Contours and nodes

Read the paths and points that form a letter.

A contour is a path around a shape. It may contain straight segments and curves. Nodes mark points on the contour; off-curve handles influence the direction of a curve between those points.

Path commands

The public study uses SVG paths. In the illustrative record below, move chooses a starting point, line adds a straight segment, and curve describes a bend through control points.

{
  "kind": "contour",
  "commands": [
    { "op": "move", "x": 120, "y": 64 },
    { "op": "line", "x": 120, "y": 420 },
    { "op": "curve", "x": 340, "y": 240,
      "c1": [120, 64], "c2": [340, 96] }
  ]
}

On-curve and off-curve points

An on-curve point lies on the visible path. A handle can sit away from that path and guide the curve into or out of a point. The Nodes tab in the interactive study reveals both types of marks.

Contour and image

A raster image samples a drawing into pixels. A vector contour describes geometry that can be inspected and scaled. See the SVG guide for a browser-readable example.