# Can anyone think of a way to get a TTF font out of a SWF file?
**URL:** https://forum.kirupa.com/t/can-anyone-think-of-a-way-to-get-a-ttf-font-out-of-a-swf-file/260816
**Category:** random
**Created:** [May 20, 2008, 6:25am UTC](https://forum.kirupa.com/t/can-anyone-think-of-a-way-to-get-a-ttf-font-out-of-a-swf-file/260816 "2008-05-20T06:25:38Z")
**Posts on this page:** 8
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Anogar](https://forum.kirupa.com/u/Anogar)
#### Post date: [May 20, 2008, 6:25am UTC](https://forum.kirupa.com/t/can-anyone-think-of-a-way-to-get-a-ttf-font-out-of-a-swf-file/260816/1 "2008-05-20T06:25:38Z")
I have an old SWF that I created, but can’t seem to hunt down the font that I used for it. I embedded the fonts, but I can’t think of a good way to get them out. Any thoughts?
edit: I tried decompiling the SWF, and that allows me to export the font, but only as a SWF file (again…) so I’m not sure that it’s helpful, heh.
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### Author:  [@sekasi](https://forum.kirupa.com/u/sekasi)
#### Post date: [May 20, 2008, 12:55pm UTC](https://forum.kirupa.com/t/can-anyone-think-of-a-way-to-get-a-ttf-font-out-of-a-swf-file/260816/2 "2008-05-20T12:55:40Z")
afaik, flash converts the pfm/ttf/whatever into it’s own “font outline” format. You can tell sometimes when you don’t have a proper font, flash gives you that warning “could not convert font xxx to outlines”.
That being said, it only converts the characters that are used (unless the person has exported the SWF with a full font in the library), so getting it into a TTF would probably be tricky.
Sorry 🙂
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### Author:  [@DanontheMoon](https://forum.kirupa.com/u/DanontheMoon)
#### Post date: [May 20, 2008, 1:08pm UTC](https://forum.kirupa.com/t/can-anyone-think-of-a-way-to-get-a-ttf-font-out-of-a-swf-file/260816/3 "2008-05-20T13:08:30Z")
^Good answer. Usually, I’ll convert my text to outlines anyway, as I like using uncommon fonts that would likely get changed to Arial on a different computer.
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### Author:  [@Anogar](https://forum.kirupa.com/u/Anogar)
#### Post date: [May 20, 2008, 6:09pm UTC](https://forum.kirupa.com/t/can-anyone-think-of-a-way-to-get-a-ttf-font-out-of-a-swf-file/260816/4 "2008-05-20T18:09:10Z")
[quote=sekasi;2328567]afaik, flash converts the pfm/ttf/whatever into it’s own “font outline” format. You can tell sometimes when you don’t have a proper font, flash gives you that warning “could not convert font xxx to outlines”.
That being said, it only converts the characters that are used (unless the person has exported the SWF with a full font in the library), so getting it into a TTF would probably be tricky.
Sorry :)[/quote]
Well, all of the font outlines are there and in vector format, so I don’t think it’s an impossible task. The vast majority of Flash sites use dynamic text, and that necessitates embedding the font, so the whole “only the characters that are getting used” thing is a little silly, that’s only the case with static text, and any Flash developer worth their salt should be making their files fairly dynamic these days, with most text being pulled from an outside and easily editable source.
> [@DanontheMoon;2328579](#):
>
> ^Good answer. Usually, I’ll convert my text to outlines anyway, as I like using uncommon fonts that would likely get changed to Arial on a different computer.
Um… using static text is bad enough, since you have to open your Flash file and reexport to change any of the copy, but breaking it apart is even worse. Just use dynamic text, preferably loaded from an external source like an XML file, and embed the fonts so that anyone can see them.
Flash is all about crazy fonts, getting them ‘changed to Arial’ isn’t an issue.
_edit_: This is this is how Flash stores Verdana, for example: [U]\*\*[http://ragonadesign.com/font1.swf\*\*[/U]](http://ragonadesign.com/font1.swf**%5B/U%5D)
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### Author:  [@sekasi](https://forum.kirupa.com/u/sekasi)
#### Post date: [May 20, 2008, 6:34pm UTC](https://forum.kirupa.com/t/can-anyone-think-of-a-way-to-get-a-ttf-font-out-of-a-swf-file/260816/5 "2008-05-20T18:34:11Z")
> so the whole “only the characters that are getting used” thing is a little silly, that’s only the case with static text
huh? I normally only embed a-z, numerals and basic latin. (like 80 glyphs) If I embedded the whole shebam my fizesizes would literally triple (58.488 glyphs :P)
But yeah, they are stored in vector format as you said. I guess some russian coder could come up with a vector/ttf converter and all you’d have to do is to export the letters one by one 😛
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### Author:  [@Anogar](https://forum.kirupa.com/u/Anogar)
#### Post date: [May 20, 2008, 6:42pm UTC](https://forum.kirupa.com/t/can-anyone-think-of-a-way-to-get-a-ttf-font-out-of-a-swf-file/260816/6 "2008-05-20T18:42:32Z")
[quote=sekasi;2328785]huh? I normally only embed a-z, numerals and basic latin. (like 80 glyphs) If I embedded the whole shebam my fizesizes would literally triple (58.488 glyphs :P)
But yeah, they are stored in vector format as you said. I guess some russian coder could come up with a vector/ttf converter and all you’d have to do is to export the letters one by one :P[/quote]
Hah, yeah I just meant that if for example you don’t happen to have a “Q” in your site anywhere, it’ll still be in the font. 😛
Now all I need is a Russian coder! :lol:
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### Author:  [@DanontheMoon](https://forum.kirupa.com/u/DanontheMoon)
#### Post date: [May 20, 2008, 6:46pm UTC](https://forum.kirupa.com/t/can-anyone-think-of-a-way-to-get-a-ttf-font-out-of-a-swf-file/260816/7 "2008-05-20T18:46:37Z")
In Soviet Russia, Text converts YOU\*!!\* 😏
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### Author:  [@glosrfc](https://forum.kirupa.com/u/glosrfc)
#### Post date: [May 20, 2008, 7:29pm UTC](https://forum.kirupa.com/t/can-anyone-think-of-a-way-to-get-a-ttf-font-out-of-a-swf-file/260816/8 "2008-05-20T19:29:03Z")
Actionscript Viewer…“Can extract all font symbols as TTF.” “Optionally lets you merge outlines from other font symbols.”
[http://www.buraks.com/asv/](http://www.buraks.com/asv/)