Installing custom fonts, from sites like www.dafont.com, can really add spice and style to your Graphic Design, Production Printing, or Graphic Communications assignments and projects. However, as the school as the computer system directories well protected, this limits you in what you can do. For instance, you cannot install fonts.

What? No fonts?

Well, thats not entirely true. There is a way, though temporary. However, there is a way.

Here's what you have to do

1. Go find that special font and download it by clicking on the "Download" button.
   
2. Save the font somewhere in a directory A good place to store them in is in a "fonts" folder in your student project directory.
   
3. Double click on that file that you downloaded. Usually, these aren't font files. They're compressed files (or, Zip files) that contain your font. Once you double click on it, it'll open the compressed file and you can copy/paste from it.
   
4. Extract (copy/paste) that font into your fonts folder that you created on the shared drive
   
5. Go to Start/ControlPanel/Fonts
   
6. Under "File" choose "Install New Font"
   
7. You need to navigate to wherever you saved your font file. Be sure to uncheck the box titled "Copy fonts to fonts folder"
   
8. Your font is temporarily installed.
   

Yes - temporarily installed. Which means once you log off and walk away from the computer, that font is uninstalled. So, every Illustrator, Photoshop, or InDesign document you made with that special font, once reopened, will not have it anymore - bummer!

What can be done in this situation?

• In Illustrator, once you've created text with your special font, you can right click on it and say "Create Outlines." This converts text to shapes (it only looks like text now).
  
• In Photoshop, once you've create text with your special font, you can right click on the text layer (under the Layer's pallette) and choose "Convert to Smart Object".