Oh my gosh! Yet a another font format for the web? EOT for Internet Explorer. TTF/OTF for Safari & Opera. WOFF for Firefox 3.6 and now SVG fonts for Mobile Safari? Unfortunately, yes!

But what are SVG fonts anyway? Is this a good webfont format? Actually, it is not a webfont format at all. The purpose of SVG fonts is to be embedded inside of SVG documents (or linked to them), similar to the way you would embed standard TrueType or OpenType fonts in a PDF.

SVG fonts are text files that contain the glyph outlines represented as standard SVG elements and attributes, as if they were single vector objects in the SVG image. But this is also one of the biggest disadvantages of SVG fonts. While EOT, WOFF and PostScript-flavoured OpenType have compression built into the font format, SVG fonts are always uncompressed and usually pretty large. For example, our Graublau Sans Web fonts have just 61 KB as OpenType PS, but 172 KB converted to SVG.

This is how a SVG font (reduced to 2 glyphs) looks like

But there is more bad news: Since SVG fonts are just a collection of vector shapes, there is no way to store hinting information. Font foundries such as FSI have put a lot of effort into optimizing their Web FontFonts for small sizes on screen using elaborate TrueType hinting. But when you convert such a font to SVG all these information will be lost.

So, SVG fonts are not really an alternative to the other webfont formats. In 2008 Apple fueled the webfont revolution with the release of Safari 3.1 with support for webfonts in TrueType or OpenType format. It’s understandable that this support was deactivated in Mobile Safari for the iPhone. The screen is very small and the use of downloadable fonts hardly justifies the loading times and traffic costs of the webfonts. But this is now changing with the iPad. The resolution of the iPad in landscape mode is equal to the standard minimum resolution used for almost all websites today. The internet on the iPad is not a light version for mobile devices. So there shouln’t be any limitations either. Steve Jobs said in his iPad keynote:

»Those devices need to be far better than a laptop or the iPhone at some key task—things like browsing the web.«

But without support for real webfonts format such as WOFF and EOT, browsing the web with Mobile Safari is not really better. So I am really hoping that Apple will include true webfont formats in Mobile Safari—preferably WOFF which is also missing in Safari but has a good chance of becoming the webfont format in the near future.

The site about webfonts, but by default, no true webfonts supported on the iPad

If you want to use webfonts on the iPad today, you need to provide SVG fonts. To convert your fonts to SVG you can use applications such as FontForge or the @font-face generator from Font Squirrel. With the webfont services from Typekit and Typotheque you also get (experimental) SVG fonts support.

The Typekit homepage with experimental SVG fonts support

Linking SVG fonts in your website is similar to using any other webfont format. You just add another line to the @font-face rule in your CSS:

Note that the file name is followed by a hash tag. This relates to the font ID, which you will have to set while converting the font to SVG. The reason for this is, that multiple fonts can be embedded in a SVG document and therefore an identifier is required.

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In March 2009, Cameron and his wife, Suzanne, spent several days in Rome to celebrate their 10-year anniversary. This was also a chance to observe in detail the Coliseum, which Cameron had already selected as the next subject in his series of letterpress posters.

Over the course of the next 12 months, the artwork was handcrafted character by character, totaling roughly 250 hours of work from start to finish. Characters from the Goudy Trajan and Bembo Pro typefaces form the Coliseum (or Colosseum), also known as today as Colosseo (Italian) and originally known as Amphitheatrum Flavium (Latin).

http://colosseotype.com

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http://www.haafe.com/

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Folder Type from Emilio Gomariz on Vimeo.

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Grafica Fidalga, a printing press in São Paulo, Brazil, makes posters on a 1929 German letterpress using hand-carved wooden letters.

(via praeganz.de)

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As part of the new brand identity of the Dutch government Peter Verheul designed a custom typeface for all forms of visual communications. Read about it in Sander Baumann’s weblog.

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An interview with František Štorm, type designer and founder of the Storm Type Foundry in Prague:

What are you reading at the moment?

I’m reading texts of my students, besides that I have to read books when designing them, I read lots of czech fiction literature. I’ve so may books so I move them slowly to my cottage from my Prague’s studio in believe that I’ll read them quietly in future far from civilization and stress. I love to red alone, among woods and ponds. Authors: Jaroslav Hasek, Jan Kresadlo, A. Schopenhauer, R. Feynmann, D. H. Thoreau, and yes, I read some poetry, too.

How do you proceed when you design a typeface?

I shouldn’t say it among students, but I don’t begin with handdrawing, my computer is my sketchbook. Recently I bought second-hand Psion Revo with Sketch application which produces funny rough pixel images made with pen on touchscreen. But seriously, everything starts with specific order or insufficiency. If I need some typeface for my layout, I simply design it.

Where do you find inspiration for your type design?

In history and in individual experiment. first I need to know the roots, than I need to express myself.

How do you find the names for you fonts?

It’s getting harder, many good names are already occupied in the industry, I xperienced twice an unwanted collision so I had to change my naming. I ssume a good name of font should always reflect something from the soul or atmosphere, the story behind specific type. Sometimes it is just the name of inspiration source, “Walbaum” for example – obvious and simple. My “Sebastian” is different cause – it shares my personal crisis in 2002-3, I expressed my pain with type…

The 20th century has seen many stylistic changes in type design. Do you currently see a trend for the new century?

New century is a clichee expression and so is the scene in graphic design. Fashinable, boring, aggresive and, above all, copying and borrowing already roven methods. I believe in “less is more”, and – graphic design is not everything.
As I’m getting older, I ask for the subject, the meaning of designed thing. There are many interesting innovative styles in non-commercial area of type design, I believe in generation of my students, they can bring refreshing ideas based on a broad social dialogue, not narrowly focused on design only.

Nowadays digital type designs can spread around the world in seconds. Do you think local styles of type design will become more or less important in this time of globalization?

In terms of availability of fonts, small foundries are more flexible than big ones. You won’t see anything new from big companies (you know them) except for merging libraries and confusing users. Local designers can sway the global scene more effectively than ever before. That’s what Erik Spiekermann said many years ago, and nowadays it becomes true forever.
In my country, many clients believe in strong identity through logo and its repeated exposition. I advise them rather to show their products and ideas with the use of original font adjusted for their purposes. It can carry the identity by verbal interaction instead of “building an image” which may be unfaithful.

For more information see: http://www.stormtype.com/

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In 1930 Jan Tschichold describes a new typeface in the publication “Börsenblatt für den Deutschen Buchhandels”, that “can be drawn by everyone without typographic knowledge”.

Sebastian Nagel from Austria extended the original drawing to 7 weights (black, extrabold, bold, semibold, regular, semilight and light), with full coverage of the Latin 1 character set. All fonts include small caps and alternate characters.

More information can be found at fonts.info. A PDF type specimen can be downloaded here.

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This website collects typographic jokes.You can submit your own and rate the presented jokes.

via TypoForum

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