I haven't read the paper, but the video explains the idea quite  
well.  The algorithm operates at the pixel level. When shrinking, it  
removes pixels without adjusting the newly-adjacent pixels, and when  
growing it creates pixels by using the average of the pixels that it  
is to be inserted between.  I think that this technique is great,  
because it provides good results, yet is MUCH simpler to implement  
than the other texture-synthesis techniques that have been published  
at SIGGRAPH in recent years.

Unfortunately this pixel-centricity of the algorithm means that it  
would not be good for high-quality font resizing.  Another main  
reason that this algorithm would not work for fonts is that the  
energy function basically runs the image through an edge detector and  
then finds low-energy paths through the resulting image.  This proves  
to be a good heuristic for photographs, but fonts are pretty much  
"all edge" to an edge detector (I'm thinking of normal-sized document  
fonts, not large fonts used in eg: an advertisement), so the  
heuristic would be unlikely to make good choices about which pixels  
to remove.

The basic problem with high-quality pixel-based font resizing in  
general (not just this technique) is that font design is a very  
difficult skill; experts make a living doing nothing but designing  
fonts.  These people are artists with a fine sense of balance,  
symmetry, etc. who have developed a deep intuition about how slight  
changes in a font will be perceived (typically unconsciously) by the  
viewer.  One pixel can easily make the difference between an  
excellent character and complete rubbish. In order to approach this  
level of performance, the computer program would need to test  
potential font modifications against a model of human visual  
perception.  Even harder, the model should be as sophisticated (read  
"refined", not "complicated") as an expert font designer, not the  
average person.

If available, a much better choice is to use an outline-based font  
(eg: TrueType) and render it at the desired size.

Josh


On Aug 30, 2007, at 8:15 AM, subbukk wrote:

> On Thursday 30 August 2007 10:55 am, bradallenfuller at yahoo.com wrote:
>> Have you seen this video about image resizing
>> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qadw0BRKeMk
> Brad,
>
> This is a very interesting approach to image resizing. The video  
> shows only
> photographic images. Has it been applied to font resizing?
>
> Regards .. Subbu
>