Re: blot_diameter

[Juergen Reuter]

On Fri, 1 Feb 2002, Han-Wen Nienhuys wrote:

> ...
> Upon further thought: traditional engraving is made by a combination
> of real engraving/cutting and stamping in a metal plate.
>
> One would think that whether a point on a metal plate is depressed in
> a stamping process, depends on the distance to the the stamp. That
> would mean that the shape of the depression is the Minkowski sum of a
> small circle (of radius blot_diameter) and the outline of the
> stamp. In other words: rounded outside angles, sharp inside angles.
>
> For cutting, one could vary the pressure on the cutting tool to
> produce lines that are thinner than blot_diameter; also it should be
> possible to produce sharp outside corners for symbols that are cut
> (bar lines, slurs, staff lines, beams).
>

Sounds reasonable.  However, I think lily should attempt to do just fine
engraving rather than purely mimicking the physical process of
engraving/stamping/cutting:  Even the finest (manually) engraved music may
still have some deficiencies that we should not try to copy.  For example,
if you look carefully at some of Petruccis early printings, you can see
that the staff lines are slightly dashed, because in these printings
Petrucci used letters with both noteheads and stafflines; but you probably
would not like to mimick this deficiency.

Greetings,
Juergen