braces (also known as curly brackets). . . Read More!

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Creating a Font from Geometric Shapes: Part 2

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Creating a font from geometric shapes, part 2

Welcome back! In part 1 of this series, we created a Font Creator file, and built our basic straight strokes. Now we’re going to make a few more basic shapes, and dig in with making some letters. Many of our letters can be made with those straight strokes, but you know there’s one more major shape that we’re going to need: We need a full-height circle as the base for the letter O. Then the letter O will serve as a building block for C, G, Q, and the zero.. . . Read More!

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Creating a Font from Geometric Shapes: Part 1

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Creating a font from geometric shapes

Many times I’ve had someone tell me, “I’d love to make fonts, but I just don’t have the creativity.” So I’m going to make a new font that uses nothing but some basic geometric shapes—primarily circles and rectangles—as the building blocks. No lettering skills necessary, just a bit of math! (And I’m totally using my computer’s calculator for that part.) You should also have a basic knowledge of using a pen tool with curves. I’ll be using Font Creator for all of the creation of this one, since it’s my. . . Read More!

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Making Actual Diet Coke with Our SodaStream

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Some finished Diet Coke, with an idea of how much syrup it takes

  We’ve been fans of the SodaStream for a long time. I blogged about how much I loved our old model way back in 2012, and I love this newer model just as much. This is the SodaStream Fizzi machine, which we got at Target. I’ll link you to the cool blue color, which I totally would have bought if they’d had it in stock at our local store. I tend to drink a lot of fizzy water—I don’t care for still water in general, so a little bit of. . . Read More!

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Font Tutorial: Renaming Font Files (for Duplicates and Organization)

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Font tutorial: renaming font files when you have duplicate names, or just for organization

Hey howdy hey, font fans! I’ve seen a couple of font questions come up lately, and have a solution for both. The questions are: – What do I do if I get a new font, but I already have a font installed with the same name? – Is there a way to rename my fonts so I can keep track of which ones have commercial licenses? This tutorial is going to show you how to change the name of a font inside its code, so that it displays with that. . . Read More!