typography : Copy & Print Center

The Font Wars: A Story On Rivalry Between Type Foundries

Posted by Simon Loxley on May 14, 2012 · Comments Off

I had thought terms like “intellectual property” and “intellectual theft” were of fairly recent provenance, so my eye was caught by the latter’s use in a headline of a 1930 edition of the US trade journal The American Printer. The article it headed proved to be equally intriguing, a response by the president of American Type Founders (ATF) to a June 1929 [...]

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Applying Macrotypography For A More Readable Web Page

Posted by Nathan Ford on May 2, 2012 · Comments Off

Any application of typography can be divided into two arenas: micro and macro. Understanding the difference between the two is especially useful when crafting a reading experience, because it allows the designer to know when to focus on legibility and when to focus on readability. This article focuses mostly on a few simple macrotypographic techniques—with a [...]

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A Closer Look At Font Rendering

Posted by Tim Ahrens on April 24, 2012 · Comments Off

The Web font revolution that started around two years ago has brought up a topic that many of us had merrily ignored for many years: font rendering. The newfound freedom Web fonts are giving us brings along new challenges. Choosing and using a font is not merely a stylistic issue, and it’s worth having a look at how the technology comes into play. While we [...]

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When Typography Speaks Louder Than Words

Posted by Carolyn Knight, Jessica Glaser on April 13, 2012 · Comments Off

Clever graphic designers love to use typography to explore the interaction between the look of type and what type actually says. In communicating a message, a balance has to be achieved between the visual and the verbal aspects of a design. Sometimes, however, designers explore the visual aspect of type to a much greater extent than the verbal. In these cases, [...]

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Drop Caps: Historical Use And Current Best Practices With CSS

Posted by Laura Franz on April 3, 2012 · Comments Off

The practice of using a large letter to mark the start of a text has been around for almost two thousand years. Illustrated caps increased usability by marking important passages and guiding readers through the text. Unlike their historic counterparts, drop caps on the Web don’t add value in terms of usability or readability—and they are hard for Web developers [...]

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Weird And Wonderful, Yet Still Illegible

Posted by Alastair Johnston on March 21, 2012 · Comments Off

First a question (or perhaps a Freudian jab at your subconscious): What does this shape represent? Could it be a trowel, a duck, an ornamental motif, or a seed-pod? I know, Aladdin’s Lamp! What if I told you it was an alphabetic character? What alphabet would you assign to it? Cham? Telugu? Perhaps it has the cursive quality of South Asian letterforms, created [...]

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Respect Thy Typography

Posted by Espen Brunborg on March 14, 2012 · Comments Off

Good typography shouldn’t have to rely on ornamental crutches to stand tall. Yet despite all the tools and knowledge available to us, we readily embrace a flourishing, decorative typography, with cheap tricks used in a misguided attempt to make it “pop”. This ancient art may rapidly be gaining popularity, but are we paying it the respect it deserves? Take [...]

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Japanese, A Beautifully Complex Writing System

Posted by Shoko Mugikura on March 5, 2012 · Comments Off

As a Japanese person living in Europe, I’m sometimes asked: “Japanese is a difficult language, isn’t it?” Those asking are often surprised when my answer is a simple: “No, actually, it’s not.” While it is true (at least to many Westerners) that Japanese is an exotic language, when compared to learning other European languages, it may seem [...]

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New High-Quality Free Fonts

Posted by Smashing Editorial Team on January 9, 2012 · Comments Off

Every now and then, we look around, select fresh free high-quality fonts and present them to you in a brief overview. The choice is enormous, so the time you need to find them is usually time you should be investing in your projects. We search for them and find them so that you don’t have to. In this selection, we’re pleased to present Homestead, Bree Serif, [...]

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16 Pixels: For Body Copy. Anything Less Is A Costly Mistake

Posted by D Bnonn Tennant on October 7, 2011 · Comments Off

16 Pixels For Body Copy. Anything Less IsA Costly Mistake I know what you’re thinking. “Did he just say 16 pixels? For body copy? Obnoxiously big! 12 pixels is ideal for most websites.” I’d like to persuade you otherwise. As usability expert Oliver Reichenstein [...]

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