Re: Thriple flat/sharp glyphs...

[Torsten Hämmerle]

First of all,

Thank you very much for all the feedback!
Sorry I didn't dig the archives myself, but initially I took the original
Feta designs for granted and carved in stone.

Where did the original double-flat design come from?

Music(X)TeX was a good guess, but the Music(X)TeX accidentals look
completely different.
Thinking of the introductory LilyPond Background Essay, there's a  section
about the flat symbol design
<http://lilypond.org/doc/v2.18/Documentation/essay/engraving-details#music-fonts>
  
and they mention Henle (computer typesetting) compared to Bärenreiter (hand
engraving). 
When looking at the examples, the LilyPond flat seems to have been derived
from the Bärenreiter stencil.

*Conclusion:* Bärenreiter use standard flat widths for double-flat flats, so
I don't see why we shouldn't adapt the existing Feta double-flat accidentals
and create a matching (triple-flat, of course).
Without Abraham's encouragement I'd never have dared touch the original Feta
designs, though.
Basically, nobody but LilyPond seems to use a compressed left flat. 

Double-flat alternatives in comparison

In the old discussions mentioned in some of the answers, Abraham proposed a
compromise that kept the original glyph width by applying an average
compression to both flats.

I've used MetaFont's proof sheets (with outlines so show how the flat
symbols are put together on the left and the filled-in normal versions to
check the visual appearance).
There has been some manual cleansing of distracting outlines of superimposed
parts and I've unified some parameters that made the counter (the small
"hole" in the flat symbol) look slightly different in some accidentals
containing flats.

1. Original Feta design

The compressed left flat even "bites off" part of the lower stem and makes
it look considerably thinner. And the compression of the left flat only
reminds me of a rear-shunt car crash, sort of... ;)

<http://lilypond.1069038.n5.nabble.com/file/t3887/double-flat-1-original.png> 

2. Abraham's equally compressed flats

Both flats are equally compressed as a compromise, thus keeping the original
glyph width:

<http://lilypond.1069038.n5.nabble.com/file/t3887/double-flat-2-abraham-equal.png>
 

3. Torsten's "real" flats with maximum overlap

Both flats are "real" unaltered flats. Maximum overlap makes the double-flat
glyph only marginally wider than the original design (cf. Dorico's Bravura
font):

<http://lilypond.1069038.n5.nabble.com/file/t3887/double-flat-3-torsten-real-overlap.png>
 

4. Abraham's "real" flats with minimum overlap

Both flats are "real" unaltered flats, there is only a slight overlap. This
is the widest of all the designs mentioned here (cf. Sibelius' Opus font):

<http://lilypond.1069038.n5.nabble.com/file/t3887/double-flat-4-abraham-real.png>
 

All the graphics have exactly the same height/width and glyph positioning,
so you can download them and flip through them to directly see how the
design slightly changes from image to image and gradually widens up.

What do you think?

Thanks for the support,
Torsten



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