Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2024/03/18/nanofont-a-3x4-pixel-font-with-legible-2x2-lowercase-glyphs.html
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Enter Michael “Code Poet” Pohoreski’s nanofont, a 3×4 font with both upper and lower cases, consistent heights and all ASCII symbols!
A link to a github page does not really allow for anyone to see what this looks like, even with the examples. I guess it’s a bit of a meta thing - the examples need enlarging to see how they work, which is kind of (not) the point, I suppose.
So I resorted to the best combination of digital and analogue technology - a magnifying glass between me and my screen. The upper case version was quite readable, in the main. The lower case version looked like alien symbols from a sci-fi film’s design dept.
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Context is key. I could decipher enough of the example to tell it’s the Declaration of Independence but I doubt I could read something I’ve never seen before.
Fun fact: a 3x4 pixel uses 12 bits of data per character, only slightly more than plain ASCII text (8 bits) and less than Unicode (normally 16 bits).
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You are conflating the number of bits required to recall the character on a lookup table (ASCII, Unicode, etc) and the number of bits required to store a raster version of the typeface in a character rom, which is system-dependent and increases with resolution.
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I see a grey rectangle that has two clearly defined and two fuzzy edges.
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like graph paper, 12 bits is what you need to store the graphics for these characters; it’s 1 for a white pixel and 0 for a black pixel to be clear. that’s why it’s called 3x4. what you need to render these characters in something like a word document is not the point.
and, the relation between the minimum data needed for drawing this font, and ascii is - to my mind - a clever observation by the poster.
( other interesting comparisons would be to count the characters in the font to find the minimum bits for encoding the letters; or to estimate the bits for compressing the text block vs the rastered image of the text )
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Now do one for retina displays which are the norm today.
I learned a lot about the ability of the brain to create details from minimal visual data when I built SatanVision, a low resolution red LED television. It has 128x96 pixels of red dots.
When I watched a 1940s black and white VHS movie I found that I could see the sheen on the satin coat of a fellow. The coat was only a few pixels wide on the screen.
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comparing != conflating
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Yeah, try switching your phone on.
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I can make out roughly half of the words. Does that count as legible? I do like the idea of using this rather than blurry scrawls for game textures and such, that seems like a definite improvement, but I’d have a hard time reading a book written in it, and it’s not an issue a magnifying glass would fix.
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F.A.D.G.I. one star BS
“Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether they could, they didn’t stop to think if they should.”
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