Could you please elaborate on the differences for those of who are not book printers and do not have regular access to the means of printing at high resolution?

You mean grades? Font Bureau has a lot of those. And they're not as dorky-looking as Century Schoolbook.

hhp

A brief discussion of fonts with grades:
http://www.typophile.com/node/81483

hrant:

>Font Bureau has a lot of those.

But they are sold only in Boston.

H&FJ does as well.

Typotheque’s Greta also.
Generally speaking, grading has been implemented for newspaper faces.
The focus of book face grading is different: optical scaling.

If the criterion of grading is equal metrics for different weights, then Handsome joins the party!

An earlier graded (different weights, same metrics) face: NPL Else.

Even earlier: Goudy Catalogue.

I was under the impression that Uli was more concerned with the “rendering” differences between PS and TT fonts than with grades or opticals.
However, here are a couple of lists about the latter: http://typophile.com/node/81517#comment-461716

Why TT (TrueType) vs. PS (Postscript)?

If the criterion of grading is equal metrics for different weights

Which I call "uniwidth". Because it's not the same thing. In contra to different weights, grades are supposed to compensate for output conditions in order to produce the same apparent weight.

Why TT (TrueType) vs. PS (Postscript)?

Good question.
Riccardo is making a valiant guess, but I'm not getting that from the original post.

hhp

> Why TT (TrueType) vs. PS (Postscript)?

The only reason for adding the suffix TT was to make the two font names different. Fonts with identical font names cannot be used on the same system.

Hinting differences between TT and PS fonts are irrelevant here, because the offset plate-making raster image processor discards all TT and PS hints, which are not required for the high resolution of 1000 dots per cm (which is equal to 2540 dots per inch).

At text sizes, that's true. But for small matter hints still... matter. :-)

to make the two font names different.

But why:
- not use different names that make sense?
- use a difference in how the curves are defined?

BTW, just to be clear: you don't really believe that FontBureau fonts can only be purchased/used in Boston, right?

hhp

> At text sizes, that's true. But for small matter hints still... matter. :-)

Unless you have an eagle's eyes or unless you have the habit of reading books typeset in small point sizes with a microscope, you will not see any difference, if the imagesetter dropped the hints, provided that the offset lithography printing plate was produced with a computer-to-plate imagesetter with a resolution of 2540 dots per inch (= 1000 dots per centimeter).

Not in individual letters, but the texture of a paragraph can become blotchy = ugly. And this is visible to the mind's eye even if the consciousness is too busy to notice.

hhp

not @2540 dpi

"Which I call "uniwidth". "

We had duplexing of weights for years, so would that be "uniwidth" too?

Duplexing mostly referred to an Italic having its metrics forced from the Roman, no? My problems with "duplexing" is that it has a hang-up with 2, and it's not very descriptive.

BTW a related idea that I find useful is when a font can be made uniwidth with another when a specific tracking value is applied. For example a Bold that becomes uniwidth with the Roman when a tracking of -10 is applied (something I've done in my Patria, and we almost pulled off in Ernestine). I've been calling that "fixed offset".

hhp

Duplexing mostly referred to an Italic having its metrics forced from the Roman, no?

Not exactly. It refers to two faces fitting on the same set of matrices. The most common pairing was certainly a Roman with corresponding Italic. But you also had Roman duplexed with Bold.

And you had special setups like a body text duplexed with gothic for certain kinds of work — like Corona with Erbar Bold, for example, or Excelsior with Memphis Bold.

So, duplexing is uniwidth for two.

Thanks for the elaboration.

So is the vote for "multiplexing" instead of "uniwidth"?

hhp

> Duplexing ... refers to two faces fitting on the same set of matrices.

In the post-Linotype, photocomposition era, there were also typefaces with identical widths, for example Serifa and Glypha. In small point sizes, switching from Serifa to Glypha was an interesting alternative:

http://www.sanskritweb.net/fontdocs/serifa-glypha.jpg

"For example a Bold that becomes uniwidth with the Roman when a tracking of -10 is applied"

That can work. I'm not sure about the name, maybe Duplacked instead.