Yes, but you also need to look at Mark Simonson's article Ain’t What ITC Used to Be posted at Typographica's Forum before you go running off to buy the fonts.

I'm sure ITC will provide a free replacement italic once they make one, so is there any reason to boycott the product? ;-)

Has anyone contacted Allan about it?

Cheers, Si

> I’m sure ITC will provide a free replacement italic once they make one

I expect to see Allan Haley tonight and will ask him about the slant vs. true oblique cut issue. It just might be that all of the advertising and specimen samples are incorrect and that the fonts are just fine.

Either way, it's a little issue of quality assurance and customer expectations. I used to work for the very same person Allan reports to now.

Great, I hope it goes well.

Cheers, Si

I'm back from my meeting with next year's TypeCon planning committee with Tamye Riggs and Allan Haley.

I had the chance to take Allan aside and show him the posts on ITC Avant Garde Gothic found on Typographica's forum.

Allan said that Monotype Imaging had discussed the oblique versions for a long time, and in the end, it came down to two main considerations:

1- They felt that the Adobe versions of AGG Oblique had become the de facto standard, thus the Pro version would be consistent; and

2- Developmental expenses.

OK, that's fair enough. How many designers are still setting with digitized versions of the 1977 release. But why did Adobe decide on slanted versions in the first place? Any insights anybody?

(BTW -- Allan's comments to me was his sincere explanation of reasons for corporate decisions and should not be considered as an "official statement" by Monotype Imaging on the issue.)

That's roughly what I suspected. That they deliberately didn't use the original oblique is interesting, but disappointing.

As far as the part about Adobe using a slanted version to begin with, that was their standard method in the early days with all sans serifs. No doubt it saved memory in the early PostScript laser printers and imagesetters and was considered a neat and practical compromise.

On the other hand, it is ITC's design. Why should they follow Adobe's lead on what it should look like? Like I said in my Typographica post, ain't what ITC used to be.

I guess we should remember that Adobe set the naming convention rules here for re-issues.

On the one hand part of the reason for adding 'std' and 'pro' to font names was to reinforce the "no guarantee of backwards compatibility" message - so ITC could have broken with the past on a pro font.

However in reality the re-issued Adobe fonts are mostly mergings of the existing Type 1 fonts with only a few extensions. So ITC's treatment of AG really isn't any different from the Adobe re-issues.

Fortunately Adobe has extended the rules of the game with Garamond Premier Pro, which leaves the door open for a "Premier Pro AG" at some point in the future. :-)

Fortunately Adobe has extended the rules of the game with Garamond Premier Pro, which leaves the door open for a “Premier Pro AG” at some point in the future. :-)

Well, never mind then. :-)

Be careful when you say "AG", some lawyers in Chicago may think you are infringing on a copyrighted name:-)

ChrisL

You're right. My careless abreviation was a clear mistake, an akzidenz wating to happen, if you will ;-)

That was a grotesk way to put it Si.
:-)

ChrisL

Just noticed a nice set of images attached to the Slanted.de thread on Avant Garde - http://www.slanted.de/573#comments - the school bus instructions are particularly nice. Si

Mark wrote:

"As far as the part about Adobe using a slanted version to begin with, that was their standard method in the early days with all sans serifs. No doubt it saved memory in the early PostScript laser printers and imagesetters and was considered a neat and practical compromise."

This is absolutely dead on. Remember, ITC Avant Garde was one of the original 35 PostScript Type 1 fonts.

Si wrote:

"On the one hand part of the reason for adding ‘std’ and ‘pro’ to font names was to reinforce the “no guarantee of backwards compatibility” message - so ITC could have broken with the past on a pro font."

Very true.

"However in reality the re-issued Adobe fonts are mostly mergings of the existing Type 1 fonts with only a few extensions. So ITC’s treatment of AG really isn’t any different from the Adobe re-issues."

If you look at the entire Adobe Type Library, this is true. But every typeface with "Pro" in the name had its character set extended. And if you look at Adobe Originals, most of them got reworked, many of them extensively. Notably for this discussion, Cronos Pro got the italic completely redone. Adobe Garamond, Minion, Myriad and many others got some revisions. We treated our real flagship typefaces with great care.

Amusingly, our OpenType "Standard" version of ITC Avant Garde is based on the Avant Garde MM outlines, rather than the single-master outlines. So we were already not worrying about matching the old one that most people know.

That being said, these things are a lot of work, and as digital type users were already used to the mechanically slanted obliques for ITC Avant Garde (which Adobe popularized), I can understand why ITC/Monotype didn't want to spend the substantial work to redraw them.

Si also wrote:

"Fortunately Adobe has extended the rules of the game with Garamond Premier Pro, which leaves the door open for a “Premier Pro AG” at some point in the future. :-)"

Huh? Please understand that Garamond Premier Pro has exactly three things in common with Adobe Garamond: it's a Robert Slimbach design, a revival of Garamont's romans and Granjon's italics, and it's an Adobe Original. But it is a completely different design, and otherwise unrelated to Adobe Garamond - not an updated version of it in any way.

Cheers,

T

"...But it is a completely different design, and otherwise unrelated to Adobe Garamond"

and quite a good one.

ChrisL

In my humble opinion, ITC shouldn't have been so shy. With OT they could've offered both oblique and italic. I will wait for Veronika (E+F) to add more goodies to their version and upgrade. :^P

My tongue-in-cheek point about Garamond Premier Pro was that Adobe has set a new standard, above Pro. I don't seriously expect people to start taking the word "Premier" and tagging > Pro designs with it, but you never know. This could get like credit cards, how about..

Helvetica Platinum
Garamond Titanium Titling Pro
Palatino Plutonium Pro Plus

Cheers, Si

Avant Garde Gothic Extra Premiere Pro Ultimate 2005 Deluxe Edition
(Sans True Italics)