Getting a larger font (NOT \fontsize)?

Question

I am trying to get some playing cards made with the help of the allrunes package.

However, the package "only" comes with fonts up to 35pt installed. If I set \fontsize to something larger, pdflatex resets to the maximum installed size.

How do I get larger glyphs? (Like, large enough to fill 1/6th of a page?) I know this should be comparatively easy, and I tried to google for it, but all I get are hundreds of references to \fontsize and \Huge, which doesn't help... :-\

Answer 1

You could try scaling:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{allrunes}
\usepackage{graphicx}

\newcommand\scaledrune[2][10]{\scalebox{#1}{\textarc{#2}}}

\begin{document}

\textarc{\TeX}

\scaledrune{\TeX}

\scaledrune[20]{\TeX}

\end{document}

Answer 2

LaTeX will be told what font sizes are available with a command like

\DeclareFontShape{OT1}{cmr}{bx}{sl}
      {%
      <5><6><7><8><9>%
      <10><10.95><12><14.4><17.28><20.74><24.88>cmbxsl10%
      }{}

If in fact it is a scalable font and can be used any size then you declare that the font is available at all sizes.

For example by default the computer modern fonts are set up to only allow standard sizes, but type1cm package makes declarations such as

\DeclareFontShape{OT1}{cmr}{bx}{sl}{
        <->     cmbxsl10
      }{}

which says (bold slanted roman in this case) font is available at any size, and so after such a declaration in the preamble you can declare any size such as

  \fontsize{1in}{1.5in}\selectfont

and LaTeX will give you 1in font without substitution. You'd need to look at the font names used by your rune font package to know what to use instead of {OT1}{cmr}{bx}{sl}.

Answer 3

Ok, I was beaten to scalebox, but you mentioned playing cards so here's I whipped up just now in TikZ.

\documentclass{standalone}
\usepackage{tikz}
\usetikzlibrary{fit,shapes,positioning,backgrounds}

\begin{document}

\begin{tikzpicture}[node distance=1.6cm, scale=0.5, shape aspect=0.75, fill=red]
    \node[diamond, fill, scale=0.5] (D1) at (-1.5cm,2.1cm) {};
    \node[above=0.5mm of D1, red,scale=0.5, rotate around={180:(D1)}] {A};
    \node[diamond, fill, scale=0.5] (D2) at (1.5cm,-2.1cm) {};
    \node[above=0.5mm of D2, red,scale=0.5] {A};
    \node[diamond, fill] (D3) at (0,0) {};
    \begin{pgfonlayer}{background}
        \node[draw, fill=white, rounded corners=0.5mm, fit=(D1) (D2),scale=0.5] {};
    \end{pgfonlayer}
\end{tikzpicture}

\end{document}

This is pretty crappy TikZ code, and can definitely be improved. The nice thing is that TikZ allows scaling, so this automatically solves your problem.