How to Fix Baseline and x-Height in a Handmade Font

Use a simple lowercase x or a comparable flat-bottomed letter to establish the main lowercase height. Use a capital H to compare cap height. Keep a descender such as p or g beside them to remind yourself which parts should extend below the baseline.

A round o may need a slightly different visual treatment from a flat-bottomed x. Judge how the letters sit together, rather than forcing every bounding box onto an identical rectangle. The goal is a coherent reading line, not mechanical uniformity.

If the source was photographed at an angle, some letters may be distorted as well as misplaced. Moving them vertically cannot correct every perspective defect. Return to the source preparation steps when the same problem affects a whole row.

A letter can look low because it is positioned incorrectly, because its body is too small, or because its descender dominates the preview. Diagnose those possibilities before scaling it.

Compare a suspect n with neighboring lowercase letters. If its main body is the right height but sits below them, adjust placement. If its bottom aligns while its shoulder is too low, adjust its size or shape. If the whole word appears cramped, inspect the relationship between lowercase and capitals instead of changing one glyph repeatedly.

Make one kind of change at a time. Saving a specimen before and after the edit helps you see whether the repair improved reading or merely changed the enlarged outline.

In MakeFont's editor, inspect the available character controls and preview the changes in ordinary words. A useful short test is “Haxg”, followed by words such as “making”, “people”, and “happy”. The first line isolates height relationships; the words expose the reading rhythm.

Also include accents. A tidy unaccented line can hide collisions above the lowercase body. Do not shrink all letters to fit an unexpectedly tall mark without first checking whether the mark itself is misplaced.

The OpenType OS/2 metrics specification↗ (opens in a new tab) documents font-level height and vertical metrics. Those values are related to layout, but they are distinct from moving a particular outline in an editor.

After the final edits, rebuild and download the font. Reinstalling an older TTF will not show the new positions. Test a paragraph at a realistic size, with both uppercase and lowercase text.

If a letter aligns correctly in the font preview but is clipped in one application, investigate line spacing and font metrics separately. Baseline repair should improve where the shape sits; it cannot fix an application that gives the line too little vertical room.

• OpenType OS/2 metrics specification↗ (opens in a new tab)

These references explain the relevant formats, software behavior, or concepts. They do not endorse MakeFont or guarantee the quality of a generated font.