Friend or Font?

Remember the Adam Ant song 'Friend or Foe"? - Great Song! It was around the time of that song and I think it was Ronald Reagan who was credited with uttering the following quote
(pearl of wisdom) :

"Surround yourself with good people, delegate authority and don't interfere!".

Regardless of the quote's historical or political context (or ramifications), if you think about it, It's really true! You should surround yourself with good people, delegate authority and don't interfere -

UNLESS ...

...you're General Custer at the Battle of Little Big Horn - you're surrounded by good people, they just happen to be Indians.

- you should just play dead and let your horses run interference.

Most graphic/type artists settle down into using only a handful of fonts (or less). Often they have developed an entire style based on their familiarity with and use of certain fonts. This can be independent of any page rendering system. Over time and experience they have come to know the nature and allowances of a specific typeface - backwards and forwards - and so have surrounded themselves with good fonts, delegated authority to them and interfere only when neccessary.


Getting to know a font is much like getting to know a person. The context may be only professional at first but over time, you have them over for a tennis match and a beer (not neccessarily in that order)

Using Icons as Bullets

In 1996, a good friend of mine helped clarify the way I thought about websites.

"A website is just an answering machine". He Said

The more I thought about it, the more I realized he was right. At that point in time websites were till somewhat anti-climactic in there visual delivery and every bit as stoic in their capabilities and yet, - many of those old jalopies still exist on the www.

Having the entire internet as a source of design inspiration is very cool. I often find myself visiting random websites/pages just to see how they were layed out and which editor/environment was used in their creation. The vintage is also indicated by the design elements used.

I find Google and Gmail to be perfect examples of highly effecient web design. Everything is streamlined, the most important information is broken into concise sectors - ultra-utilitarian and with rudimentary complement of graphics (which help speed things up). Everything you need however, is right there and easily found.

I was starring at my gmail page and realized that I have been taking all of this for granted! I also decided to point out a major feature of Google design: simple icon usage!

(above) icons are used as bullets.Point titles are bolded.

As usual, a very good example of design got me thinking. It opened the floodgates and all those thoughts from the inspiration came raging into the space of my mind like a crack-addicted chimpanzee hell bent on destruction...

...I can use this. (more often)

There are so many useful tips right in front of us! Most Page layout programs and website builders offer us templates where we just plug in or add whatever graphics we want. Customizable stylesheets and formatting is better than it ever has been before - there are at least 2000 ways to skin a cat now digitally (not that we have a need to at this moment - it might prove crucial later though).



...and it's only getting better!

How Type Saved Civilization! (the Irish are still extremely cool though)

That the history of type is no less than history itself cannot be argued with any due sensibility. All we know from history was recorded using it's device and the device as constantly innovated by our predessecors, speaks volumes on it's own behalf.



History is filled to overflow with victor's tale of conquest - violence echoes the intrigue of human exchange.

Type as a story teller is not only non-exempt from those wilds and throws we call history, - it is frought with them. It might in fact be a mistake to denegrate it's very nature of being one and the same. Mysteries abound - Yet those cultures and civilizations we know most about today, had the most to say by way of written language. We cannot only lay open the mysteries of the past by studying what was written about it but how it was written.

Is'nt that friggin' cool?

I am a human without neccessarily being a human-ist. I know and even kinda like some who are and some who are the same in sentiment as I am. Reason: - I guess I just don't trust you guys... apologies.(feel free to do somthing lavishly extravagant to restore my faith in you.

But You don't have to be a humanist to harbour a deep appreciation of the Renaissance/humanist movement in our inescapably humanist history. If it's glass is filled to overflow, you can at least drink it down to half full/half empty.



Drink in the largely Italian renaissance movement - I charge ye!- It's a fruity bouquet,a little more bright than sweet,lighter and more vibrant it's mood - a cornucopia of rediscovery!

...probably began with an hombre' called Marco Polo and his ultra-venturesome travels across the semi-known world. To China using the 'Silk Road' he would have legendary encounters, - the stuff that dreams and nightmares are made of and would later write about them in a book called Le livre des merveilles.

It is more than possible, that Marco Polo did not know what dragon or giant he had awakenened. Those stories and accounts were slowly divulged over generations in Italia and indeed Europe, written in any number of hands and spoken of in square,granite-columned halls and increasingly vernacular circles. It was a stone thrown and all of Europe would be a pond full of ripples.

The education was one of a gradual nature. The world beyond the alps would come crashing in over some centuries, laying waste to any preconcieved ideals concerning the superiority of a nationalistic identity.

The Chinese were written of as being the first to invent and implement block printing. The first actual printing press was devised and in use long before descriptions of it would inspire Europeans. But seeing the genius and economic benefactors of this conceptual wonder from a distant land, would initiate a progression - a ripple in the pond which would affectionately be known as the printing press.


As if in nearly complete parallel, the whole of Italy and residually that of Europe,would begin seeking out their own identity. They would seek to illuminate the former greatness of Rome in all of it's power and glory, - therby laying claim to a history as old and as rich, - as humanistically edifying as that of China itself. It is only fitting that they would look and reach into the annals of artistry to find such legitamacy.

Upon studied review of Polo's disertations, and with a sublime confidence (albiet proportionately unfounded) in the willy-nilly ascertion that the world was actually round, Christopher Columbus would be cajulted into trying an uncharted oceanic voyage to the source of a European awakening. He would find another culture, perhaps equally as interesting in all artistic and cultural respects. He would find...

The New World!

Serif PagePlus X3

If You're like me, you seek out the Pure and utilitarian.You believe there's alot to be said for the unassuming,frugally concieved yet ultimately, empowering stuff in this world.

The level of our artistry never finds it's ascendency in the specific toolboxes we use. A software application find's it's utility in intent. It gives us a tool by which we achieve our artistry.

For that reason, I am attracted to a small list of bang (value) for the buck resources which have those very definite attributes and features which empower the artist for not-alota-mulah.So many of the wonderful rendering capabilities we enjoy today have by now become standards that we cannot do without. Clearly, - without giants leading the way
(Quark XPress_ and Adobe Pagemaker/Creative Suite_etc...), We might have been left in a deep,dark and unfamiliar forest or so one would think.


The unknown darkness can be exciting! It can also get kind of old -A ram's horn pronouncment of greatness becomes as easily, an enticing but eerie whisper from the darkness and murky mire of Proprietary posturings... midnight promises.

Traveling quite merrily along with us all the while, has been Serif Software and their unequalled line of "Software With Imagination"! The software is designed with imagination with your imagination in mind.

Serif's PagePlus X3 gives you all the features and flexibility of the the giant publishing programs while making it affordable for the pro and average user alike!

Serif offers solutions fine crafted to the specific and unique needs of the artisan. If you want or need to build a suite of abilities, Serif accomodates in a most effecient way with their powerful line of products. With PagePlus X3 - You will have customiseable toolbars and keyboard shortcuts,the ability to import and enhance EPS PostScript® graphics,Import PDF Files with in a couple of clicks,it has a new Word 2007 text import filter, overall easy and intuitive environment layout


With Serif Software, you can build as you go -intuitively adding incredible creativity as you need to! once you do, you have the empowerment to transfer text, drawings and images between Serif programs!

I like Serif PagePlus and DrawPlus software
because of it's intent. They have built affordable software solutions which are immediately useful while keeping pace with the latest available (licensed) industry standards to create a very cool, very fun and eloquent workflow which is now powerful enough for the pros!

Font Editing/Rendering Software with a WOW!!!

This Software allows you to have the flexibility neccessary to create powerfully personalized fonts sets with easy to use features! Begin from scratch or use preset points. FontLab FontLabLtd aquired Fontographer


Fontlab font editors

Post Script 1 to OpenType Migration

While seemingly yesterday, Microsoft brought in Adobe to help co - develop a cross-platform type standard which would allow cross outline and encoding support resulting in the "OpenType" format. There were and still are problems with matching up the conventional names and supports of each standard.

Everything is pretty much format/support standard nowadays. You may have your work cut out for you however if you have been working in a purely adequate Mac based graphics environment, and the higher-ups from atop their mountain in P&A were sold at pricepoint on a PC based printer.

Everything is "Beans-n-Gravy" until you go to print if past formatting cannot be found or rendered correctly in the new output environment.

Adobe provided a good read for those faced with the undaunting task of "sinking" their (Postscript based) imput graphics capability with the .OT (Open Type) standards for output. A downloadable, Face to Face format transposition table here in the HOPEFULLY, helpfull following order (From Adobe Forums):
Type 1 PostScript FontName
Type 1 Mac Menu Name
Type 1 Win/PC Menu Name
Type 1 PC File Name
Prefix Type 1 Mac Outline File Name
Matching OpenType format font
Matching OpenType format
Mac Menu Name
Matching OpenType format Win/PC Menu Name


Then there is also the output solution like the HP Multiple Product Adobe PostScript Printer Driver which supports a quasi extensive list of HP products. This is mainly for those graphics departments which use higher quality, inhouse/end-process printers for proofing before,during and after flight.


A much simpler solution available from FontLab is called TransType.


This Universal font format converter for Mac and Windows. Versions SE 2.5.1 and Pro 3.0.2., allows you to convert practically any font into any other format on Mac and PC.What might the advantages of using TransType Pro be?

In my experience, any product that a manufacturer purports to be 'universal' is either too ambitious/too soon in supports, too proprietory or it quietly and efficiently delivers a suprisingly, useful result. The latter fits FontLab's TransType.

Universal is the prefacing key word for this fontlab product and it speaks to ease of use as well as support. For Mac: Mac OS 9.2 with CarbonLib 1.6+ or Mac OS X (10.3 or higher is recommended), Intel-based Mac OS X(* visit FontLab site for details)

For Windows: Microsoft Windows OS (95/98/ME/NT/2000/XP).

Perhaps most important are the encoding conversions which read and convert Unicode, ANSI, ASCII, among many others (international etc...16 for Microsoft,23 for Mac) It is a simple converter environment and interface which already the most standard features and preferences checked and yet is fully customizable!

FontLab has designed a solid, options and features-rich beast of a font conversion tool that is mainly for converting from the major pre-OpenType (TT,GX) to OpenType /PS standard.

The interface is well designed, a familiar layout of font manager and conversion tool which thankfully makes no grandios assumptions. A typical scenario (after lightning quick install) would be to open the program,choose a system font for conversion and then save it to the same or any other folder you create. FontLab TransType has batch and font family save features which once preferences are set, allow for codepage and script exactitude as well as maximized glyph/outline transference.