bitbutter

I'm excited to get to know the new version better, congratulations to c74 on the new release.

But this struck me right away: the legibility of patcher text has taken a big hit.

I understand that the 'smeary' font rendering is probably a necessary consequence of making the patches zoomable. But since at the moment i'm not seeing any obvious reason i'd want that capability, the cost doesn't seem to justify the gain to me.

I hunted around in the preferences in the hope that there would be some kind of 'use pixel fonts' checkbox, but i guess this option is not available.

The smudgy text rendering reminds me of how flash used to render text a few years ago. As has been the case with Flash, i hope this can be improved in future.

Meanwhile: to others who share this disappointment, have you found some display/font/colour settings that you think minimise the smudgy effect?

(Perhaps downloading a pixel font and specifying that as the display font in the preferences may work, as long as max isn't using sub-pixel positioning for objects, or their labels.)

max5-blurry-text-rendering

Quote: bitbutter wrote on Wed, 23 April 2008 13:23

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> Meanwhile: to others who share this disappointment, have you found some display/font/colour settings that you think minimise the smudgy effect?

For me it stopped being a disappointment after I simply started using a bigger font size (= bigger objects, = more encapsulation).

Quote: bitbutter wrote on Wed, 23 April 2008 13:23
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> Meanwhile: to others who share this disappointment, have you found some display/font/colour settings that you think minimise the smudgy effect?

Ah, yes. Perhaps this is part of a cunning ploy to encourage better patching practices! I'm turning the font size up too (and my little laptop screen is feeling the pressure).

> ...have you found some display/font/colour settings that you think minimise the smudgy effect?

> For me it stopped being a disappointment after I simply started using a bigger font size (= bigger objects, = more encapsulation).

And the Patcher Window navigation stuff (for me, anyway) is such that the larger space in which to work is a breeze to move around in. Never thought of the increase in font size as a way to encourage better patch hygiene [the integrated docs and examples, and the Clue Window, on the other hand....].

> ...have you found some display/font/colour settings that you think minimise the smudgy effect?
>
> For me it stopped being a disappointment after I simply started using a bigger font size (= bigger objects, = more encapsulation).

And the Patcher Window navigation stuff (for me, anyway) is such that the larger space in which to work is a breeze to move around in. Never thought of the increase in font size as a way to encourage better patch hygiene [the integrated docs and examples, and the Clue Window, on the other hand....].


Another thing I suggest trying is the new Scale... and Scale Spacing... items. Since this feature was introduced, I find myself using object boxes in a more typographical way. Larger font sizes tend to look really nice now. Note also that you can zoom in and out of your patcher window, and spawn multiple view windows of the same patcher.

Another thing I suggest trying is the new Scale... and Scale Spacing... items.  Since this feature was introduced, I find myself using object boxes in a more typographical way.  Larger font sizes tend to look really nice now.  Note also that you can zoom in and out of your patcher window, and spawn multiple view windows of the same patcher.

Max5: Blurry text rendering