Graphics Programs Reference
In-Depth Information
to forgo a Happy Meal or two, Sloop Script is remarkably
fresh, legible, and elegant (available in three styles for
$40 each).
Blackletter fonts
N
Blackletter typefaces are not easy
to read, but if you have a funeral or Hallowe'en party to
advertise, or a logo for a Mega-Destruction rock group
T-shirt, blackletter fonts cast the tone of anything you
type.
Pi (picture) fonts
N
A digital font is composed of a
runtime program that Windows executes, instruction sets
for kerning and metrics, but beyond this, the characters
in a font don't have to be English, and they don't
even have to be text in any language. Pi fonts—also
called dingbats and extras when the picture font offers
embellishments to an accompanying text font—are
collections of little vector drawings. Pi fonts are
especially welcome to add a distinctive element when
you're designing a logo. You already own a few Pi fonts:
Windows Wingdings and Web Dings come preinstalled
with your operating system.
Finally, designer typefaces
don't belong to any class
of typeface. Grunge fonts
(deliberate degraded typefaces),
typewriter-style fonts, Retro
(good for creating fast-food
and novelty logos), fonts
whose characters are mirrored
to simulate DaVinci's secret
manuscript writing … are all
examples of highly recognizable
styles. Here is a compendium of
typeface specimens discussed in
this section.
Sans serif — Headline fonts
Serif — Paragraph text fonts
Designer and novelty fonts
Pi (picture) fonts
Although we use the terms synonymously today, a
font
refers to a specific set of glyphs or files
you install on your system. A
typeface
refers to a style of character set and can have many
different styles, such as Bold, Bold-Italic, Condensed, Old Style (which has numbers whose
baselines alternate for legibility), Expanded, and others. Clipboard (a font that ships on the Xtreme CD) is a
font because it has no family members (nor deserves any). On the other hand, Bodoni is a typeface and has
quite a large family.
