A Synthesis of Recognition and Morphing

We present a new approach to managing the appear-ance of handwritten symbolic information for pan-based systems in which text is recognized and gradu-ally transformed into clean typography. The approach is best suited to pen-based symbolic input and ma-nipulation in which the user interacts directly with the display. Once a collection of user-drawn strokes has been recognized as comprising a specific symbol, the strokes begin a gradual metamorphosis into the corresponding raster image from an appropriate font. The transformation retains legibility at all intermedi-ate stages and can proceed smoothly at widely dif-fering rates. The metamorphosis is accomplished by an energy-based stroke correspondence algorithm, fol-lowed by level-set shape transformation that gradually introduces characteristic features of a given font, such as serifs and spurs. This technique leads to a qualita-tively different form of pen-based interaction in which the user enjoys the benefits of character recognition and highly legible typefaces without abrupt changes in appearance or positioning of the text. The interplay between hand-written symbols and pre-defined raster fonts suggests a number of new methods for correcting character recognition errors; for instance, the recog-nizer can be given additional hints by “touching up” an incorrectly recognized symbol