Corrupted font rendering in P3D/OPENGL

[wit221]

I have posted about the issue in the forum but did not receive any response.
Here are some previews of the issue received from different people:

http://imgur.com/a/3PQP8
http://imgur.com/a/eL6eM
http://imgur.com/3lrVQ1l
https://imgur.com/a/8iVjy
http://imgur.com/5NN6rNm

The way I implement text rendering is the following:

fontLarge = createFont("Caviar_Dreams_Bold.ttf",(int)8*displayWidth/100, true);
textFont(fontLarge);

where 8*displayWidth/100 is the maximum font size in the application.
I then use textSize() to resize that font depending on the size it should have and use both the three arguments and the 5 arguments text() method.

The issue appears on some devices, on some not. The general trend I observed is that the issue appears on high pixel density devices but not on lower ones. It is only a general observation, since the font problem does not appear on, for instance, the s6 edge, which has the same density and resolution as the N6P, which does have the issue. The bug seems to be independent of the android version and locale.

I have tried switching from P3D to OPENGL, to no avail. I have tried, isntead of using createFont(), to create fonts in the Processing IDE and then importing them to the assets folder and using loadFont(), to no avail. I have tried to change the font numerous times, to no avail.

The only differences I see every time I implement a change is that a different set of letters is not displayed properly. As a matter of fact, when I changed the font and decreased the size considerably when I create the font, only signs (such as "!", ",",".") appear.

In some devices, the bug appears in a different way: instead of fully showing some letters and not showing others at all, letters overlap:

http://imgur.com/2aZIyE6

The longer the application runs, the more corrupted the font is:

http://imgur.com/Y8iBGKL

This suggests textSize() might be the culprit, since it is the only method I call besides text() that deals with font rendering.

At a given time, if a glyph is bugged, it is bugged in the same way on the entire screen. For instance, if "p" is displayed as an overlay of "&" and "r", then all "p"s on the screen will be displayed as an overlay of "&" and "r".

Is it an error in my implementation or a bug?

[codeanticode]

Does this happen only with the largest font size, 8*displayWidth/100, or with smaller sizes too?

I just pushed a new release of the mode, RC1, can you take check if this problem still happens in this release?

[codeanticode]

@wit221 Did you have a chance to see if this still happens in RC1? Thanks!

[evshellshear]

Hi @codeanticode,

I think I have this issue too. I have tested RC1 and it did not help. You can test the game BugRope at https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=processing.test.bugrope&hl=en. I have a Nexus 5x Android 6.0.1 and in the beginning it seemed to cause a problem but the problem is now gone. However, someone who downloaded my game on a LG g4, h811, running rooted but stock 5.1, BUT with "modified dpi setting", has corrupted fonts. A friend of mine with a stock standard S7 has the problem too. Check out http://i.imgur.com/dd0Qdaz.png for an example of the font issue. Keen to know any fixes to solve this. I'd be happy to share my code with you if that helps.

Cheers,
Evan

Thanks for any help!

[codeanticode]

Ok, at least I can reproduce it (on a N5X), not yet sure about the cause though. My guess is that it is related to the logic that creates the textures needed to store the font's glyphs. Looking into it.

[evshellshear]

Awesome. At least you can reproduce it. I can't on my Nexus 5 anymore. It
used to happen but not anymore. I used to think it was a memory issue but I
doubt that nowadays.

Thanks!

Cheers,
Evan
On Apr 5, 2016 10:10 AM, "codeanticode" notifications@github.com wrote:

Ok, at least I can reproduce it (on a N5X), not yet sure about the cause
though. My guess is that it is related to the logic that creates the
textures needed to store the font's glyphs
https://github.com/processing/processing-android/blob/master/core/src/processing/opengl/FontTexture.java#L88
.

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[evshellshear]

@codeanticode thanks for that. Let me know when there is an update to the Android mode and I'll rebuild my game with it, post it on Google Play and get people to test it. Otherwise I can just send you the apk if you want.

Thanks for your help!

[codeanticode]

Try RC2 https://github.com/processing/processing-android/releases/tag/latest

However, font rendering issues might not be completely fixed. I noticed that some characters (backslash and k) are missing in the output of the following sketch:

String text = "";

void setup() {
  fullScreen(P2D);
  randomSeed(1);
  textFont(createFont("Arial", 80));
}

void draw() {
  background(0);
  fill(255);
  text(text, 0, 0, width, height);
  text += char(int(random(50, 127)));
}

void mousePressed() {
  if (looping) noLoop();
  else loop(); 
}

but this could have a different cause. Can you check if you see the same missing characters?

[evshellshear]

Awesome. Thanks for that. I don't actually see the issue on my phone so
I'll build an apk and send it to you if that's OK.

How do I actually install this RC2 to processing? Do I just need to unpack
it into the Processing directory and copy over the Android Mode folder?

Thanks again!

Cheers,
Evan

[codeanticode]

The new release should show up in the contribution manager, but this might take a while until the indexes are updated. In the meantime you can install RC2 manually by downloading the zip file, unpacking it, and moving the AndroidMode folder into the your sketchbook/modes folder.

[evshellshear]

Great. I did it and have now uploaded a new version to Google Play (a few hours ago so it should be available soon - look for version 2.36) which you can test if you want. It is at https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=processing.test.bugrope&hl=en. Let me know if there are still problems on your phone. If you don't have any problems I will start contacting other people who I know which had the problem and ask them to test it.

[evshellshear]

I'll post a comment when I see version 2.36 there.

[evshellshear]

@codeanticode It looks like version 2.36 is live now. If you want to give it a spin to see if it works and let me know what happens, I'd really appreciate that.

Thanks again!