All these fresh faces just arrived this week. As always, subscribe to our newsletter and read this blog for the full stories on these. Now for all the latest from the following foundries:
Capitol Pro , Capitol Skyline Pro
Korolev / Compressed / Condensed / Korolev Italic
M Metallic Hei PRC
M Stiff Hei PRC
M Stream PRC
Cariola Script
Coomeec Pro
Levato Pro
David Hadash
Fencing Regular
Koorkin Pro
Terminax Regular
Titanium Motors
Our Fontlympic Decathlon continues, but first, yesterday’s results:
Now on to today’s event. Kerns are adjustments in spacing made to specific pairs of letters. Some letter pairs, due to the nature of their forms, tend to crash or trap too much whitespace when juxtaposed. Look at the following samples and select the one that exhibits the best overall spacing, keeping in mind that sometimes the best kerns are the ones that don’t exist.
Polls close at midnight (Pacific). The next event in our Typographic Decathlon continues here tomorrow at 1pm.
This week and next our Fontlympic coverage turns to the Typographic Decathlon, beginning today with the Headline event. Five contenders test their ability in a series of challenges ranging from the sprint—to the long running text.
Competing for the top spots are Jackson Cavanaugh’s Alright Sans, Eric Olson’s Klavika, Michael Abbink’s FF Milo, Christian Schwartz’s Neue Haas Grotesk, and Jörg Hemker’s FF Sero. As each face is put through its paces, one will emerge as the best performer all-around.
Using your typographic eye and best judgment, select the face that best completes the challenge.
Polls will remain open until midnight tonight, Pacific. Responses will be tallied and points awarded daily. The next event begins here in 24 hours.
Some fonts on FontShop are unfortunately only available in PostScript and TrueType formats. While we generally recommend not purchasing PostScript fonts whenever possible, we understand that Mac users may be concerned about compatibility — don’t worry, TrueType works with Macs!
Although during checkout, the format options may be noted as “PC TrueType”, this format is in fact compatible with Macs. Mac users can install TrueType fonts on their computers. If you’re a Mac user running OSX, we recommend purchasing TrueType instead of Mac PostScript if OpenType is not an option since PostScript is a legacy format that may cause issues on newer computers. TrueType files end in .ttf which you can install and use on Macs.
Next week, we’ll go over the differences of the formats — stay tuned!
As things kick off in London today, we’ll be pinning athletic design inspiration on our Fontlympics 2012 Pinterest board.
Next week, we’ll be hosting the Fontlympic Decathlon on our blog. The five typefaces that will be competing against each other in various events next week will be showcased not only on the blog, but the Fontlympics Pinterest board as well — you won’t want to miss out on which face will be crowned the best all-around typeface!
Besides the Fontlympics, we couldn’t contain our excitement for the release of the Dark Knight trilogy finale last week and took a look into the use of typography in the bat years gone by.
From the onomatopoeia discussed on the FontFeed a couple months ago to the comical lettering of Adam West days, Batman has flown through sharply edged letters to shiny type to serifs and finally down to simple sans for the Dark Knight trilogy. Check out the typographic evolution of Batman beginning with movie posters from the 1940s on our Holy Typography Batman! Pinterest board.
And for the coffee-holics anonymous out there, we have a Pinterest board just for you:
On our new Mugshot board, you’ll find a selection of coffee-themed fonts and matching images from fStop. Every time you feel like you’re having a case of the Mondays, head on over to our Pinterest to find type samples and images that will make you feel better.
July Staff Picks are in! Staff Picks are FontShop’s monthly chance to recommend faces we like and to suggest ones we’d like to see get more use. Let’s take a closer look at a few of them now. See the complete list.
“If it’s good enough for the Ramones, then it’s good enough for me.”
“A useful font that’s great for text, and at larger sizes you see the interesting cuts each glyph has.”
We’re also on Pinterest now, where you can graphically browse through recent Staff Picks, as well as see all the type-related stuff we happen upon while traversing the web.
What’s the difference between the new Epoca Classic, and the previously released Epoca also on hand here at FontShop?
The specific kind of contrast that Epoca Classic accentuates is stroke contrast—the difference in weight between the thick and thin strokes. The greater the difference, the higher the contrast. The more the strokes appear the same weight, as in Epoca, the lower its contrast, or more monolinear it becomes.
Epoca Classic’s heightened contrast adds a touch of sophistication to the design, and relieves a bit of the tension on the horizontals when printed at text sizes. This phenomenon is particularly visible in the heavier italic weights.
We’re pleased to welcome Epoca Classic to FontShop, and also glad to see it become a part of Hoftype’s Epoca family.
We hear there’s some big event kicking off in London this Friday (no, not TYPO London – but you can win a conference ticket for October 19-20). Getting in the spirit of international competition, we’re holding a coinciding event – The 2012 Fontlympics — a celebration of fonts and their many feats!
Catch a preview in last week’s newsletter and make sure to subscribe to future issues to catch all of the events. Watch our Twitter, Facebook, and Pinterest as we spotlight our typographic competitors over the 16 days of the games. And you will not want to miss staying tuned to the blog for a special interactive competition.
That’s right, beginning Monday, July 30 and ending Friday, August 10 the FontShop blog will host the Fontlympic Decathlon, pitting five typefaces against each other throughout 10 events. Vote each weekday for the best face in each event and help us determine the best all-around typeface.
Let the games begin!
These fresh faces just arrived this week. Here’s all our new stuff from the following foundries:
Epoca Classic by Dieter Hofrichter
Museo Sans Condensed by Jos Buivenga
Neubauladen
As always, there’s more to come on these, so make sure to subscribe to our newsletter, read this blog, and tell us what you’re thinking in the comments.
FF Chartwell Pies concludes our series on visualizing data with type. Pie charts are among the most familiar and easy to use, and in FF Chartwell Pies, that’s no exception. Just grab a set of values, make sure they add up to (or at least don’t exceed) 100, put plus signs in between, pick some colors, enable ‘Set 1′ from the OpenType Stylistic Sets, and you’re all set. More detailed instructions can be found in a previous FF Chartwell post.
To demonstrate FF Chartwell Pies, I created 366 pie charts, each representing a day of the year. The dark pieces represent nighttime hours and the light pieces represent daylight hours, as observed here in San Francisco this year. The two dark shades separate portions of the day between midnight and sunrise, and between sunset and midnight. Noting the abrupt change in angle of the daylight, one can spot Daylight Savings going into and out of effect, and other nice patterns. Today’s pie chart is the 16th chart on the 10th row, first image. Select the images for a closer view.
Though this is the end of our series, there’s more to look forward to still—including the soon to be released FF Chartwell Web, and all the stuff designers everywhere make out of this beautifully simple, utterly useful face.
Thinking how to close the Chartwell series, I thought of all the ways designers will be using FF Chartwell, and then thought up a few ways they probably wouldn’t use it. In the end I decided to make (and lead out with) type made out of charts made out of type. Thanks for reading, and send us back all the ways you use FF Chartwell. We’d love to see what you come up with.
Webfont licenses allow your font to live on your website using the CSS @font-face rule and come in two formats; EOT and WOFF.
Internet Explorer uses EOT, Embedded OpenType, to render webfonts and it has been supported since version 4.0. While WOFF, Web Open Font Format, is supported by multiple browsers — and it is currently in the process of being standardized upon the recommendation of the W3C.
If you are new to webfonts then take a peek at FontShop’s Designers Guide to Webfonts, available on our education page. It’s great introduction and while you’re there you can brush up on your typography skills.
We also recommend downloading FontFont’s webfont user guide, available here, for more in-depth reading aimed at web developers and system administrators.
On the eve of FontBook App for iPad’s first birthday, we can’t wrap up this week’s series without extending a big THANK YOU to the over 25,000 (that’s 50,000 font-ogling eyeballs) of you who have downloaded the app in the last year. Now close your eyes, make a wish, and tell us in the comments what you’d like to see in FontBook’s future!
Fonts don’t stop at digital downloads only — type is everywhere! We created two new Pinterest boards this week to help satisfy your type desires in physical form.
Fonts can be just as stylish as other designs we sport on a daily basis. Our Wearable Type board features fashionable finds from temporary tattoos to apparel to jewelry. Continue to be proud of your type geekiness even when away from your computer with these finds! Wear News Gothic designed by Morris Fuller Benton and John Renshaw on a warm hoodie, show your love for Simoncini Garamond with a t-shirt, or mark yourself with some slabs.
We also know many of the fonts we have available on FontShop are mouthwatering, but you can’t eat them (even if they are named Roast Beef or Candy)! Our Edible Type board will give you real glyphs to drool over. You can also find food-themed fonts such as René Menue Symbols OT from URW, Poppi Food Two from Emigre, and Too Much Coffee and Donuts OT from Comicraft on our Editable Type board.
Be sure to follow us on Pinterest, otherwise you’ll miss out on some tasty type!
Obviously Saturday’s birthday is a huge milestone for FontBook. But do you recall that the FontBook app grew up quite a bit in its first year?
Around five months, FontBook 2.0 emerged, adding 250 new families, a news stream, automatic updates, better bookmarking and more. In April, with the release of the Retina Display iPad, FontBook got a shiny new look. We’ve loved watching our baby change over the past 12 months. We hope you have too!
As we celebrate FontBook‘s birthday this week, we want to hear from you. Today’s question: what do you mostly use the FontBook app for iPad for?
Something else? Tell us in the comments.
