Two functions that help me handling Text in GD

gd_text_helper.php

<?php
function _calculateTextBox($text,$fontFile,$fontSize,$fontAngle)
{ 
		/************ 
	    simple function that calculates the *exact* bounding box (single pixel precision). 
	    The function returns an associative array with these keys: 
	    left, top:  coordinates you will pass to imagettftext 
	    width, height: dimension of the image you have to create 
	    *************/ 
	    $rect = imagettfbbox($fontSize,$fontAngle,$fontFile,$text); 
	    $minX = min(array($rect[0],$rect[2],$rect[4],$rect[6])); 
	    $maxX = max(array($rect[0],$rect[2],$rect[4],$rect[6])); 
	    $minY = min(array($rect[1],$rect[3],$rect[5],$rect[7])); 
	    $maxY = max(array($rect[1],$rect[3],$rect[5],$rect[7])); 

	    return array( 
	     "left"   => abs($minX) - 1, 
	     "top"    => abs($minY) - 1, 
	     "width"  => $maxX - $minX, 
	     "height" => $maxY - $minY, 
	     "box"    => $rect 
	    ); 
}

function _imagettfstroketext(&$image, $size, $angle, $x, $y, &$textcolor, &$strokecolor, $fontfile, $text, $px)
{
	for($c1 = ($x-abs($px)); $c1 <= ($x+abs($px)); $c1++)
	for($c2 = ($y-abs($px)); $c2 <= ($y+abs($px)); $c2++)
	$bg = imagettftext($image, $size, $angle, $c1, $c2, $strokecolor, $fontfile, $text);
	
	return imagettftext($image, $size, $angle, $x, $y, $textcolor, $fontfile, $text);
}