Antic Typeface [updated]

Santiago Orozco's picture

I'm working in a font family inspired by modern calligraphic forms, It is called: Antic. I'm still working on the italics because I want to make them “true italics”, not just slanted.Hope you like it how it goes so far, and comment is welcome. Below there's a link to the pdf.


*link corrected*

Eimantas Paškonis's picture

Link doesn't work.

Eimantas Paškonis's picture

Show black & white pairs, alphabets and pangrams of the same size instead of posters.

Some of your letters (e, c, o) are slanted, while others (n, t, f, v, x...) are not.
/e/ bar falls out of style by being so thin. On the other side, curves are thicker than other stems.
Compare /n/ and /r/ connections - they are not the same.
Hairline /a/ looks fine, but heavier weight's tops are too heavy.
Either /M, O, C, Y/ are too wide, or other capitals are too narrow. Inconsistency.

Can't tell more because of provided poster limitations.

Stinger's picture

Looks very promising, like it a lot!

First things that I noticed is the somehwat small crossbar on the /e/ (in the "synth mixtape & coffee" line it really stands out). The /a/ on that same line also looks a bit off. Looks like you are trying to create contrastb there but it's not working exactly right (not sure how to fix it though, im not a pro myself)

as noted above, the /y/ seems a bit out of form since it's leaning a bit & has odd angles?

I like the /a/ and /c/ a lot. love how that c drops at the top

I see that the /M O C/ are wide as Minerva noted, but not sure if you should fix them. They need some companions maybe? You could decide to widen the /P/ and /R/ and similar others as well? Just an idea though, not sure how that will turn out!

Bendy's picture

It'd be a good idea to set some paragraphs (black on white) at text sizes and perhaps the glyph set at a large size so we can zoom on all the details and see how it performs in running copy.

Take all advice with plenty of salt...

Since this has a humanist architecture, consider the speed of writing...I really like the dynamism/forward motion of the e, and I think I'd try to match that in some other letters. The t for example is more restrained in its foot, which turns up more. Look also at how swoopy your ampersand (or the g) is compared to the f, which is much firmer. The base of the t is malformed in the middling light weights.

Your a sticks out a bit much for me: remember the game is to get even rhythm and counterspaces among all the letters. Especially in the boldest weight, it's hard to see whether the problem is the small counter of the a or the much larger counter of the o. I think o generally needs a little contrast, and probably some narrowing. (Also the c)

I think the n and r have different joins by necessity. I'd probably tweak the m however. There's something funny going on at the x-height in the m, n and r for me: the arch looks lower than the spurs, or the spurs look too long, I'm not sure.

Crossbars of I could be more definite, if you're going to go with this style.

It's normal for curves to be heavier than stems, at their thickest point, to compensate for the parts where they are thinner. I can't see any spots where you've made them too thick, other than perhaps the top of the e.

Spacing looks tight in the boldest weight.

Santiago Orozco's picture

Hi! thanks everybody!

@minerva: I was thinking the same of ‘y’, I've corrected now, and the joints on ‘n’ and ‘r’ are different by necessity, as @Bendy point it out

@stinger: I also first noticed the ‘e’ crossbar too, but I wasn't sure, that's the kind of things that need to be said by someone else

@Bendy: I wasn't aware of the stiffness on ‘t’ and ‘f’, and yes the ‘t’ on light weight is wrong, I'll try to low a little bit spurs on ‘m’ ‘n’ and ‘r’

now here are some examples of Antic in running text

Eimantas Paškonis's picture

Are the alphabets updated version?
And instead of pictures and body text, give alphabet (and some pangrams) .pdf's. Can't zoom in now.

/e/ crossbar still falls out. Try making it like /a/ pointed variant.
While you want flowing feel with some slanted letters, /a/ is pointing in the opposite direction.
When you change (thicken) /e/ bar, /g/ ear has to be changed too.
/b/ is narrower than /d/, /p/ is WAY narrower than /q/.
/y/ is still too slanted. It has to be made from /v/.
/z/ diagonal needs to be thinner.
/x/ is slanted (not sure if intended).
Add a bar to /G/ terminal.
/S/ too wide.
/Z/ and /z/ are slanted to the left.
Make /1/ flag shorter and more angular.
/2/ diagonal is too thick.
/6/ and /9/ are way too slanted.
Plus, there's lots of optical correction to be done.

Santiago Orozco's picture

@Minerva, no these aren't updated version

thank you for your comments!

Eimantas Paškonis's picture

How's the progress?

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