Best Of New Brass EP-2 assembly & Mod clinic

[central.vermont]

Ron,

You say you need to strip the boiler room. Did you already clear coat the decal? Because if have not you should be able to remove it with the decal setting solution by wetting it with a Q-tip and rubbing gently. Sure would save you some effort.

Jon

[u18b]

Jon,

Unfortunately (very unfortunately)....

I already clearcoated it.   

[peteski]

I know Peteski has offered decal help.  I hate to put anyone to a lot of trouble.
All we really need is new/smaller lettering.  All I'll be re-doing is the boiler room.  The cabs I will go with as they are (they are fine).  But I will strip and repaint the boiler room.

THE MILWAUKEE ROAD decal is probably OK.

But E-3 needs to be compressed slightly and maybe just a tiny tad smaller.

And the EP-2 class decal needs to be smaller.

I emailed the Milwaukee Rd historical society asking if they had any Milw Rd fonts in Windows Tru-type fonts.
He said he knew of none.
I think that would have made decal work easier.

If it is only the E-3 and EP-2, that will not be too much work.  Even without a font. Color matching might be a bit tougher, but doable.  I hope that you have (or have access to) a flatbed scanner. PM me - I'll explain.

[glakedylan]

font: copperplate gothic is close

kindest regards
Gary

[peteski]

font: copperplate gothic is close

kindest regards
Gary

Thanks Gary!

[u18b]

font: copperplate gothic is close

kindest regards
Gary

Hi Gary, thanks for the suggestion.
It is in the neighborhood, but there are enough differences that I will look elsewhere.

But your suggestion has sent me on a font expedition.

So I will be posting a bit more of what I find.

[wcfn100]

All of those type faces are some version of Roman.  The 'Milwaukee' is Railroad Roman. 

Jason

[peteski]

While it would be helpful having a proper (or close enough) font would be nice, if I only have to remake E-3 and EP-2 decal, it will not take  me very long to trace either the original decal or a photo of the real loco.  Once I have a vector-based representation, I can easily manipulate it in whichever way I need.  I do have RR Roman in my font collection (from railfonts.com).  I can then convert each letter to curves to manipulate its shape.  Heck, I recently bought a TrueType/OpenType font editor too. 

[u18b]

Well, this is an interesting thread.  It has taken us all to some unexpected places and now is no exception.

It appears we need to explore fonts.

The decal sheets I bought were adequate in every regard except the herald on the side of the boiler room and cab.  And that sheet is OK for all 5-stripe Railroad Fair scheme EP-2s.  But not for this first one- the 6-Stripe original.

So the plan is:

1.  I'm going to explore fonts (right now).
2.  Choose something that comes pretty close.
3.  Send the font file to Peteski who has graciously agreed to help.
4.  I will scan my boiler room and also send the pic to Pete.
5.  Pete will take those files, and use Corel Draw to make the final file.
6.  And print some heralds on decal paper for me.

(if he wants to document what he does for this thread, it would be a nice addition- since I know a lot of people would be curious.)

More posts coming.

[u18b]

Step number one is to not  re-invent the wheel.
So I contacted the Milw Rd historical society looking for fonts. 
http://www.mrha.com/
President answered.  Very nice, but no help.

Then I go looking for railroad fonts by website.

http://www.railfonts.com/
Wow.  They have a lot.  But alas!  Not what I need.

The Train SIM guys do a lot of this.  Maybe they have something.
http://www.railsimstuff.com/
No luck here.

No luck here:  http://www.fontspace.com/category/railroad

No luck here:  http://www.1001fonts.com/railroad-fonts.html

Well, I might eventually find something, it might be a good educational exercise to work through this.
So I'll do this on my own.

More posts to come.

[u18b]

So the next thing to do is

-know what were even want.  That means a workable photo of the prototype.
And actually (for some reason) that is a bit hard for this loco.  I just have not come across tons of photos of this loco.  And the ones I HAVE seen are at a bad angle and/or a low resolution so that they are not helpful.

But we have been working with one photo that is side-on and reasonable.  So we can work with it.

Here is a close up of our herald.
I enhanced the photo a little.  Still fuzzy, but clear enough to work with.


As was posted above, this is basically a stretched Roman font.
The stretching part is easy.  Corel Draw can handle that with no problem.

The hard part will be choosing the font.

Compared with the decals I already have, we can see the guy did a pretty good job.  It just doesn't work for this loco.


More coming.

[u18b]

As in any endeavor of life, there is always a WHOLE lot more to it than a novice knows.
That's true here with fonts.    There are well over dozens of terms that go into font anatomy and usage.

Here is a good resource.  I'm going to try and use some of these terms with caps.
http://www.fontshop.com/glossary/

Now to analyze the Milw Rd. photo.


First thing we notice is the presence of SERIFS.  Those are essentially the little points and ornamentation lines on the tips of the letters.  So a “block” kind of font has no serifs.  This Milw font is typical of the Roman type fonts.

This is a block font.

This is a serifed font.


Second, we notice that the STEMS (downstrokes) are generally fat and most of the CROSSBARS (horizontal connecting strokes) are thin.

But further, we notice that the STEMS (downstrokes) are not all the same.  Most are fat, but there are exceptions. 
The M, W, and A are uneven.

The third thing I notice is that the SERIFS are fat.
Using the website glossary above, they are BRACKETED.  That means there is a curved line that goes from the STEM to the tip of the SERIF to fill it in (making it look fat).  So we need a SERIF Font with BRACKETS.

The fourth thing I notice is that the fat STEMS are somewhat uniform.
The T, H, E, M, I, L, U, K, U, R, and D all have the same SERIFED BRACKETED STEM.

Therefore, as I'm studying fonts, the shape of the I and the H will be a good and fast indicator if this is even a possibility.

Just a little more prototype study before we quit.
On the A, notice that the CROSSBAR is in the middle (it can be high, middle or low).  This one is in the middle.

Also,  note that the K is actually pretty unique.  The TAIL (right downward fat stroke) intersects the upper ascending slanted thin stroke toward the terminal end of the thin stroke.  It does NOT intersect in the middle or near the main STEM on the left.  That letter may be tricky.

The last thing we want to note is the road number 3.  The terminal ends of the 3 are fat- almost with little balls.

Time to go looking for fonts.
I'm going to focus my attention on TrueType fonts because they seem to me to be easy to install.

EDIT:  Another thing I noticed is that the terminal ends of the E are the same length.

[u18b]

Now, one font was already recommended.
I installed it.
Opened up Corel Draw.
Typed out the Milw Rd herald.
Enlarged it (not worrying about stretching or compressing at this moment).

Here it is.  (assuming it is the same font- sometimes font names can be confusing.  It is possible this is a different font).


It does indeed have SERIFS.
But it has no BRACKETS.
Further, the strokes in this font are uniform.  There are no fat STEMS and thin CROSSBARS.
So I won't be using this font.

Time to go looking for more.
Fonts are everywhere.
You can google them, you can find them on tons of software.
It is not hard to find font.
It is CHOOSING one that is hard.

Finished posting for now.  More later.

[bbussey]

Did you check ALL of the Roman fonts on RailFonts?  Because, there are a bunch of them, even if not labeled as Roman.  SP, NP, RRRoman, and others.  Also the B&O historical society has all the B&O Roman fonts, and some of the other societies have fonts as well if I remember correctly.  I find it hard to believe that there isn't an existing TrueType font that is either spot-on or close enough to convert to curves and make an exact match.

It's not Copperplate, that much is certain.

bb

[u18b]

Hi Bryan,

No, I didn't check all the Roman fonts individually.
And thanks for the extra resource.

Actually, I have a couple of fonts as possibilities.

But I have to spend some time developing the thread, photos, writing/ and posting.
My goal is to do the same here as I have done all along.
I'm going to document the whole process so it might be of some help to someone else one day.

So I am not made a final decision yet, but I am not at square-one either.