Once you have data, you can use various processes to make large type. When FontShop released our new FF Real, I took the opportunity and had one weight in one size cut from maple wood. I took the font data and surrounded the outlines with a thin line. That instructed the CNC machine to cut the body of the letter just 3 units (on a 1000-unit system) away from the extreme points of the character shape.

Buchstaben Gemacht
We’ve tried it all: plexi, maple, pear, resin, magnesium, polymer, formica. CNC milling, 3D-printing, pantograph cutting, etched metal, vacuum-forming
Real Anweisung
Instructions for CNC milling
Real Tisch
This is what new wood type looks like
Real Korrex
FF Real as wood type, 16 cicero, in the Korrex proof press