Other items on my wish-list:

• ovals;
• left-aligned and right-aligned to a specific point, instead of centered;
• specifying the (center/left/right) anchor point at some angle other than 12 o'clock and 6 o'clock;
• maybe even some arbitrary spline-curve, given some points? (bearing in mind that I have no idea how splines work).

(*) The complication giving me trouble is that I need to recalculate the position (or drawing-angle) for each letter, to account for the fact that GD draws TrueType characters from the lower-left corner, not the center.

I could easily set a separate scaling factor for X and Y coordinates (to make ovals), just like I could vary the radius on-the-fly (to make a spiral) but the problem is that the letters will be angled oddly (as if they were supposed to be in a circle). Too much for this bear of little brain! But, if you have suggestions, I'm all ears.

___
-DA

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I suppose the thing to research is the notion of 'path'---i.e. a continuous curve where on each character could be drawn perpendicular to a point of tangency. This is the idea supported in postscript and elsewhere...

--hsm

"Never try to teach a pig to sing...it wastes your time and it annoys the pig."