Follow-up to live critique

aquatoad's picture

Hi all.

I just finished reading the transcript from the recent live crit. Almost needed color coding to follow all the conversation threads! More of these live crits are in order.

One question in the chat that I wished I'd been involved with was "when to approach a distributor with you design?" Generally it seemed the response was: when you have something fairly "together" people will work with you to noodle and polish.

I was recently in Ed Benguit

aquatoad's picture

For example:

Here is one of my cap/display efforts from the class. Sent off to ITC per the above. The reply was very positive, and(but?) included the following suggestions:

1.Create a lower case
2. Enlarge to 3-6 weights
3. Add italics
4. Consider a condensed weight
5 (Where's the yen? :-)

So perhaps hamburgefonts won't cut it, but the rest of the response indicated an excitement about the work so far, encouraging to a first timer. When and what do you send?


bieler's picture

Once upon a time, oh, about anytime before 1986, ITC was the only decision you would have as a type designer.

How quickly that has been forgotten. ITC was as hated as MS is today. Fortunately, they got caught with their pants down when DTP whizzed through.

And fortunately, they recovered, and got humble.

jfp's picture

ITC is just a subdivision of Agfa Monotype. And who want to be included in the Agfa Monotype collection? hey, huh.

ITC lost their marketing power when Batty left them, as Monotype lost similar things decades ago, when Dreyfus left too.

And Agfa have nothing to lost... so don't lost you with them.

aquatoad's picture

How did you decide on ITC?

Given Ed's history at ITC and the fact that the work was designed on his watch, it was a natural to submit there. Admittedly ITC is not the first place I dash off to in search of the latest and greatest. But also admittedly, up until recently I thought and ascender was and elevator.

JFP, perhaps I should have sent it off to you :-)
(see attached)

Ok, so that's what I did. Back my earlier question, what do YOU do?


aquatoad's picture

Oops. How did i manage to miss:
and ascender was and elevator :-)
How about:
an ascender was an elevator!

To all those who appologize for their bad english at typophile: I have difficulty ordering a sandwich in english, let alone spanish or swahili.


jfp's picture

Oh yes, its funny to see some similarities between your proposal and this inscription in Malakoff. Nice spot Randy!

aquatoad's picture

To all of you successful, filthy rich typographers out there (and I'm hoping for a response?),

When you submit a design for review:
1). How complete was it when you first sent it?
2). How complete was it when you got accepted?
3). What did you send that got accepted? (Full character set? Example as you see it used? PDF? Print outs? Totally finished font files? etc.)

This info would be really helpful. Being new to the whole thing, I'm wondering how it works. I suspect at the highest levels there is reputation and personal connections that get you in the door. What about everyone else.


sean's picture

This is a good thread. I wish I could see more this kind of thing in "Build".

Please consider as you answer Randy's questions that you include what foundry you submitted your design it to.
This seems important to me.

I hope you get a lot of answers on this one Randy. I'm watching. Jared's answer was good one.

How about some more experiences?


sean's picture

Hours later...

Oops. I meant " I wish I could see more this kind of thing in "Release".

You know, the one that grows cobwebs. Sorry.


jfp's picture

The first time I submited (as described) a typeface it was longtime ago, probably Angie, my first one to FF. In fact, I just send the a basic character set (suh panels done for Morisawa, it was in 1990). But this was before I start to design with computers. They don't have done any comments, I just decided how many weights, etc.

Then, i submited Anisette to FB circa 1995/96, there, they asked for hamburgefonstiv and some others trials if you have, such weights, etc.

Then, they reviewed it and ask for corrections, etc.

Now, its my own boss who decide if he accept my designs, generally he is quite cool with me and we have same feelings on letterforms.

t1mmy's picture

This is truly a powerful thread. I'm like Randy, very new to the game. It would be nice to see this info compiled into a handy PDF document for people like us to use as research.

I believe the best answer I've recieved so far from anyone is this. Don't sell your first fonts, hand them out for free. By doing this you will get a lot more people downloading your font. By doing this you will find out if your font is truly perfect. Are all the contours closed? Are there kerning pairs that you didn't account for? Guaranteed that someone in the world will find something wrong. You also can get a name for yourself and start to generate a little traffic through your web site. Develop a fan base of sorts.

Anyways, that's my two cents. I'd like to think that some of my early fonts could start generating cash, but I have a long road ahead of me (much like any starting typographer). If you look at type web sites almost everyone has a free font for download. Chank told me this once: All my free fonts are either very old fonts, or fonts I don't wish to continue on creating glyphs. I think that's a good piece of advice. Get as many of these buggers under your arms. Once you decide your path then take the good ones from the bad ones.

Did I go too far off the original subject?


sean's picture

Tim, I would have to, by instinct, disagree with you on a couple of things.

First, I would not want to use my market to test my designs. They should ( my designs ) be perfected before they are released. It would seem an unfortunate situation that the first impression of your foundry or type face would be riddled with issues. I would give your market more credit. The name you get for yourself might not be good with incomplete efforts.

Second, "Get as many of these buggers under your arms.". I would rather have one design of top quality than ten of half of the first. In other words, quality not quantity. I believe Bringhurst could be referenced for a much more eloquent version of this statement. As a painter, I totally agree with Picasso

sean's picture


Please don't be mad at me. I have kind of moved, in my own way, this topic to "Release".

"Release" not "Build".

I hope I am not out of line here. But as Tim said, this is a powerful thread. My hopes are, despite it's irony, that it will get even more attention there. Also, I really want to see that "Build" area built. It is a really great area of discussion that seems to me under used. It could become yet another shining light in the legend of Typophile.

But I digress yet again...

Here it is...


aquatoad's picture

Sean, no worries on the thread migration. Though I did think I was loosing my mind for a minute or two.
Let me see if i

hrant's picture

> interpolation

Since the computer can't guess what you want, it needs two fonts (like a Light and a Bold) to create more weights automatically*. Fog can do interpolation, but it seems FontLab's is better, not least because you can extrapolate too, and can often interpolate adequately between totally different fonts!

* You can also create lighter/darker weights from a single font, but that's not interpolation, and it generally requires a lot of clean-up, as well as adjustments (like making the thins thinner/thicker).


Stephen Coles's picture

How did you decide on ITC?

Stephen Coles's picture

Well put, JFP. Hence my question.

Jared Benson's picture

When I worked at HTF, we would receive submissions from designers who have already blown out their typeface into sixteen weights, complete with italics. And we would look at these and see (I should say, Jonathan would see) some basic letterform design issues in the core weight. At that late stage, to suggest a revision would demand design changes to several dozen fonts, and the work that would entail would seem prohibitive.

So I'm with Ed Benguiat on this one.

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