So many fonts, so little time
So, what could be cooler than a ransom note made by cutting out letters from a dozen different magazines? Well, there’s an easy one; the crazed look on the face of the investigator who has to know exactly which magazines were used in the creation. You see, there are those who read messages and then there are those who want to identify the fonts used in the message.
Oh, excuse me! Typefaces, not fonts. My bad. It was almost by accident that I ended up reading a forum earlier this evening that dealt with the arcane science of lettering. A discussion so intense that I couldn’t stay there any more than a few minutes. Fear that some of the members might be tracking the choices I make in my brain for words in boldface.
Back in the “dark ages”, when newspapers were laid out by hand (reference to the Cadre) from typewritten columns, we had collections of random letters created by the Letraset company. Not a great variety, because the product was expensive, but useful in the Nth degree for creating headlines. And their catalogue was inspirational.
Fastforward to the land of Postscript printers, and TrueType fonts, and a world wide web that has more variety than anyone could ever need for the proverbial ransom note. I happened to spot a sign from the NYC subway system on TV, and in an idle moment set out to find the “font name”.
Too much information. I even ended up at a site that plays a version of Twenty Questions with you; give enough descriptive information and the site will point you to a font foundry that can sell you the typeface you need for your project. Just the process involved is worth the visit, because unless you make your living pasting down random letters, chances are that you’ve never considered anything other than a world based on Arial and Times Roman. Time to get out of the village and see what the world has to offer.
