How to generate the movie DVD available sound systems symbols?

Question

On the back every movie DVD I have seen there are bunnch of available sound systems characters, they look like a square (just the outside not solid filled) and a number of filled squares on various positions on the square e.g. right in the center, on the corners etc. You see the little characters right inline. I was wondering if one could do the same with circles etc. too? Consider a square at the same height of the alphabetical characters, then imagine other squares (they seem 1/8 th of the size of the first square), solid, also different number of solid squares in different configuration appears next to Languages, Subtitles and Commentary.

For example, the back of the DVD in the above image, at bottom left, on the right side of the barcode, before the "5.1 English," and right above the "Subtitles", on my DVDs, the similar character appears on the same line of the text and same height though.

How does one make them in (La)TeX?

Answer 1

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{pstricks}

\usepackage[active,tightpage]{preview}
\PreviewBorder=0pt% edit to suit your preference.
\PreviewEnvironment{pspicture}

\begin{document}
\begin{pspicture}[showgrid=false](-4,-4)(4,4)
    \psframe*(-4,-4)(4,4)
    \psset{linecolor=white}
    \psframe*(-0.5,-0.5)(0.5,0.5)
    \psframe*[origin={-3,3}](-0.5,-0.5)(0.5,0.5)
    \psframe*[origin={0,3}](-0.5,-0.5)(0.5,0.5)
    \psframe*[origin={3,3}](-0.5,-0.5)(0.5,0.5)
    \psframe*[origin={-3,-3}](-0.5,-0.5)(0.5,0.5)
    \psframe*[origin={3,-3}](-0.5,-0.5)(0.5,0.5)
    \psframe[linewidth=4pt,dimen=middle](-3,-3)(3,3)
\end{pspicture}
\end{document}

Explaination

1. Choose a document class. Using minimal is enough provided that you don't need settings (such as fonts, etc) defined in article. But here I used article by accident.

   \documentclass{article}
   

2. As we draw the diagram in question using PSTricks, we need to load pstricks package.

   \usepackage{pstricks}
   

3. In order to get a PDF output containing a single tight diagram for each page, load preview package, and configure its settings. Note that the PDF output in this answer only contains one page because there is only one pspicture; If we have more than one pspicture then we will have a PDF output with multiple pages.

    \usepackage[active,tightpage]{preview}
    \PreviewBorder=0pt% edit to suit your preference.
    \PreviewEnvironment{pspicture}
   

4. In most case the size of canvas must defined in advance (such as in this answer). By inspection, I chose (-4,-4) as the lower left corner and (4,4) as the top right corner.

    \begin{pspicture}[showgrid=false](-4,-4)(4,4)
    \end{pspicture}
   

5. Draw a black solid rectangle as the background. * is used to make the rectangle solid and the line color (black by default) will be used as the fill color.

    \psframe*(-4,-4)(4,4)
   

6. Because we want to draw several white solid rectangles, setting the line color to white globally saves more keystrokes.

    \psset{linecolor=white}
   

7. Draw a white solid rectangle at the center.

    \psframe*(-0.5,-0.5)(0.5,0.5)
   

8. Draw other white solid rectangles. The origin option can be used to translate the white solid rectangle used previously.

    \psframe*[origin={-3,3}](-0.5,-0.5)(0.5,0.5)
    \psframe*[origin={0,3}](-0.5,-0.5)(0.5,0.5)
    \psframe*[origin={3,3}](-0.5,-0.5)(0.5,0.5)
    \psframe*[origin={-3,-3}](-0.5,-0.5)(0.5,0.5)
    \psframe*[origin={3,-3}](-0.5,-0.5)(0.5,0.5)
   

9. Draw the white hollow rectangle. Note: there is no *. By default dimen is set to outer --- increasing the line width makes the path expand inward. For this answer, we need to change dimen to middle such that increasing the line width makes the path expand in both direction, inward and outward.

    \psframe[linewidth=4pt,dimen=middle](-3,-3)(3,3)
   

10. Compile with xelatex or latex-dvips-ps2pdf.

Answer 2

Adapting Damien Walters example using TikZ:

\documentclass[border=2pt]{standalone}
\usepackage{tikz}
\usetikzlibrary{calc}

\begin{document}
\begin{tikzpicture}[fill=white, draw=white, line width=8pt]
    \fill [fill=black] (-4,-4) rectangle (4,4);

    \fill ($( 0, 0) - (0.5,0.5)$) rectangle ($( 0, 0) + (0.5,0.5)$);
    \fill ($(-3, 3) - (0.5,0.5)$) rectangle ($(-3, 3) + (0.5,0.5)$);
    \fill ($( 0, 3) - (0.5,0.5)$) rectangle ($( 0, 3) + (0.5,0.5)$);
    \fill ($( 3, 3) - (0.5,0.5)$) rectangle ($( 3, 3) + (0.5,0.5)$);
    \fill ($( 3,-3) - (0.5,0.5)$) rectangle ($( 3,-3) + (0.5,0.5)$);
    \fill ($(-3,-3) - (0.5,0.5)$) rectangle ($(-3,-3) + (0.5,0.5)$);

    \draw (-3,-3) -- (-3, 3) -- ( 3, 3) -- ( 3, 3) -- ( 3,-3) -- cycle;
    \end{tikzpicture}
\end{document}