Hello, Nick.

In general the font is ok, although I suppose it is designated for several countries whose alphabet is based on the cyrillic one. Knowing only the Russian alphabet, I was wondering which letters are after the capital Щ and which are the last 3 uppercase letters?
If after the capital Щ is Ъ, then it was quite difficult to recognize it, for me personally. Because its shape looks more to Б, which is a quite readable letter in your font. But when you meet the Ъ (after seeing Б) it is a bit confusing. Also, it doesn't look like Ь. Shouldn't the design of these 2 letters (Ь and Ъ) be quite similar ? Maybe other users have a different opinion...
By the way, for which purposes the font is being designed? It takes some effort for me to read the lowercase part.

Hi Tatiana, thanks for your feedback. Yes, the letter after the capital Щ is Ъ. I have now based the shapes of Ъ and Ь on the Б as you said that was the most readable:

Are these better?

It would be a great help if you could paste a paragraph containing all Russian Cyrillic characters (if that's possible) if you post again, then you would be able to see how characters look in the context of words.

Somebody else said "Very odd П, г, н, ь, ъ & I don't really like Л, ы, у. The Serbian letters are incorrect. Because it's a script, it must either have Serbian cursive alternates for г, п, т, ш or have no Serbian glyphs at all, just not to confuse people."

Should the П and Л have a crossbar at the top between the two vertical stems? I've looked through many handwriting samples and all that I have seen are shown without.

This is going to be used for advertising. Thanks for your help.

Dear Nick,

1. The letters above could be one variant. Do me a favor, please, and try to make Ъ based on your first displayed Ь. And leave Б as it is in the first version. I like the bowl of first Ь much more than the second one.
2. Text in Russian (have in mind that I substituted 2 letters, ь-ъ е-ё because I cannot find now a text containing them, thus some words are displayed intentionally wrong ):
Окончив газету, вторую чашку кофе и калач с маслом, он встал, стряхнул крошки калача с жилета и, расправив широкую грудь, радостно улыбнулся, не оттого, что у него на душе было что-то особенно приятное, — радостную улыбку вызвало хорошее пищеварение.
Но эта радостная улыбка сейчас же напомнила ему все, и он задумался.
Два детские голоса (Степан Аркадьич узнал голоса Гриши, меньшого мальчика, и Тани, старшей дёвочки) послышались за дверъми. Они что-то везли и уронили.
— Я говорила, что на крышу нелъзя сажать пассажиров, — кричала по-английски дёвочка, — вот подбирай!
«Все смешалось, — подумал Степан Аркадьич, — вон дети одни бегают». И, подойдя к двери, он кликнул их.
3. 1. Uppercase П is just fine, lowercase...hm... I've seen it like this too, but you can make it like the capital one. Would be more reliable.
3.2. Yes, maybe lowercase г is too much like uppercase. I usually make it like this:

3.3. Л - just fine. It is a matter of taste. Why you do not like it?
3.4. ы, у ... yeah, but since it is a script font, why don't you make several versions of letters and they could be used randomly within the text. That is to say, in a paragraph you could have 2 different ы or у and thus you reinforce the meaning of a script font.
3.5. Cannot express my opinion about Serbian, but surely there is no need to restrict yourself. Include Serbian too and talk to some other people about it.
4. "Should the П and Л have a crossbar at the top between the two vertical stems?"
What do you mean? Show me an example, please...

I found this page,

http://learncyrillic.tumblr.com/post/43584727121/learn-to-write-serbian-cyrillic

The only thing I noticed distinctive about Serbian handwriting in my first glance at that site, though, is that з in handwritten form extends below the line, looking like a Latin handwritten z. But even that is significant enough.

Tatiana, here are the paragraphs. Thanks for those.
I'm not doing several versions of each glyph, it's beyond my capabilities.

I managed to create this cursive style from various 'Learn Cyrillic handwriting' tutorials on the web

Please bear in mind that here is no kerning in this sample.

Dear Nick, the chevrons are not used in Cyrillic handwriting, only in typography.

Thanks Maxim. I just copied and pasted from Tatiana's text above. More importantly can you read it, and does it look OK to you? (and anybody else looking at this - all comments welcome). I'm flying blind here.

в - I would like it that way (open belly): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Russian_Cyrillic_handwriting_Flerov_19...
н п - too much complicated, н is hard to decipher
ь - now it is "ve", BTW better than original
Of course everything IMO (I can read Russian, though pretty poorly ;)
and I read "у" as "ц"

More importantly can you read it, and does it look OK to you?

For the conventional lower-case patterns take a close look at the script fonts offered by ParaType). Segue Script (© Microsoft) is not bad either, although, I suspect, too plain for your liking.

However, all of them, except two — Propisi and English 157 — feature calligraphic (not vernacular) or non-cursive, print-style capitals, which is something you don’t want.

For the generic, standard upper-case cursive forms check out Propisi, English 157, and—surprise—ITC True Grit. They all follow the same basic pattern.

Nick, you have some good advisers here, so do not worry about your blindness:) You will regain your sight :)
Jan is right concerning the letters н + п. Although п seems quite ok for me, н is indeed difficult to recognize.
And Maxim gave you a good example of a script font.
Now, you said earlier, that the purpose of your font is to be used in advertisement. Is it about one word or few, or a whole paragraph? If it's about the last one, than I have to say that it is quite difficult to read a passage set with your font. It is like a mature hand is learning to write... Which actually, is you, trying to write in Russian. And because its not your native language, of course, it is more difficult than for a native one. Maxim's script is flowing and the letters do not disturb my brain from reading the paragraphs.

Referring to your font:
1. What if your characters would be designed with the same or almost the same x-height? Maybe, the reading would be easier than. It depends on your final goal: what you are trying to achieve?
2. When the height is different between the left and right part of the same character, the reading becomes even more difficult. Take a look at the following 2 words, узнал +улыбку, how the characters are displayed.
But if you could manage a similar height of characters (nr.1), maybe nr. 2 could be avoided... Again, it depends on how many words will be displayed on the advertisement.
And by the way, what "character" would you like to give to your font?
Similar font was designed by Parachute, http://www.parachute.gr/typefaces/allfonts/libera-pro#Cyrillic
check all 3 languages: Russian, Greek, Latin.
You see, the height of letters is different, and even the hight of left+right parts of characters varies sometimes. Of course, you are not going to read whole passages set with this font, but in Greece it became extremely popular in ad sector. It is widely used for packages. Even, during local elections, the banners were displayed with Libera.

Thanks everybody. This is all very helpful, especially your script paragraphs Maxim. I think will I need to simplify certain aspects to make it more readable. I'm quite ill at the moment, so will be back with further stuff on Monday (hopefully)

And because its not your native language, of course, it is more difficult than for a native one. Maxim’s script is flowing and the letters do not disturb my brain from reading the paragraphs.

The typeface used in the sample I posted (Segoe Script) was designed, if I remember correctly, by Jim Wasco for Microsoft. I don’t think Jim’s mother tongue is Russian (or Belarusian, Serbian, Ukrainian, etc.).

Get well soon, Nick.

Maxim is correct, Jim Wasco did the Latin, Greek and Cyrillic in the font, but Monotype spent a lot of time on refinement, with expert reviews, to try to make it look somewhat authentic.

I've done some more work on it. I might have to do some alts to make the flow better. Hopefully it is looking more legible now. There are some questions on this pic.

New Caps and l/c image:

Is it an improvement?

Better, but still your ь reads as e. Don't make such a big loop in the upper part of ь.

This "miagkiy znak" is OK
This is too high, it ought to be like "y" (sixty one)

Why not this way? (el)

I've done some alterations: it is now smooth which should add to legibility. I have simplified certain characters, there are a few alternates to improve flow and replacement 'end' characters. Hopefully it's pretty readable now.

Dear Nick,
sorry for not being able to catch up with the comments. It is because of lack of time, not interest!
Here are some of my comments, at the first sight:
1. The font has been upgraded!!! Very nice:)
2.
л is too open at its upper part. JanekZ's draw shows it better what I mean.
3.

During the reading is a bit confusing meeting the couple of letters иш, ищ. I was trying to understand when one letter ends and another begins (1st image). Nontheless, in the second image, the things are not so bad. So, see what you can do, if you want to change something.
4.
The transition from е to г is to rough.
5.
This "tviordyi znak" - ъ seems now foreign among all letters.
The upper left horizontal line could be simplified.
I will try to sneak in again during the following days.
Good luck:)

Nick, your first л (see the image below) was just fine!
Why did you change it?