Thursday June 11, 2009
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Font News
Anonymous Pro Now Available
I announced back in April that a new version of my popular free font Anonymous™ would be available soon. That would be today.
Anonymous Pro is now available.
Friday May 1, 2009
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Font News
Links
Veer Premieres "F is for Fail"
Proxima Nova stars in a new animated short film by Brent Barson, sponsored by Veer: “F is for Fail” (and co-starring Adobe’s Arno Pro). The still from the film (above) sums up my reaction. Well done, Brent! (And thanks to Veer, too.)
Thursday April 23, 2009
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Font News
Links
Lakeside and Filmotype Zanzibar Favorited
I’m really honored to have my Lakeside and Filmotype Zanzibar among the 40 typefaces chosen in Typographica’s “Our Favorite Typefaces of 2008”. Thanks so much, Dyana and J.F.
I participate in this annual tradition from the other side of the fence as well. I chose Nick Shinn’s Modern Suite, which blew me away when I saw the specimen book for it at last year’s TypeCon in Buffalo.
Friday April 17, 2009
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Font News
Coming Soon: Anonymous Pro
This has been in the works for a while now. I released the current version of Anonymous in 2001, with a few tweaks and updates since, but nothing you could call a major new feature.
In fact, there have been numerous requests for features from users, and many of these have been incorporated into Anonymous Pro, such as:
- Bold and italics, making it a complete four-style family
- Expanded character set, covering most Latin-based languages, as well as Greek and Cyrillic
- Metrics adjusted to make it more similar in size to other fonts
- Several characters redesigned for better readability and clarity
- Many small improvements to the overall design of the characters
- Box-drawing characters—you never know when you might need them
I’m still in final testing, but I expect to release Anonymous Pro soon. [Update: Anonymous Pro is available now.] And, like the current version, it will be free. Here is a sneak peek (click to see it bigger):
Tuesday March 31, 2009
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Font News
Sneak Preview: SketchFlow Print
I’ve recently been working on a font for Microsoft called SketchFlow Print. It will be bundled with the next version of Expression Blend, part of Microsoft’s Expression Studio suite. A new feature of the program, called SketchFlow, allows a designer to create a prototype of an application that looks like a sketch, and it comes with fonts to support that look. Christian Schormann, one of the brains behind the app, demoed SketchFlow at MIX09, and you can see SketchFlow Print in use throughout his presentation.
The idea for SketchFlow Print came from Doug Olson at Microsoft, who wanted a typeface in the style of lettering used by architects. There are already many “architect” fonts, but none of them had the natural, lively look he wanted. Doug had worked previously with talented residential architect Michaela Mahady of SALA Architects, Inc., and was taken by her lettering. She agreed to let it be the starting point for SketchFlow Print and provided samples for me to work from.
Typefaces based on handwriting can be tricky because typefaces are unnaturally consistent compared to real handwriting. This problem is sometimes overcome by using multiple variations of common letters, which can then be substituted automatically or manually to avoid obvious repetitions. Fortunately, Michaela’s handwriting is quite neat and consistent already, so we decided to keep it simple and just have one version of each letter. The challenge for me was to make subtle changes to minimize conspicuous patterns or disruptions in the overall texture, without resorting to alternates or draining the life out of it. All of us are pretty happy with the way it turned out.
Tuesday January 20, 2009
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Font News
Introducing Changeling Neo
In 2003, I released my interpretation of China, an old VGC face, which I called Changeling. I redesigned many of the characters for more even type color. I also added lowercase-style variants to nearly all the uppercase forms, for endless “unicase” combinations, alternate forward- and back-slanting characters for A, M, V, and W, and a more complete character set. I spaced it to emulate the “tight, but not touching” style of spacing popular in the ’70s. Finally, I created four new styles—Light, Regular, Stencil, and Inline.
Changeling Neo (2008) builds on this with even more alternate characters (including a few from VGC China I had previously left out), extensive language support, and lots of improvements in fit and finish. Changeling Neo is available exclusively in the OpenType format. Alternate characters are accessed using OpenType Stylistic Alternates and Stylistic Sets features. Standard characters that were “hijacked” in Changeling (to make room for alternate characters) have been reinstated. Changeling Neo also includes support for fractions, superscript and subscript, as well as tabular figures.
For more information, I’ve made two PDFs you can download:
Changeling Neo is available now from MyFonts.com.
Friday January 9, 2009
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Font News
Introducing Refrigerator Deluxe
Refrigerator dates back to 1988 as one of my earliest PostScript typefaces. The concept was very simple: A blocky, condensed sans serif with rigidly geometric forms. I was inspired partly by Neville Brody’s Industria, but very quickly it veered toward more of a mid-20th century vernacular appearance. It wasn’t based on anything specific. Rather, it seemed to come from memories of block-style lettering from when I was young.
Refrigerator Deluxe (2008) extends the family from a specific vernacular style to an anthology of vernacular styles through the extensive use of alternate characters, nearly doubling the character count. (The alternate characters are accessed either through OpenType Stylistic Sets or the Glyph palette, depending on your software application). These range from squared off, closed shapes, with a minimum of angled strokes, to open, stylized shapes with more of an Art Deco feel. Using different combinations of these alternates, Refrigerator Deluxe can take on an endless variety of appearances from basic block to high style.
Also new in Refrigerator Deluxe is the addition of a fourth weight (Regular), improvements in many small details, like spacing, kerning, hinting (for better on-screen display), character design refinements, extensive language support (most Western and Central European Latin-based languages), fractions, case-sensitive forms, and lots of “f” and “t” ligatures.
For more information, I’ve made two PDFs you can download:
Refrigerator Deluxe User Guide
Refrigerator Deluxe is available now from MyFonts.com.
Monday November 24, 2008
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Font News
Coming Soon: Diane Script
I recently partnered with Mark Solsburg of FontHaus, who has lately become fascinated with twentieth century French type foundries and type designers, to create a faithful digital revival of Diane, a typeface designed by Roger Excoffon. It was released in 1956, around the same time as his more famous Mistral and Choc. For reasons that aren’t clear to me, Diane seems to have never become as popular as his other faces, especially in the U.S. Finding full specimens of the font turned out to be quite a challenge. In many cases, only the caps and lowercase are shown.
With Mark’s help, I was able to get hold of source material from the University of Groningen in the Netherlands, D. Stempel GmbH metal type services in Frankfurt, Germany, as well as from some type specimen books that I already had in my possession.
As I researched and studied the face, many curious facts came to light. The caps in earlier specimens of Diane are completely different from specimens published later, suggesting that the face was redesigned at some point, perhaps in the mid-1960s. So we are left with two different sets of caps.
The original had very elaborate, swirly strokes, characteristic of Excoffon’s gestural designs for posters and logos. Later on, these appear to have been replaced by a set of simpler, more traditional script caps. The original caps are criticized in one source I found (“Practical Handbook on Display Typefaces”, 1959) as being “exquisite” but “not highly legible”. Perhaps this is what led to the simpler caps being introduced.
Even more curious, the caps shown in the Olive specimen “3 Scriptes” that accompanied its release in 1956 are noticeably different from the ones found in existing Diane metal fonts. The only conclusion I can make is that Diane, as it was shown in the “3 Scriptes” specimen, was not yet finalized when this was published. (Some of these earlier character designs are included in my revival.)
Changes appear to have been made in the lowercase as well. Several characters have non-connecting incoming strokes in the 1956 version. In the later version, the strokes all connect. The lowercase o also differs, with the original “3 Scriptes” specimen showing a loop inside the counter, apparently dropped in the released version.
In my digital revival of Diane, I’ve included many of these differences. Diane Script Première includes the beautiful caps from the original version, while Diane Script features the later, simpler caps. Both faces include the non-connecting lowercase characters and the earlier lowercase o as alternate characters. Diane Script Première includes three of the “unfinished” caps from the “3 Scriptes” specimen as alternates.
Of course, metal foundry faces had nowhere near the number of characters that modern digital faces do, so it was necessary to design quite a few new characters to match Excoffon’s original ones. This proved to be a fairly straightforward process, with one exception: the ampersand.
As hard as it is for me to believe, it appears that Diane never had an ampersand. None of the specimens I’ve found so far has shown one. I still hold out the possibility that one exists, and intend to add it if it turns up. In the mean time, I have come up with two that I am satisfied with. The first is a simpler design to go with the simpler caps in Diane Script. In the second, I tried to capture the energy and exuberance of Excoffon’s original caps. Studying Excoffon’s gestural design work was very helpful for this. Diane Script Première includes both ampersands, with the simpler one as an alternate.
Diane Script and Diane Script Première are not the first attempt to revive Diane digitally. However, in my research, I discovered a detail that previous attempts have gotten wrong: the alignment and spacing of the caps in relation to the lowercase. Unlike most typefaces, Diane’s caps actually sit slightly below the lowercase baseline. The most easily found specimens of Diane show the caps and lowercase separately, so this fact is hidden. Luckily, my source material included a few obscure specimens in which the correct relationship can be seen.
Several of the lowercase letters have disconnected outgoing strokes, intended to connect to the following letter. However, when it falls at the end of a word, the disconnected stroke is conspicuous and unnecessary. In the metal typeface, this was apparently an acceptable compromise. But in OpenType format, we can have it both ways. When such a character falls at the end of a word, the orphaned stroke is omitted automatically. (An OpenType-savvy application and/or operating is system required for this feature to work.)
In reviving Diane, I’ve sometimes felt more like a detective than a type designer. I’m very happy with the way it turned out and hope my efforts will bring new life to Roger Excoffon’s masterpiece.
Diane Script and Diane Script Première are available now from FontHaus.
Friday October 3, 2008
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Font News
Introducing Filmotype Ginger
Ginger is the most recent Filmotype font I’ve digitized. (See also Zanzibar and Glenlake.) It’s the first in a range of Filmotype “G” series fonts—condensed sans serifs whose names all start with “G”—that have many Futura-like features that are unusual for the style. I was interested in this range of typefaces even before I knew about Filmotype. Few of them have ever been digitized before. I plan to do all of them eventually (sooner than later, I hope).
To bring Ginger into the 21st century meant designing dozens of new characters to expand its limited character set. Caps, lowercase, numbers and a few symbols and punctuation marks might have been okay back in the 1950s, but today’s fonts are global citizens and have to play as well in Prague as they do in Peoria. In designing the new characters, I tried to imagine how Ginger’s designer would have designed them. (We know who designed some of the Filmotype fonts, but not Ginger. Over the years many of the records of who did what were lost.)
Like all the new Filmotype revivals (available from Font Bros), Ginger has been remastered to high standards and is a modern font in every way. It is available in OpenType format, which means you can use the same font on either Mac or PC, and includes many OpenType goodies, such as an alternate lowercase “a”, arbitrary fractions, case-sensitive forms, and extensive language support.
Filmotype Ginger is available now from Font Bros.
Friday May 16, 2008
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Font News
New Metallophile Sp8 Fonts Released
I released the Light and Light Italic styles of Metallophile Sp8 in 2003. The original plan was to add more weights later, but later never seemed to come. When I started getting requests from customers for more weights, I realized that had to change.
And now it has. Introducing Metallophile Sp8 Medium and Medium Italic. These, like the original Metallophile Sp8 fonts, are based on a classic sans serif hot metal face, Spartan, set at 8 points.
My concept was based on the observation that digital versions of classic typefaces look quite different from their counterparts in metal type. The metal faces, printed on plate-finish paper using letterpress printing, had a warmth and texture that was lost in the precise mathematical world of digital typography. It was not only the imperfections of ink on cast metal, it was also the proportions and spacing, which were particular to the size of type. In digital type (with some exceptions), one size fits all. In metal type, every size was custom tailored. 8 point digital Futura looks quite different than 8 point metal Futura, especially in print.
There have been some attempts in digital type at simulating the look of classic metal typefaces, such as ITC Founder’s Caslon, but rarely has it been tried with more modern sans serifs. Metallophile Sp8 Light was an attempt, but without more weights it was limited in its usefulness.
The original metal Spartan Light was paired (or “duplexed”) with Medium as a boldface on the old Linotype casting machines. With that in mind, I decided Metallophile Sp8 Medium would be the best boldface for Metalophile Sp8 Light.
As part of this process, the entire family was moved to the OpenType format, with a greatly enlarged character set, including extensive language support, a full set of math characters (based on the standard “pi” sorts of the metal type days), f-ligatures, a large set of pre-built fractions as well as arbitrary fractions via OpenType. The new fonts also include and alternate two-story lowercase “a” and alternate left quote marks, just like the original metal face. I redesigned the “ß” to give it the more traditional form, but included the more contemporary version I did in the original Metallophile Sp8 fonts as an alternate.
More weights are already in the works, which I hope to release this Summer, but I wanted to get these out as soon as they were ready.
Monday May 12, 2008
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Font News
Metallophile Sp8 OpenType Coming Soon
When I released Metallophile Sp 8 in 2003, the plan was to add more weights eventually. Now that I am converting my older fonts to OpenType format, that time has come. These four fonts should be available soon from my usual distributors. More details to come. More weights later this year.
Monday March 17, 2008
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Font News
Introducing Filmotype Zanzibar
Zanzibar is the second Filmotype font I’ve digitized. (The first was Glenlake.) At first glance, I didn’t think much of it. But when I started looking more closely, I realized I’d never seen anything quite like it and decided I needed to do it.
That “Zanzibar” is nearly an anagram of “bizarre” seems fitting. The surviving people from Filmotype (later Alphatype) have not been able to tell us who designed this gem, so we have no record of the designer’s intentions. Released in the early 1950s, it seems somewhat inspired by the work of Lucian Bernhard (Bernhard Tango, 1934) and Imre Reiner (Stradivarius, 1945). At first, it appears to be a formal script, but there are no connecting strokes. It would be better described as a stylized italic, similar to Bodoni Condensed Italic or Onyx Italic, with swash capitals.
About those capitals: If they were plans for roller coaster tracks, they would either be unsafe or very exciting to ride. I have rarely seen such a whimsical combination of spirals and angles. Perhaps the happy result of one too many martinis?
The overall effect—a mix of hairlines, swelling strokes, and dots—reminds me of musical notation. I kept this in mind as I filled out the missing characters. Film font designers had it easy. The original design included only caps, lowercase, numbers, and a minimal set of punctuation and currency symbols—about 70 characters. The digital version contains over 400 characters, including support for most Latin-based languages, math symbols (you never know), user-defined fractions (OpenType support required), and all the usual characters you expect in a modern font.
I also added a few alternate characters to address a design flaw in the original. The lowercase b, h, and k all have a little hook at the top that goes to the left. Unfortunately, when one of these characters follows an f or l, it causes an unsightly collision. Moving them apart only makes it worse. To address this, I created hookless versions of all three that come into play automatically when you enable the OpenType Contextual Alternates feature in your layout or graphics program.
Filmotype Zanzibar is available now at Font Bros.
Wednesday February 6, 2008
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Font News
Introducing Lakeside
I haven’t been posting much to Notebook lately because I’ve been, well, busy. The thing I’ve been busy with is this:
Lakeside is a script face I’ve been working on for the past two years. It was initially commissioned by an independent filmmaker for use in some film titles. It’s based on the hand-lettered titles of the classic 1944 film noir classic “Laura.”
An unusual feature of Lakeside is that it has three styles of capital letters suited to different uses:
There are normal caps for, er, normal use; over-sized caps for a fancier appearance; and smaller, plainer caps for all-caps settings—something not normally possible with a script font like this.
Lakeside takes advantage of the OpenType format to put a virtual lettering artist at your fingertips. Here is the font with OpenType Contextual Alternates turned off and then on:
Notice how each letter tailors itself to its position within a word, using a different form depending on whether it comes at the beginning, middle or end. Notice also how the crossbar on the lowercase “t” seems to “know” about adjacent letters and adjusts its width appropriately. (It’s not actually “a little bit too tight,” it’s just that those words are good for showing how the magic works.)
For more information, see the Lakeside Specimen Sheet (496k PDF) and the Lakeside User Guide (1mb PDF).
Licenses for Lakeside can be purchased at Font Bros. Other venues will be added soon.
(Note: Last year I mentioned this font on Notebook when it was still under development. At that time, it was to be called “Launderette.” Unfortunately, that name was taken—twice—so I chose the name “Lakeside” instead.)
Tuesday August 28, 2007
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Font News
Presenting Filmotype Glenlake
You could say I’m a Tim Burton fan. I’ve written elsewhere about some of the typographic anachronisms in his film Ed Wood, but I also think the titles in that film are wonderfully, typographically evocative—pitch perfect for the period in which the film is set. For a long time, though, I couldn’t figure out what the bold, condensed sans serif typeface was that they used in the titles.
I’m not easily stumped identifying typefaces, but this was one of only two times I’ve posted a query to the Typophile Type ID Board. In the end, I found it myself: Glenlake. (After I found it, I wondered if the Ed Wood title designers chose it because of the name—as in Ed Wood’s film Glen or Glenda… Could be.)
Still, Glenlake was something of a mystery. It popped up here and there in old film font catalogs, sometimes with a different name, but where did it come from? The more I looked at it, the more distinctive it seemed… a kind of Fifties precursor of Compacta or Helvetica Compressed (both Sixties designs).
So last year, when Stuart Sandler invited me to help digitize the classic Filmotype library, and I saw Glenlake was part of the library, I had to say yes. There are more of these funky/cool Filmotype faces to come—perhaps even more weights of Glenlake (it had only one)—including some really cool scripts that I’m working on.
Above: One of the original Filmotype film font machines.
Of course, the old Filmotype fonts were made mostly in the Fifties, and they pretty much only did the basic character set—caps, lowercase, numbers, and some punctuation. The digital version is being released in the oh-so-modern OpenType format and includes a complete, modern character complement, suitable for setting type in most Latin-based languages. I even threw in alternate designs for the “a” and “y”—something that didn’t exist in the original Glenlake design, but was common in Filmotype’s other sans serif fonts.
So, there you have it. Filmotype Glenlake, a digital revival of a classic Filmotype font from the Fifties, available for online purchase from Font Bros. I think it’s a heck of a font, and one that I’m proud to have helped bring back from obscurity. (Be sure to check out the other new release, Filmotype MacBeth, a bouncy, casual serif design.)
Thursday June 14, 2007
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Font News
Proxima Nova 1.2
Proxima Nova is now up to version 1.2 with a couple of new features:
- It now includes supplemental fonts (in OpenType format) containing small caps/old style figures (ScOsf) and alternate characters (Alt) in place of the normal lowercase, figures, etc. This allows programs that don’t yet have proper OpenType support (Flash, Word, etc.) to access small caps, old style figures and alternate characters.
- Previously unencoded glyphs have been encoded (private use area) to make it easier to access glyphs via Unicode in situations where OpenType feature support is lacking.
Customers needing either of these new features who purchased Proxima Nova licenses from my site (www.ms-studio.com) may contact me at mark@ms-studio.com for a free upgrade. Please include your DigiBuy order number.
Friday June 1, 2007
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Font News
Kinescope and Snicker Update
Kinescope and Snicker, which were released last month at Font Bros, are now available here at Mark Simonson Studio as well.
Update to the update: I’ve added a special set that includes both fonts for only $39 (basic license).
Monday April 30, 2007
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Font News
Kinescope and Snicker Released
Mark Simonson Studio is proud to announce the release of two new display fonts: Kinescope and Snicker. Both fonts were inspired by hand-lettered titles in the old Fleischer Brothers’ animated Superman cartoons from the 1940s.
Kinescope uses advanced OpenType magic to choose the most pleasing character shapes as you type and features extended language support. (An application with advanced OpenType support required for the magic stuff.) To find out more, check out the Kinescope User Guide (1.6mb PDF).
Advanced OpenType support is not required by Snicker, but it has some tricks up its sleeve, including case-sensitive punctuation, automatic fractions, and extended language support. To find out more, check out the Snicker User Guide (1.2mb PDF).
For the first month, Kinescope and Snicker will be available as low as $29 each exclusively from Font Bros. Follow these links for more details:
June 1 Update: Kinescope and Snicker are now available here at Mark Simonson Studio as well.
Wednesday March 7, 2007
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Font News
Three New Fonts: Update
Well, here it is the beginning of March and those three new fonts I wrote about in December are still not out. A few people have written me about this, so I should explain.
Basically, I keep getting sidetracked by client work, taking time away from finishing the new fonts. Client work has real deadlines—deadlines I have no control over. My self-imposed deadline for finishing the fonts was, by comparison, more flexible. So when push came to shove, you can imagine what happened.
The good news is that I’m on the case again and it shouldn’t be much longer. I hesitate to give a date except: soon.
Update: Kinescope and Snicker have now been released (April 30, 2007).
Tuesday December 5, 2006
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Font News
Coming Soon: Three New Fonts
As you may be able to tell by my sporadic Notebook postings of late, I’ve been a very busy guy. Some of the things I’ve been working on I can’t talk about (yet).
One of the things I can talk about is three new fonts I will be releasing in the near future. All three were inspired by hand lettered titles in 1940s films.
Kinescope and Snicker are loosely based on title lettering in Fleischer Studio’s animated Superman films from the forties.
In both fonts I’ve ended up with something a bit different than the source of my inspiration, but I think you can see the resemblance.
Kinescope will include context-sensitive characters. For example, when a letter falls at the end of a word, the connecting stroke is clipped off. This gives settings a more natural hand-lettered look. Stylistically, Kinescope falls somewhere between Brush Script and Kaufmann Script, but more elegant than either.
Snicker is a cartoony block letter style. One of the design challenges with Snicker was to come up with a suitable lowercase—the lettering in the Fleischer titles that inspired me only used capitals. Although it is intended for display sizes, it works pretty well for text. Consequently, I’m toying with the idea of adding a lighter weight and italics. It could perhaps become a typographically interesting alternative to Comic Sans…
The third font, Launderette, is based closely on lettering used in the titles of the 1944 Otto Preminger film, Laura:
This font was originally commissioned by a filmmaker who wanted to use the same “font” in the titles of his own film. As with most films of that time, the titles were hand-lettered by an artist, not typeset.
The challenge with this font was that there were very few characters in the source lettering. Most of the characters had to be created from scratch to match the style of the existing ones. Launderette, like Kinescope, will have context-sensitive characters to give it a custom, hand-lettered look.
I hope to release these new fonts by the end of the year.
Update: Kinescope and Snicker have now been released (April 30, 2007).
Wednesday August 16, 2006
Filed under:
Font News
Font Bros.
Fellow font guy Stuart Sandler and his partner, Mike Ibach, have launched a new online font venue called Font Bros. The site has some of the same retro look as Stuart’s older Font Diner site, but unlike Font Diner, it offers a hand-picked selection of display faces from a dozen or so independent foundries (including Mark Simonson Studio).
The range of styles covers the whole gamut of type and lettering genres, not just retro. Some of the fonts (like Michael Doret’s amazing Metroscript) are brand new. They are also in the process of remastering the formerly freeware Fontalicious library, bringing it up to professional quality standards.
So, go check it out. It’s pretty cool. www.fontbros.com
Monday January 9, 2006
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Font News
Proxima Nova 1.1 Released
The new release of Proxima Nova features a couple of compatibility fixes and more flexible access to alternate characters.
As a side benefit of one of the fixes, the Normal, Condensed, and Extra Condensed styles appear in their own font submenus. This turns out to be a better arrangement than having the whole family all in one submenu. I should have done it this way in the first place.
Alternate characters will now be much easier to deal with. I’ve set up seven “Stylistic Sets” so that alternate characters may be substituted globally in any combination. The new sets are also smarter the the original two in the way they handle the two-story and one-story lowercase “a” in the roman and italic. Again, I should have done it this way in the first place.
The update is free to customers who purchased before December 14, 2005. Customers who purchased after December 14, 2005 already have the new version.
For complete details, see this PDF file.