Kern Baby Kern

It has been predicted that Apple will have sold 45 million iPhones by the end of 2009. And that’s before it hits China. There aren’t hundreds of type-related apps for the iPhone, but here are few; and a few type-related tips too. (Helvetica Moleskine give-away details at the end).

iPhone apps

Recently released, MyFonts’ What The Font for iPhone is a terrific little app. The biggest barrier is not MyFonts’ image recognition technology (which has proven itself online), but the dreadfully inadequate iPhone camera. However, despite that it does a pretty good job. Just ensure that the lighting is good.

Continue reading this article

The Week in Type

The move to my new host, Fused Network, went very smoothly. As iLT has been expanding pretty rapidly, a server with a little more oomph was required. If you’re looking for great hosting and fantastic support, then try Fused. David, the main man at Fused is something of a server superstar.

Chelsea Darling was the winner of my first twitter-type prize. Chelsea won a copy of Simon Loxley’s The Secret History of Letters. I’ve decided to do this every week. So, from now on, I’ll pick a random follower and send you some type-related goodies. And, no, Chelsea Darling is not a character from AbFab — it’s her real name.

OK, let’s kick off this week’s the week in type with something I really want need. The Helvetica Moleskine:

Continue reading this article

The Week in Type

Welcome to this week’s the week in type. Thanks to all those who commented on David’s great On diacritics article. Upon seeing Greg Meadows’ photos from the boneyard in last week’s the week in type, Matthew sent me some of his own:

Continue reading this article

By David Březina

The globalisation of the type market and rising interest in multi-lingual typeface design is a source of great optimism among many typographers. Yet despite the proliferation of these beautiful new typefaces, many still do not support some European languages, let alone cater for African and Asian languages. In fact, contrary to the claims of advertisements, the offering is, in respect to language support, quite limited.

The aim of this article is to explain the fundamentals behind the use and design of Latin diacritical marks (accents) and help typographers make informed choices regarding their use. Design considerations are illustrated mostly with Central-European diacritics for the following reasons: a) they are generally less familiar to Western typographers. To quote Czech type designer Tomáš Brousil: “For Western typographers our accents are as strange as, for example, the Arabic script.” That they are seen as merely an add-on to the familiar Latin alphabet often leads to severely underestimating their importance; b) they are fairly familiar to the author; c) Central European, and the Czech language in particular, made one of the earliest uses of diacritics with Latin script (the substitution of diacritics for the use of digraphs was proposed by Jan Hus in his De Ortographia Bohemica in 1412).

Continue reading this article

The Week in Type

Notice anything different? iLT has gone green. In addition I have a new masthead. For more than a year, one of my all-time favourite typefaces has graced the head of these pages; but it’s time for a change. I had given some thought to a complete redesign, but then I asked myself, why? So, I’ve chosen not to redesign just for the sake of it. Instead, I’ve made some relatively minor changes, including the menu at the very top, tweaks to the sidebar, and swapping out the red for a little green. Now who can name the typeface?

OK, on with the show. Let’s start out with some more green. This lovely poster from ColorCubic:

And this even more impressive piece:
Continue reading this article

by Alec Julien

Five?

There are generally taken to be five vertical measures of note in type design (from bottom to top): descender, baseline, midline*, caps-height, and ascender.

But if you delve into the minutiae of font design, you soon discover that there are a slew of important vertical metrics that aren’t much talked about. In this article, I will take a look at several of these metrics, and how they are used in font design.
Continue reading this article

The Week in Type

A belated Happy New Year to all. It’s that back-to-work time for everyone. Feeling inspired? I’m hoping that 2009 will pass by a little slower than 2008. Here’s iLT’s first post of 2009. Enjoy!

You may have wished for one of these at Christmas. The leather ‘type bag’ from Assouline. If you have a spare $450, it’s not too late:

Via typornography.
Continue reading this article

Quality Free Font

A very brief post about a typeface from a type designer I’m particularly fond of. FF Reminga from Xavier Dupré is a great little text face with a sumptuous calligraphic italic. FontFont is offering the Bold Italic completely free of charge for a limited time. So, be sure to take it for a spin. And, be sure to check out some of Xavier’s other types.

Download Reminga Bold Italic. Be sure to let me know if you use it. Would love to see.

Thanks to Ivo for the heads up!

The Best of Type

This year has been a great year for type, with many new releases. Some of them are exceptional. Following is a list of my personal favourites of the past year. This is by no means an exhaustive list; there are, in fact, many others deserving of accolades.

Compendium

Difficult to imagine a best-of list with no showing from Ale Paul. This one is no exception. Ale released several great faces in 2008, but my favourite has to be Compendium. A fluid, beautifully crafted script, made all the more wonderful with a large helping of OpenType wizardry:

I wonder what Ale Paul has in store for 2009. I’ll be sure keep you up to date.
Continue reading this article

Come on Marlene

Fast closing in on 2009. I can’t believe it. What happened to 2008? The very lucky winner of the Seb Lester poster is mentioned toward the end of this post. Thanks to everyone who entered. This week’s the week in type is a big one, so make sure you’re sitting comfortably. Enjoy.

A beautiful new letterpress poster from Cameron Moll. I’ve ordered one:

Continue reading this article