{"course":{"slug":"vector-and-print","title":"Vectors, Logos and Things That Get Printed","url":"https://addaly.com/learn/vector-and-print","level":"beginner","track":"create"},"lesson":{"slug":"outline-the-fonts","title":"Why the printer asked you to outline the fonts","url":"https://addaly.com/learn/vector-and-print/outline-the-fonts","position":18,"of":73,"minutes":9,"answer":"Outline text so a missing font cannot reflow your layout, but keep an editable master and embed rather than outline for body text, because thousands of glyph paths choke a RIP.","keyIdea":"Outline text so a missing font cannot reflow your layout, but keep an editable master and embed rather than outline for body text, because thousands of glyph paths choke a RIP."},"body":{"format":"markdown","text":"## The message, and what is behind it\n\n*\"Curve karke bhejo.\"* *\"Please convert text to curves.\"* *\"Outline the fonts.\"* Every print shop sends this, and most designers do it without knowing why, which means they also do it in the places where it is a mistake.\n\nHere is the mechanism. Text in a design file is not a picture of letters. It is a string of characters plus a reference to a font: *set this in Poppins SemiBold*. The shapes live in the font file on your computer. Open that design on the shop's machine, which does not have Poppins, and the application substitutes something else. The letters change width. The line breaks move. A headline that fitted on two lines becomes three, a logo gets wider than its box, and nobody notices until 2,000 copies are printed.\n\nConverting text to curves replaces the reference with actual geometry. The letters become paths. There is no font to be missing.\n\n- CorelDRAW: **Ctrl+Q**, Convert to Curves\n- Illustrator: **Shift+Ctrl+O**, Type > Create Outlines\n- Inkscape: **Shift+Ctrl+C**, Path > Object to Path\n- Affinity Designer: Layer > Convert to Curves\n\n## The cost, which nobody mentions\n\nOnce outlined, the text is not text. No spellcheck, no search, no editing, no restyling. A client asking to change a phone number means redrawing it.\n\nSo the working rule is: **keep an editable master, and export an outlined copy.** Name them so a tired person at 11pm cannot confuse them:\n\n```\nposter-diwali-v3-EDITABLE.cdr\nposter-diwali-v3-OUTLINED.cdr\nposter-diwali-v3-PRESS.pdf\n```\n\n## When outlining is the wrong answer\n\nOutlining a 64-page book is a bad idea, and it is a mistake people make trying to be careful. Each glyph becomes a path of maybe 30 to 90 nodes. A page of body text goes from a few hundred font references to tens of thousands of curves. The file balloons, the RIP crawls, and jobs time out on older equipment.\n\nFor body text, **embed the fonts** instead. A PDF export embeds a subset of each font (only the glyphs used) and the press sees exactly your typeface with none of the node explosion. Every PDF/X preset does this by default. There is a permission bit inside font files controlling whether embedding is allowed; nearly all commercial and open fonts permit it, but a small number do not, and your export dialog will complain if you hit one.\n\nOutline for logos, headlines, short display text, and anything going to a cutting machine. Embed for everything else.\n\n> Figure: Outline it, or embed it. Outline it: Logos, wordmarks and headlines; Anything going to a cutter or a laser; Short display text nobody will edit; Cost: no spellcheck, no search, no resetting; Keep an editable master beside it. Embed it: Body text, and any long document; Only the glyphs you used travel; The RIP sees your typeface, not curves; Cost: refused if the font's fsType forbids it; Every PDF/X preset does it already. Both remove the missing-font risk. Outlining replaces the reference with geometry; embedding carries a subset of the font itself. The deciding number is how many glyphs there are, because each one becomes thirty to ninety nodes when it is outlined.\n\n## Fonts you can legally use, free\n\nBody text in a paid job with a pirated font is a real risk, and \"I downloaded it from a free fonts site\" is not a defence. Many aggregator sites host cracked cuts of commercial faces.\n\nSafe sources: **Google Fonts** (almost all under the SIL Open Font Licence: free for commercial use, embeddable, and you can sell what you make), **Fontshare** from the Indian Type Foundry, **Ek Type** for open Devanagari and Gujarati, **The League of Moveable Type**, and Adobe's own open-source releases like Source Serif. Read the licence file that ships with the font once; it takes two minutes.\n\nFor Indic and other complex scripts, test the actual words before committing. Correct rendering of conjuncts depends on OpenType shaping tables and on the application's text engine, and support varies across Inkscape, Illustrator and CorelDRAW versions. Type your client's real name in the real font at the real size, then look at it. Do not test with Latin placeholder text.\n\n## Kerning, tracking, and where they show\n\n**Tracking** is uniform space applied across a range of characters. **Kerning** is the space between one specific pair. They are different jobs.\n\nBad kerning is invisible in body text and glaring in a headline or a logo, because the flaw scales with the type. The pairs that break most often are the ones where a diagonal or an open shape meets something else: **AV**, **To**, **Ya**, **LT**, **P.** followed by a full stop, and any capital next to a quotation mark.\n\nMost fonts ship a kerning table the designer wrote: that is **metrics** kerning. Some applications also offer **optical** kerning, which ignores the table and spaces by looking at the shapes. For a well-made text face, metrics is better. For a cheap or free display face with a thin kerning table, optical is usually better. Illustrator and InDesign expose the choice in the Character panel.\n\nAdjusting a single pair by hand:\n\n- Illustrator and InDesign: click between the two letters, then **Alt+Left/Right**\n- Inkscape: place the text cursor between them, **Alt+Left/Right**\n- CorelDRAW: Shape tool (**F10**) on the text, select the character node, and drag, or use the interactive spacing arrows at the corners of the text block\n\nNever use a \"faux bold\" or \"faux italic\" button. It thickens or slants the outline mechanically, which fattens curves unevenly and slants the counters wrongly. Use the real weight the family ships.\n\n## Type on a path\n\nIllustrator has a Type on a Path tool. Inkscape: select text and a path, then Text > Put on Path. CorelDRAW: hover the Text tool over a curve until the cursor changes, or Text > Fit Text to Path.\n\nThe honest problem: on a tight circle, letters splay apart at the top and jam together at the bottom of an inner curve, because the spacing is measured along the baseline while the letter bodies sit outside or inside it. The fix is a larger radius, more tracking, and baseline shift to move the text off the path, not scaling the letters, which changes their weight. For a circular badge, set the bottom text on a second, separate circle drawn in the opposite direction so it reads left to right rather than upside down.\n\n## Before you send\n\nOpen the outlined copy on a machine that does not have your fonts. If it looks identical, you are done. That test takes thirty seconds and catches the failure this whole lesson is about."},"check":{"question":"A designer outlines every piece of text in a 64-page book, including the body copy, to be safe. The press reports the file is extremely slow to process and one job times out. Why?","options":[{"text":"Outlining strips the font's hinting, so the RIP has to recompute hinting for every glyph at output resolution.","correct":false,"tempting":"Invents extra work for the RIP; hinting stops mattering once glyphs are plain geometry."},{"text":"Outlined text can no longer be compressed inside the PDF, so file size grew and transfer, not processing, is the bottleneck.","correct":false,"tempting":"Confuses file size with processing load, and PDF compresses path data in any case."},{"text":"Outlining forces the text into a transparency group that must be flattened, and the flattening is what slows the RIP.","correct":false,"tempting":"Attaches an unrelated flattening step to a conversion that changes only how the marks are described."},{"text":"Every glyph became a path of dozens of nodes, so each page went from a few hundred font references to tens of thousands of individual curves to render. Body text should have embedded fonts; outlining is for logos, headlines and files going to a cutter.","correct":true}]},"prev":{"slug":"redrawing-from-a-photograph","title":"Rebuilding a mark that only exists as a photograph","url":"https://addaly.com/learn/vector-and-print/redrawing-from-a-photograph"},"next":{"slug":"what-is-inside-a-font-file","title":"What is actually inside a font file","url":"https://addaly.com/learn/vector-and-print/what-is-inside-a-font-file"},"authorship":"Founder and series editor: Dr Mustafa Mun. Written by AI models to a written standard. Exam keys checked blind by a second model: 3,665 of 3,666 agreed. Academic review invited.","review":{"status":"Draft, open for academic review"},"cite":"Addaly (2026) 'Why the printer asked you to outline the fonts', in Vectors, Logos and Things That Get Printed. Edited by M. Mun. Addaly. Available at: https://addaly.com/learn/vector-and-print/outline-the-fonts (Accessed: 31 October 2026).","licence":{"name":"CC BY-NC-SA 4.0","url":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/"},"reader":{"schema":1,"title":"Why the printer asked you to outline the fonts","courseTitle":"Vectors, Logos and Things That Get Printed","module":{"index":3,"slug":"type-as-shape","title":"Type, which is also vector"},"answer":null,"keyIdea":"Outline text so a missing font cannot reflow your layout, but keep an editable master and embed rather than outline for body text, because thousands of glyph paths choke a RIP.","hero":{"kind":"figure","figure":{"t":"figure","label":"Figure 3.1","figure":{"left":{"title":"Outline it","items":["Logos, wordmarks and headlines","Anything going to a cutter or a laser","Short display text nobody will edit","Cost: no spellcheck, no search, no resetting","Keep an editable master beside it"]},"type":"compare","right":{"title":"Embed it","items":["Body text, and any long document","Only the glyphs you used travel","The RIP sees your typeface, not curves","Cost: refused if the font’s fsType forbids it","Every PDF/X preset does it already"]},"title":"Outline it, or embed it","caption":"Both remove the missing-font risk. Outlining replaces the reference with geometry; embedding carries a subset of the font itself. The deciding number is how many glyphs there are, because each one becomes thirty to ninety nodes when it is outlined."},"alt":"Figure: Outline it, or embed it. Outline it: Logos, wordmarks and headlines; Anything going to a cutter or a laser; Short display text nobody will edit; Cost: no spellcheck, no search, no resetting; Keep an editable master beside it. Embed it: Body text, and any long document; Only the glyphs you used travel; The RIP sees your typeface, not curves; Cost: refused if the font’s fsType forbids it; Every PDF/X preset does it already. Both remove the missing-font risk. Outlining replaces the reference with geometry; embedding carries a subset of the font itself. The deciding number is how many glyphs there are, because each one becomes thirty to ninety nodes when it is outlined."}},"blocks":[{"t":"h2","id":"the-message-and-what-is-behind-it","runs":[{"text":"The message, and what is behind it"}]},{"t":"p","runs":[{"text":"”Curve karke bhejo.”","i":true},{"text":" "},{"text":"”Please convert text to curves.”","i":true},{"text":" "},{"text":"”Outline the fonts.”","i":true},{"text":" Every print shop sends this, and most designers do it without knowing why, which means they also do it in the places where it is a mistake."}]},{"t":"p","runs":[{"text":"Here is the mechanism. Text in a design file is not a picture of letters. It is a string of characters plus a reference to a font: "},{"text":"set this in Poppins SemiBold","i":true},{"text":". The shapes live in the font file on your computer. Open that design on the shop’s machine, which does not have Poppins, and the application substitutes something else. The letters change width. The line breaks move. A headline that fitted on two lines becomes three, a logo gets wider than its box, and nobody notices until 2,000 copies are printed."}]},{"t":"p","runs":[{"text":"Converting text to curves replaces the reference with actual geometry. The letters become paths. There is no font to be missing."}]},{"t":"ul","items":[[{"text":"CorelDRAW: "},{"text":"Ctrl+Q","b":true},{"text":", Convert to Curves"}],[{"text":"Illustrator: "},{"text":"Shift+Ctrl+O","b":true},{"text":", Type > Create Outlines"}],[{"text":"Inkscape: "},{"text":"Shift+Ctrl+C","b":true},{"text":", Path > Object to Path"}],[{"text":"Affinity Designer: Layer > Convert to Curves"}]]},{"t":"h2","id":"the-cost-which-nobody-mentions","runs":[{"text":"The cost, which nobody mentions"}]},{"t":"p","runs":[{"text":"Once outlined, the text is not text. No spellcheck, no search, no editing, no restyling. A client asking to change a phone number means redrawing it."}]},{"t":"p","runs":[{"text":"So the working rule is: "},{"text":"keep an editable master, and export an outlined copy.","b":true},{"text":" Name them so a tired person at 11pm cannot confuse them:"}]},{"t":"code","lang":"","label":"Text","text":"poster-diwali-v3-EDITABLE.cdr\nposter-diwali-v3-OUTLINED.cdr\nposter-diwali-v3-PRESS.pdf"},{"t":"h2","id":"when-outlining-is-the-wrong-answer","runs":[{"text":"When outlining is the wrong answer"}]},{"t":"p","runs":[{"text":"Outlining a 64-page book is a bad idea, and it is a mistake people make trying to be careful. Each glyph becomes a path of maybe 30 to 90 nodes. A page of body text goes from a few hundred font references to tens of thousands of curves. The file balloons, the RIP crawls, and jobs time out on older equipment."}]},{"t":"p","runs":[{"text":"For body text, "},{"text":"embed the fonts","b":true},{"text":" instead. A PDF export embeds a subset of each font (only the glyphs used) and the press sees exactly your typeface with none of the node explosion. Every PDF/X preset does this by default. There is a permission bit inside font files controlling whether embedding is allowed; nearly all commercial and open fonts permit it, but a small number do not, and your export dialog will complain if you hit one."}]},{"t":"p","runs":[{"text":"Outline for logos, headlines, short display text, and anything going to a cutting machine. Embed for everything else."}]},{"t":"h2","id":"fonts-you-can-legally-use-free","runs":[{"text":"Fonts you can legally use, free"}]},{"t":"p","runs":[{"text":"Body text in a paid job with a pirated font is a real risk, and “I downloaded it from a free fonts site” is not a defence. Many aggregator sites host cracked cuts of commercial faces."}]},{"t":"p","runs":[{"text":"Safe sources: "},{"text":"Google Fonts","b":true},{"text":" (almost all under the SIL Open Font Licence: free for commercial use, embeddable, and you can sell what you make), "},{"text":"Fontshare","b":true},{"text":" from the Indian Type Foundry, "},{"text":"Ek Type","b":true},{"text":" for open Devanagari and Gujarati, "},{"text":"The League of Moveable Type","b":true},{"text":", and Adobe’s own open-source releases like Source Serif. Read the licence file that ships with the font once; it takes two minutes."}]},{"t":"p","runs":[{"text":"For Indic and other complex scripts, test the actual words before committing. Correct rendering of conjuncts depends on OpenType shaping tables and on the application’s text engine, and support varies across Inkscape, Illustrator and CorelDRAW versions. Type your client’s real name in the real font at the real size, then look at it. Do not test with Latin placeholder text."}]},{"t":"h2","id":"kerning-tracking-and-where-they-show","runs":[{"text":"Kerning, tracking, and where they show"}]},{"t":"p","runs":[{"text":"Tracking","b":true},{"text":" is uniform space applied across a range of characters. "},{"text":"Kerning","b":true},{"text":" is the space between one specific pair. They are different jobs."}]},{"t":"p","runs":[{"text":"Bad kerning is invisible in body text and glaring in a headline or a logo, because the flaw scales with the type. The pairs that break most often are the ones where a diagonal or an open shape meets something else: "},{"text":"AV","b":true},{"text":", "},{"text":"To","b":true},{"text":", "},{"text":"Ya","b":true},{"text":", "},{"text":"LT","b":true},{"text":", "},{"text":"P.","b":true},{"text":" followed by a full stop, and any capital next to a quotation mark."}]},{"t":"p","runs":[{"text":"Most fonts ship a kerning table the designer wrote: that is "},{"text":"metrics","b":true},{"text":" kerning. Some applications also offer "},{"text":"optical","b":true},{"text":" kerning, which ignores the table and spaces by looking at the shapes. For a well-made text face, metrics is better. For a cheap or free display face with a thin kerning table, optical is usually better. Illustrator and InDesign expose the choice in the Character panel."}]},{"t":"p","runs":[{"text":"Adjusting a single pair by hand:"}]},{"t":"ul","items":[[{"text":"Illustrator and InDesign: click between the two letters, then "},{"text":"Alt+Left/Right","b":true}],[{"text":"Inkscape: place the text cursor between them, "},{"text":"Alt+Left/Right","b":true}],[{"text":"CorelDRAW: Shape tool ("},{"text":"F10","b":true},{"text":") on the text, select the character node, and drag, or use the interactive spacing arrows at the corners of the text block"}]]},{"t":"p","runs":[{"text":"Never use a “faux bold” or “faux italic” button. It thickens or slants the outline mechanically, which fattens curves unevenly and slants the counters wrongly. Use the real weight the family ships."}]},{"t":"h2","id":"type-on-a-path","runs":[{"text":"Type on a path"}]},{"t":"p","runs":[{"text":"Illustrator has a Type on a Path tool. Inkscape: select text and a path, then Text > Put on Path. CorelDRAW: hover the Text tool over a curve until the cursor changes, or Text > Fit Text to Path."}]},{"t":"p","runs":[{"text":"The honest problem: on a tight circle, letters splay apart at the top and jam together at the bottom of an inner curve, because the spacing is measured along the baseline while the letter bodies sit outside or inside it. The fix is a larger radius, more tracking, and baseline shift to move the text off the path, not scaling the letters, which changes their weight. For a circular badge, set the bottom text on a second, separate circle drawn in the opposite direction so it reads left to right rather than upside down."}]},{"t":"h2","id":"before-you-send","runs":[{"text":"Before you send"}]},{"t":"p","runs":[{"text":"Open the outlined copy on a machine that does not have your fonts. If it looks identical, you are done. That test takes thirty seconds and catches the failure this whole lesson is about."}]}],"check":{"question":[{"text":"A designer outlines every piece of text in a 64-page book, including the body copy, to be safe. The press reports the file is extremely slow to process and one job times out. Why?"}],"options":[{"text":[{"text":"Outlining strips the font’s hinting, so the RIP has to recompute hinting for every glyph at output resolution."}],"correct":false,"tempting":[{"text":"Invents extra work for the RIP; hinting stops mattering once glyphs are plain geometry."}]},{"text":[{"text":"Outlined text can no longer be compressed inside the PDF, so file size grew and transfer, not processing, is the bottleneck."}],"correct":false,"tempting":[{"text":"Confuses file size with processing load, and PDF compresses path data in any case."}]},{"text":[{"text":"Outlining forces the text into a transparency group that must be flattened, and the flattening is what slows the RIP."}],"correct":false,"tempting":[{"text":"Attaches an unrelated flattening step to a conversion that changes only how the marks are described."}]},{"text":[{"text":"Every glyph became a path of dozens of nodes, so each page went from a few hundred font references to tens of thousands of individual curves to render. Body text should have embedded fonts; outlining is for logos, headlines and files going to a cutter."}],"correct":true,"tempting":null}],"order":[2,0,1,3],"why":null},"prev":{"slug":"redrawing-from-a-photograph","title":"Rebuilding a mark that only exists as a photograph","minutes":9},"next":{"slug":"what-is-inside-a-font-file","title":"What is actually inside a font file","minutes":9}}}