Baskerville-inspired exploration

kosal22 Sep 2010

For a while I've been too scared to attempt anything other than a display font because text faces are a totally different kind of beast. Alas, working off of the open-ness of the Baskervilles I've looked at, I'm trying to design my first for-text typeface. It's intended to be used at around 9pt. So, to further demystify the inner workings and details that create a readable text face, can I get a crit on the lowercase glyphs I have so far?

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eliason22 Sep 2010#

I'd keep working on the top left of m/n/p/r and the bottom right of d/u. The r's ear could also be darker, I think.
The s is nicely balanced.

kosal22 Sep 2010#

Thanks. For that serif of the characters you've mentioned, what do you think can be improved? Is it the weight? angle?

eliason22 Sep 2010#

Something about the drawings seems off to me. I would try things like letting the u baseline serif dip under the baseline on its left side, and adjusting the the n/r top so the V-shaped counter's left side is more like | or \ than /.

By the way, you should make sure your bowls at their thickest are wider than your straight stems, in order to be optically balanced. (See how the vertical of d looks blacker than the left side of e?)

kosal23 Sep 2010#

Thanks, will try that. As for the V shaped counters, making them lean like / was my superficial attempt at a creative flare. Is it too unnatural in that it would hinder legibility? Are there any typefaces that do that?

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