Simplified "Stoic" Sagittal for 13-limit tonality diamond use

ndentonprotsack
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Re: Simplified "Stoic" Sagittal for 13-limit tonality diamond use

Post by ndentonprotsack »

Hey Dave,

I tried out what you suggested, and I totally agree! Here are the results (this is starting to feel like it is getting very close to a finished project, the symbols are much more readable now): download/file.php?mode=view&id=364
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Dave Keenan
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Re: Simplified "Stoic" Sagittal for 13-limit tonality diamond use

Post by Dave Keenan »

Yes. Thanks for that. We're definitely getting there. Can you explain why you didn't go with my version of the triple scroll, which has no close approaches between scrolls (more uniform whitespace between them)? Is it because of the middle one getting lost against a staff line? I had hoped that was mainly an issue when that shape was used for symbols with only a single scroll.

The two new unencoded scroll components should be a single scroll each, even though they are for use in a double scroll and triple scroll respectively. The duplication and triplication should be done in the encoded symbols that reference them. That's so we only need to make any change in one place.

I would like to have a bit more of a fiddle with the outlines, but I have too much other stuff on for the next few days.
ndentonprotsack
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Re: Simplified "Stoic" Sagittal for 13-limit tonality diamond use

Post by ndentonprotsack »

Hello Dave,

Sorry for the long delay on this reply. I have done everything you have suggested, and worked through each symbol with a fine-toothed comb.
Apologies about not using your symbol directly. I tried to copy-paste the glyph you made into the font I have been working with, but it wouldn't let me import it. I have no clue why. So I just modified the double-dent symbol I derived from the standard single scroll until it looked similar to the one you made. You are right---it is not similar enough, so I have further modified it to match yours as well as possible.

Here are the results:
Image

And here is the FontForge File:
Stoic Sagittal demo 2.png
(60.47 KiB) Not downloaded yet
If you have any time to fiddle with this a little more, I would definitely appreciate that! I have again, spent many hours trying to get the spacing as optimized as possible within the constraints of our initial design. I am not sure I know how to do much better with my limited knowledge of symbol design and the program.

Best,
Nick
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Re: Simplified "Stoic" Sagittal for 13-limit tonality diamond use

Post by Dave Keenan »

Thanks so much for that. I believe the double-scroll and the triple-scroll look too much alike when on a line. I believe I can improve them without compromising anything else. I should be able to get to it in a few days.
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Re: Simplified "Stoic" Sagittal for 13-limit tonality diamond use

Post by Dave Keenan »

Hi Nick, @ndentonprotsack

So much for me getting to it "in a few days". Sorry. But I am now working on the Stoic symbols.
ndentonprotsack wrote: Tue Jun 01, 2021 3:16 amI tried to copy-paste the glyph you made into the font I have been working with, but it wouldn't let me import it. I have no clue why.
Ah yes. I remember struggling with that gotcha early on. I eventually discovered that, in order to be able to copy and paste between font files, they have to be open in the same instance of FontForge. If you open each file separately from the operating system's file manager, you will get separate instances of FontForge, that apparently don't communicate with each other. So you have to open (at least) the second file from the File/Open dialog in the first instance. Then you can copy and paste between them.
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Re: Simplified "Stoic" Sagittal for 13-limit tonality diamond use

Post by Dave Keenan »

When I imported the 8-pixel-per-staff-space bitmaps into the background layer of the 2 and 3 dent symbols of your latest .sfd file above, it became apparent that the scrolls in the 3 dent symbol were not as far apart vertically as they should have been. They were only offset by 199 font units when they should have been 256 font units (half a staff space) as in the bitmap version. That corresponds to 3 pixels instead of 4 in the 8-PPSS bitmap.

I also decided that, for aesthetic reasons, the scrolls in the 2-dent symbol should be 320 fu apart instead of 256 fu. That corresponds to 5 pixels instead of 4 in the 8-PPSS bitmap. This is so that they consistently align with the (left) barbs in the 10-dent symbol.

I then decided I needed to go back to the bitmaps to find and prove a double-scroll that is sufficiently distinct from the triple-scroll when they are both on a line, while at the same time being recognisably intermediate in shape between the standard single (right) scroll and the triple scroll I devised previously. Here's the result.


Image


So now I'll go back to FontForge, import the new 2-dent bitmap, and try to produce a corresponding double-scroll outline. I don't think it will require many changes from the one you have already made, except for the slightly greater vertical spacing.
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ndentonprotsack
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Re: Simplified "Stoic" Sagittal for 13-limit tonality diamond use

Post by ndentonprotsack »

Wonderful Dave! Thank you for this, and it is great to hear from you again. I am looking forward to seeing how these bitmaps translate; I definitely agree with the choices you’ve made in these final prototypes.

You may also be happy to hear that I am mentioning the work we have done on this system in my PhD research proposal (the step that takes me to my candidacy). The proposal is not going to be published or appear anywhere outside my review panel, but I am hoping to eventually write an article some time soon that talks at length about this system and its usefulness for transcribing complex sounds from field recordings and/or certain non-western musical practices that utilize free intonation (or other tricking-to-notate kinds of tuning). I could go on a long rant about how this all relates to my thesis/research, but I will save that for another time as it is midnight here haha.

Best,
Nick
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Re: Simplified "Stoic" Sagittal for 13-limit tonality diamond use

Post by Dave Keenan »

@ndentonprotsack, I wish you all the best with your PhD proposal.

At long last I have a new set of outlines for you to try out on the staff.

As well as installing my earlier version of the triple-scroll and producing a new double-scroll with wider vertical spacing and a scroll shape intermediate between those of the single and triple scrolls, I have increased the width of the triple-barb to match the bitmap.
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Re: Simplified "Stoic" Sagittal for 13-limit tonality diamond use

Post by Dave Keenan »

Nick, I look forward to a repeat of the staff examples you gave in this post, but using the new font.

In the meantime, I've been thinking ahead.

I've been thinking about what code points we want for these, in the SMuFL mapping, and hence where we will put them in our modified version of the Bravura font in the meantime.

I've also been thinking about how to to categorise Stoic within the overall Sagittal system. We named it "Stoic", based on seeing it as another symbol subset, akin to Spartan, Athenian etc — seeing the Stoics as "alternative Athenians", being more austere in using only 2 kinds of flag (up to 5 at a time) where Athenian uses 7 (at most 2 at a time).

But it is not an alternative to the full Athenian set — only the single-shaft Athenians. And we do not propose to add multi-shaft Stoics because such symbols would be difficult to construct and would be too busy, in the sense of being overcrowded with detail. So it would be different from other subsets in supporting only Evo (single-shaft Sagittals combined with conventional accidentals) and not Revo (single Sagittals equivalent to such combinations).

And I wonder if it would be sensible to try to extend the Stoics to give alternatives for single-shaft Olympians, by adding only the existing accent marks (the ticks :': :.: representing schismas, and the wings :`: :,: and birds :``: :,,: representing one and two schisminas).

And in that case, we would have created not merely a new symbol subset, but a new flavour of Sagittal, akin to Evo and Revo. It would be an alternative Evo. Perhaps "Evo-2" or "Stevo" (short for "Stoic Evo") or "Nevo" (short for "new Evo" or "Nick's Evo"). :)

Back to the code points:
Although there are 12 pairs of symbols in the Stoic set, only 9 pairs are new. The other 3 pairs are existing single-shaft Spartans. So, at a minimum, we need 18 new code points.

If we look at the existing Sagittals in SMuFL, we find we have unused code points at:
E31A to E31B (2) at the end of the double-shaft Spartans
E336 to E33F (10) at the end of the Spartans
E368 to E36F (8) at the end of the Athenians
E388 to E38F (8) at the end of the Trojans
E3AE to E3AF (2) at the end of the single-shaft Prometheans
E3DE to E3DF (2) at the end of the triple-shaft Prometheans
E40C to E41F (20) at the end of the Magrathean accents

During the last SMuFL update, we actually offered the last 16 code points (E410 to E41F) back to the SMuFL free pool, but Daniel (wisely) chose not to take them. Saying only that he would keep them in mind if they ever had a need for them. So I guess we should now retract that offer and install Stoic there. Should we leave the gap of 2 between Magrathean and Stoic, or at the end of Stoic? I'm thinking we're more likely to want another Stoic than another Magrathean. So that would put the Stoics at E40C to E41D.

We could title the new SMuFL section as:
Stoic Sagittal extension (medium precision) accidentals (U+E40C–U+E41F)

Another option would be to split the Stoics between the 10 at the end of the Spartans and the 8 at the end of the Athenians. But that seems too untidy. And there is a proposal to use some of those for some new double-shaft and X-shaft symbols.

A third option would be to start a whole new "Sagittal supplement" at the end of the existing SMuFL allocation. That would put the Stoics at EF10 to EF21. But I'd prefer to keep all the Sagittals together, since we have the option to do so while keeping the new extension contiguous.

Then we need to think about what the SMuFL names for the symbols should be, and their descriptions. The descriptions could simply be copied from the corresponding Spartans and Athenians. And the names could be the same too, except for an "S" added to the end (for Stoic).
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Re: Simplified "Stoic" Sagittal for 13-limit tonality diamond use

Post by Dave Keenan »

There are some other fields in the Sagittal character map spreadsheet that we'll have to work out for the Stoics.

The long ASCII is obvious enough:
|(
|((
|(((
/|
/|(
/|((
/|(((
//|
//|(
//|((
//|(((
///|

and that will give us the forum smiley codes and the WinCompose sequences.

The smileys themselves will be the 6PPSS bitmaps above. The new WinCompose codes will require the existing sequences for :|(: :!(: :/ /|: and :\ \!: to have a space appended for "early exit". The sequences for :/|: and :\!: already end in <space>.

The Stoics will not have short ASCII. There are no characters left.

An interesting problem is to come up with Sagispeak pronunciations for the Stoics.

I've moved discussion of Sagispeak for Stoics to the Sagispeak thread here:
viewtopic.php?p=4470#p4470
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