This idea might produce a very nice font - the small counters and sharpe serifs are interesting.

Just, please, don’t turn it into a garalde University Roman! ;)

No, don't worry, I can't stand University Roman. ;o)

It hasn't been done to death... recently. But it's like a few things ATF et alia did about a century ago. And even though I think it would probably look quite charming, I don't think it would sell very well.

Paramond sounds almost right. But it's not... bucktooth enough. Paramonde? Tourdumonde?

BTW check out Paganini, which is a design I favor.

hhp

Hrant, do you have examples of those things ATF did...?

Not sure what you're getting at with the bucktoothiness...

Paganini's really nice, but transitional.

As for selling, I don't mind if I don't get rich off of it. That's what Traction is for. ;o) I envision this one to be useful for glamorous magazine titles and book covers — maybe it can gain some sort of popularity through that channel? And I could always make a high-x-height, short-ascender version that could be more widely used.

Oh, I'm having way too much fun with this already. :)

http://i87.photobucket.com/albums/k129/melissybeth/Twits-1.jpg

hhp

Aren't those ascenders a little puny?

Hrant: That pop reference is entirely lost on me.

Riccardo: Yeah, the ascenders currently reach the height where I had foreseen the cap height. I do like it that way, though. Maybe I can make a compact cut of the font along with a tall cut.

the ascenders currently reach the height where I had foreseen the cap height

A peculiar design choice for a serif.

Well, it doesn't have a meaning yet before I make an actual capital. ;o) Obviously I'd make smaller capitals for the compact cut of the face, sort of like Gauthier.

How does this look for the full-sized cut? Cap/x is the golden ratio, asc/x = 2, desc/x = 2/3 (desc/x = golden ratio seemed too short). Are the descenders maybe still a bit too short?

That's from Monty Python. Those are British twits who are self-important and quite nasal. :-)

hhp

Hmmm, asc/x = 2 seems a bit on the excessive side. Maybe I should bring it back down, even for the "tall" cut. I usually like Garamond's /f, but I had trouble with this stratospheric one (and I still don't quite like it).

Your |f| looks like it's ready to set sail to faraway islands... ;)

That sounds like a good thing. :)

Anyway, I've shortened the ascenders a bit. I think the /f looks saner now, too.

And now I'm having way too much fun with this /g. :)

And full basic lowercase:

I like where you're heading with this, but some of the characters seem uncharacteristically dull for such a fun face – some by nature, of course (there's only so much you can do with serifs and stems), but at the very least I'd look at s and z again – many garamonds have some great shape ideas there that you could steal.

A agree that the /s is a bit out of character — too wide and dark for a Garamond. Not sure what could be done about the /z, though...?

Note that while I want the face to look energetic and fresh, I want to stay clear of "goofy" or "funny". I know that /g is dangerously close to tipping over into that regime, but I think it pulls it off through sheer charisma. ;o)

Well, for z you could add a top serif, as per a lot of garamonds. But even if you don't do that, the ductal flavour of the other characters gets lost a little with the rather constructed z – those serifs are unlike any other in the font, very circle-segmenty.

I don't know if you do comparisons (because of possible undue influence, etc.), but perhaps take a quick look at Amsterdamer Garamont, another rather extreme version of the form. Or even Nick Shinn's Oneleigh.

Alright, I made a slender /s and a serifed /z to better fit into the Garamond flavor. I agree they look more appropriate. Thanks!

I've also made the /r shorter again to fit the tiny /r's of the typical Garamonds.

I try to avoid comparisons as much as I can, and when I do, I look at a large number of Garamonds on MyFonts to get a general impression rather than trying to emulate a certain specific solution. I don't like the Amsterdamer Garamont at all (that droopy Jannon /a!), but Oneleigh is brilliant (especially that /g!).

Starting on the caps... do these proportions look about right?

I wonder if I can really pull that /A off...

More caps, calmer /A:

Cute. It’s going to be interesting to see how this will gain weight. It’s very cute and elegant – those qualities will be trickier to keep up in bolder styles.

I'm going more for elegant than cute, but I'll take both. ;)

If the Bold will end up less elegant, well, book cover designers will just have to use the Light!

First draft of the full alphabet:

Looking Good - this direction has merit.

Thanks Bob!

How is this /Germandbls working?

For those familiar with the matter: Do those /Schwa/schwa work?

Schwas are generally poorly made, so there's no strong precedent. Here I would make the eye in the capital form huge instead of tiny.

hhp

Hrant: I can't imagine that looking anything but weird...

Is that spike on top of /fl working?

I tried old-style numbers that rise to 3/4 the cap height. They strike me as a bit coarse. Maybe I should rather reduce them to x-height?

I really like this.

- The spike on the /fl looks a little awkward with the sample you've posted, but I'm not sure what it would look like in a word. Could you post a sample with a word?
- I really enjoy the numbers you have, but I agree; the extenders would look better reduced to x-height.

Ps. To be honest, I preferred the other /A (with the more funky apex)

I preferred the other /A (with the more funky apex)

+1

Funky apex /A will be in the final release, just not as the default glyph. I might release a version with the .ss01 alternates cycled in as the defaults separately for ease of use, as I've done with other fonts.

Ahana, here are some ligatures in their natural environment.

New x-high old-style figures. I think they fit the Garamond flavor better than the 3/4 cap-height ones. I'm somewhat intrigued by that /I-shaped /1 version, but I think I'll stick it into .ss02. The other /1 design is just much more legible.

I also changed the stress distribution in /5/7.

Hi Christian,

The stroke modulation of the /ſt/ link looks really odd to me. I wonder if the shorter form of the /ſ/ might work better in this ligature?

Yeah, I took the design from Traction, where it works out — not so much here, apparently. I'm just going to revert to /ſ/t, they work together just fine without a ligature.

- I love all of the ligatures (especially the /fj one). Also, it turns out I was wrong about the /fl - it looks fine in a word.

- The new numbers look a lot better (and the /1 (not /I-shaped) is much better).

Thanks Ahana!

Steve: I just removed the x-height spur from /ſ, and I gotta say, I love it that way. It might be less historical, but way more legible (which is a rather sensitive subject for /ſ!).

Christian, I really like them both, but I can't decide which version I like best.

I have a feeling the serif version might work better when in close proximity to letters with x-height details and vice versa.

Take 'assistance' for example. In terms of rhythm, the serif plays well with the /a/ terminal, the top serif in the /i/, the bar of the /t/, etc. I suspect the serifless version of the /ſ/ might not flow as well in words like this. However, I think the serfiless version is likely to work better in words like 'psychosomatisch'.

Is it possible to see both words with alternate versions in one image for comparison?

Hi Steve,

here's the comparison. While I can see your point from the intellectual point of view, I feel the forest of spurred stems in the second instance of /aſſiſtance/ blurs like a herd of zebras (though, I admit, a relatively attractive herd), whereas the first instance is cleaner and IMHO more legible.

I suppose I could make the spurred version a stylistic alternate, but that seems like an awful lot of work for something that's probably never going to be used (especially considering the dozen or so ligatures!).

EDIT: Actually, I just did the work. It wasn't that much after all. ;o)

The obvious answer is a contextual alternate that removes the spur when neighboring letters have head serifs.

I'm joking.

On balance, I think the serifless version is nicer, but I do like the serif version as well. It does seem like a lot of trouble to create alts for a potentially little-used character, but if you've done the work already, it's a win-win! :)

Small caps! And yes, that's a small-cap /longs right there! So sue me! :D

Nice small caps! I like how substantial some of the character changes are.

Not entirely sure about the alternate Q and Q.smcp, something feels disjointed about that tail. (Maybe it's a stroke logic thing, that it's placed at an oblique angle intersecting at the thinnest point. But I don't know enough ductus theory to tell.)

Johan, the /Q.long architecture mirrors that of the Roman monumental capital, as far as I can tell. The angle of the thin stroke where the tail connects is quite close to the pen angle implied by my lowercase onstrokes and diagonal stresses.

On the other hand, I'm a bit worried about the stylistic difference between /J and /j.sc. The tapered tail works well for all-smcp, but together with /J, it looks a bit off. Maybe I should also adopt a tapered design for /J?

The smallcaps now come with a unicase alternate feature. :)

Looking at:
typophile.com/node/104308?page=1#comment-596972

I'd say the "fists" are... indelicate compared to the letterforms. The hedera is more in character, but maybe a bit too mainstream?

hhp

Dunno, they're meant to draw attention, so they need a certain heft — much like the pilcrow... I rather like how old-fashioned they look alongside the caps.

I didn't mean the color, more like the cuffs looking so bulky, and the fingers a bit sausage-like. But I've actually never made manicules, so I might be asking for too much.

hhp