Feather Font Friday, or the Quill Pen
Here are some tidbits about that venerable writing instrument, the quill pen. I’ve used a quill pen only a couple of times (messily), and am deeply impressed by people, past and present, with the talent and commitment to practicing to make letterforms easily and well. Here’s an account of one modern-day quill pen enthusiast, and […]
Far Away Font Friday: National Geographic’s Cartographic Typefaces
By Juan Valdes from nationalgeographic.com [Ed.: link is not valid.] From the article: Our maps have long been known for their distinctive typefaces. But few outside the Society know little of the history that lies behind them. Until the early 1930s, most of our maps were hand-lettered—a slow and tedious process requiring great patience and even greater skill. […]
First Sans Serif Font Friday
Today’s Font Friday is about the first sans-serif typefaces in history and in the modern era, from the fascinating site “Graphic Design History.” The site has a vast amount of thoughtfully-organized information. Says site creator Nancy Stock-Allen, M.F.A.: This site was first put on the web in 1999 as a quick outline of my lectures […]
Fried Font Friday
From the Handmade Font website: Eggs Font. Put Eggs Letters In One Basket “The Eggs Font was a challenge for us (just imagine how many eggs were fried for this unique font) and now it’s a new quest for all food typography lovers: you need to buy eggs letters and put them in one appetizing […]
Phys.org Font Friday
From the magazine Phys.org. This is from a while ago—2013, in fact—but still really interesting. Scientists use electron ‘ink’ to write on graphene ‘paper’ by Lisa Zyga, Phys.org (Phys.org)—Nanoscale writing offers a reliable way to record information at extremely high densities, making it a promising tool for patterning nanostructures for a variety of electronic applications. […]
Final F-U Friday: If You Really Hate Someone
From xkcd.com, naturally. On the final day of 2021, here’s how to ruin someone’s life forever, starting with January 1, 2022. Welcome to my world! ::cackles evilly::
Festive Fonts Friday (Christmas Eve Edition)
Here are some free festive fonts from dafont.com for your holiday use! (There are lots more at the link.) Not to be confused with my post Festive Font Friday (Tuesday Solstice Edition). Kingthings Christmas by Kingthings site Download Santa’s Sleigh by HypoTypo Download Candy Cane by Michel Bujardet site Download Merry Xmas by imagex site […]
Festive Fonts Friday (Tuesday Solstice Edition)
Not to be confused with my post Festive Fonts Friday (Christmas Eve Edition), which will appear on Saturday the 25th. Image above: “Diagram of the Earth’s seasons as seen from the north.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solstice Tuesday, December 21 at 15:59 Universal Time is this year’s winter or summer solstice! (Former: Northern Hemisphere; latter: Southern Hemisphere.) UT is […]
How to make a cup of time
With a purchased clockwork mechanism, you can make a clock out of almost anything, but this is my favorite. Materials: A melamine cup. Melamine foodware was mostly made during the 50s and 60s so you can often find cups at thrift or vintage stores. You can also find modern-day melamine cups in camping or baby […]
Farhad’s Font Friday: Knife Typography by Farhad Moshiri
Life is Beautiful is a 2009 installation by Iranian artist Farhad Moshiri using hundreds of kitchen knives to create some exquisite typography. (via notcot) FARHAD MOSHIRI “Life is beautiful” 2009Knives / CouteauxDimensions according to space / 3,25 x 6,16 mPhotograph: © Guillaume ZiccarelliCourtesy: Galerie Perrotin, Hong Kong & Paris Born in 1963 in Shiraz, Iran (Islamic Republic of)Lives and works between Tehran, […]
High-speed camera system reveals what snow looks like in midair
These fluffy snowflakes, known as aggregates, form when snow crystals collide with other snow crystals. Many of these flakes also show some riming, or an icy coating. A new high-speed, three-camera system developed at the University of Utah made these pictures as the snowflakes fell. Credit: Tim Garrett, University of Utah University of Utah researchers […]
First Nations Font Thursday 2 — Thanksgiving/Day of Mourning
See also my posts First Nations Font Thursday 1 and First Nations Font Thursday 3. To many non-Native Americans, Thanksgiving Day is a celebration of family, friends and the founding of this country, and an opportunity to think about the things we’re grateful for. To many Native Americans, however, it is known as the Day […]
Filters Font Friday
Type descriptions and filters like the below find their way into my most fervid dreams. The talented and hardworking presentation designer Mimi Heft (https://www.mimiheftdesign.com/) told me about Ilovetypography.com. Hire her for all your presentation needs! Original post is at https://fonts.ilovetypography.com/cedars?mc_cid=b9d99d1a93&mc_eid=b2ec9d6f4f. CEDARS+ is a new and revolutionary way to describe type via formal characteristics resulting from […]
Fright Night Font Friday
From the awesome, fontacular website fontmeme: Fright Night font here refers to the font used in the poster title of Fright Night, a 3D comedy horror film released in 2011. The film is a remake of the 1985 film of the same name and revolves around a teenager called Charley Brewster, who suspects his new […]
Fear-Free Fur Font Friday, except no fonts and it’s Sunday: Halloween Safety Tips for Pets
Here’s my yearly push to keep your little furry ones safe on Halloween. From the ASPCA: Halloween can be the spookiest night of the year, but keeping your pets safe doesn’t have to be tricky. The ASPCA recommends taking these simple, common sense precautions to keep your pet happy and healthy all the way to […]
Furry, Feathered (and more) Arabic Font Friday
Architect and graphic designer Mahmoud Tammam has translated his love of word manipulation into a delightful series celebrating language. Based in Alexandria, Egypt, the creative started the project as a “personal challenge.” He explains*, “I manipulate Arabic words and transform them into their meaning, and I made a total of 40 illustrated words.” In addition, […]
From Foucault to Frida Font Friday: Cover designs for books that don’t exist (but should)
From io9.com, from an article that’s since been deleted: As part of his Masters of Branding study at the School of Visual Arts, Tyler Adam Smith is creating 100 covers for books that should be written, from goofy snarks at popular authors to imagined sequels to beloved books. Designer Debbie Millman, who chairs the branding […]
Feline Font Friday 3 — in honor of Lucy the Cat, also it’s Tuesday
My first, best, cat’s name was Lucy. Lucy was short for Lucifer—as in “luc” = “light” and “fer” = “bringer”—because of the joy she brought to my life. She was small and almost all black, with yellow-green eyes. I loved her more than I’ve ever loved anyone, cat or human, before or since. I had […]
Create-a-Font Friday
From fontmeme.com, more cool stuff: Below is a list of software that allows you to create and modify a font.
Featured Font Friday: The Improbable Resurrection of a Quirky, Once-Popular, Art Deco Font
By Steven Heller from TheAtlantic.com: Monotype U.K. Tens of thousands of more-or-less similar typefaces are currently available, yet designers continue to create new ones and revive old ones every day. The soon-to-be released Monotype Metro Nova, however, stands out as a notable resurrection of what was arguably a lost masterpiece by William Addison Dwiggins (a.k.a WAD […]
Fiery Font Friday
Ok, how cool is this? Look at all those fonts! Seriously, folks, that’s a lot of fonts, but there are so many they become kind of a pattern, and it somehow works. Don’t try this at home. With excellent commentary by Peiran Tan about Chinese fonts. Source: https://metalsharkplayer.wordpress.com License: All Rights Reserved. Typefaces Both the packaging and contents of tương […]
Phonetikana Font Friday
Clever font sneaks pronunciation guide for English speakers into Japanese katakana characters By Casey Baseel from Rocketnews24:
Phone Font Friday: A Glowing Font Created by Waving an iPhone in the Dark
From wired.com: Next >> View all
Flowing Font Friday
SoraNews24: “Bringing you yesterday’s news from Japan and Asia, today.” By Dale Roll SoraNews24 is a fun blog about, well, yesterday’s Japan and Asia news, today. A fair amount of it is aimed at people learning about Japanese language and writing. From an earlier blog post: Written Japanese uses three kinds of script. At the top […]
From Hell(vetica) Font Friday
Helvetica’s evil twin, Hellvetica, will haunt your nightmares “We wanted people to see this in the wild and be like, ‘What the HELL is wrong with my computer?’” says the typeface’s creator, Matthew Woodward. BY LILLY SMITH Hold your favorite graphic design tome close. We now know what the classic typeface Helvetica would look like […]
Flying Font Friday 2
From My Modern Met.com. Also see my post Flying Font Friday 1, about airport signage. Norwegian nature photographer Kjell Bloch Sandved has devoted his photographic career to capturing the beauty of the world we live in and along the way, amassed a collection of butterfly and moth images with interesting patterns on their wings. Sanved’s […]
Fightin’ Font Friday
The only people perhaps more obsessive than type designers are builders of model aircraft. TLai Enterprises offers a font for sale called AmarilloUSAF. With its straight lines and blocky look, AmarilloUSAF provides the correct, forthright feel of the real thing. AmarilloUSAF Pro—Enhanced US Air Force Aircraft Marking Font
Foreign Font Friday 2
Here’s a beautiful font inspired by the designers’ love of travel. Photographic images of destinations paired with a strong sans serif typeface create a unique and memorable look. See also Foreign Font Friday 1, about typefaces that have a foreign look. Around the World With Type by Rigved Sathe and Payal Jagwani We intend to […]
Feudal Font Friday
Tee hee.
Effacing Font Friday
By Margaret Rhodes from Wired magazine: Self-Censoring Font Redacts Words the Feds Are Watching For Seen, a font from designer Emil Kozole, recognizes National Security Agency spook words and blacks them out. Image credit: Emil Kozole
Fleurons Font Friday
A fleuron, or flower, is a decorative typographic character. The category of fleuron includes some characters that are not floral in design. Also known as a printer’s flower or floret. Flowers are in a category of characters known as ornaments or type ornaments. Scroll down or jump to here for a short essay on fleurons.
Found Font Friday
With regard to the surreptitious disposal and triumphant recovery of the Doves Type from London’s Thames River (from an article in typespec magazine): The Doves Type® revival. Not to be confused with my post Found Font Friday 2, about fonts created from lettering and signs found in the great outdoors. Raised from the dead: The Doves […]
14,000+ color names! Just type in a hex code
Smashing Magazine‘s Smashing Newsletter Issue #190 has this gem: more than 14,000 color names, accessible by entering a 6-digit hex code. Some examples below. Click on “quick! Find one of 14’000 color names!” to get the HTML, CSS, and JS code (see below). What comes to your mind when you hear terms like “Bright Nori”, […]
Fans Font Friday 3 – Art Deco
Here are some beautiful hand fans from the Art Deco era. Vintage Advertising Hand Fan – 666 Brand Salve A common use of imagery on hand fans seems to have been informational rather than just decoration. This one is for “666” brand remedy for everything from malaria to neuralgia. The stylized illustration of Diana is […]
Forgotten Font Friday
A lovely type-related article from Atlas Obscura, chroniclers of the strange and wonderful. The Lost Typefaces of W.A. Dwiggins The pioneering designer created dozens of fonts, only a few of which are still around today. By CARA GIAIMO for Atlas Obscura
Fairbanks, Flagstaff, Fresno, Florida, Fairfield, Falmouth, Fayette, Fargo, Fort Worth Font Friday
Andy Murdock is co-founder of The Statesider: “The most interesting US travel stories, delivered directly to your inbox.” Here he writes about the 222 fonts he found with names associated with US places. The United Fonts of America Before 1984, I had never encountered the word “font.” Then a Macintosh computer showed up in my […]
F*cking Font Friday
Scunthorpe Sans, according to its promo material at Vole.wtf, is “[a] s*** font that f***ing censors bad language automatically.” The Vole.wtf page has a font generator, where you can input the foul words of your choice and see the censorship in real time (scroll down for an example of what it looks like). Indulge your […]
Family vs Variable Font Friday
The fearsome Hydra provides a handy illustration of current vs. future trends in digital typography. Current: typeface “families” with a different cut for each style: e.g. 8 pt/12 pt/ 18 pt, thin/regular/bold, condensed/regular/expanded, etc., and combinations thereof. (“Cut” refers to the metal type of yore, in which the master for each style was literally cut […]
Fonting while Queer Font Friday
In-person LGBTQIA+ celebrations may be cancelled this year, but a new(ish) typeface can soothe your wounds with rainbow colored strokes. Behold: the typeface “Gilbert.” [Update] I’m getting some formatting errors in this post, so here’s a link to the original article: https://www.typewithpride.com/ On 31 March, 2017, Gilbert Baker the creator of the iconic Rainbow Flag […]
“Murder Most Foul” Font Friday
A little bit of a reach for Font Friday today: “Foul” Font Friday (what I thought of first) -> “Murder Most Foul” Font Friday -> Hamlet typeface. In the play, the ghost of Hamlet’s father tells Hamlet that he has been a victim of “Murder most foul” by his own brother’s hand, moving the action […]
Fans Font Friday 2 – Klackin
Klackin Fans™, that is! Klackin Fans are awesome, rude, queer-themed fans with awesome, rude, queer-themed phrases on them (plus the odd 420 or political one) in mostly garish colors and with terrible font choices and kerning. They beg to be seen by huge crowds at a bar or festival, but that’s not possible anymore in […]
Fans Font Friday 1 – Flirtations
Apart from the small matter of the horrifying death and illness we see around us and in the media, by now we are all heartily *tired* of this pandemic. Whether we are stuck at home, stuck working, stuck taking on new household/schooling responsibilities, any combination thereof or—I hope not—stuck in bed with *any* ailment, a […]
Fur and Feathers Not-Font Not-Friday-Either
The human world is going to hell—if it’s not there already—but our animals still need us. No fonts today. Long post. TL;DR Walking your dogs and petting your cats (and other critters) helps both them and you I miss my kitty “socializing” at the SF SPCA The Fear Free® training program was helpful for me […]
Fonting While Female Font Friday
Golly gosh, folks, this Sunday, March 8 is International Women’s Day! Isn’t it neat that they let us ladies have a whole day to ourselves? And a whole month to ourselves too? One out of twelve is just nifty! In any case, I thought I’d celebrate the day’s novel status with some typography for this, […]
Foam Slime Font Friday – Late Valentine’s Day Edition
Yes, today is oops, six days ago was Valentine’s Day, the American holiday compelling those with partners to give expensive pink and red gifts to their sweetheart(s). Also in the offing: chocolates, flowers, lavish diamond jewelry, marriage proposals. Obligatory! Compulsory! And of course if one does not have a partner(s), one is a failure as […]
(Oscar) Film Font Friday
The Oscars are on Sunday, February 9! Here’s a great breakdown of the design of posters of some leading films. See also Film Fonts Friday 1; (Bond) Film Font Friday; Film Font Friday, Wes Anderson Edition; and Font Film Font Friday. Read the text below, or click the link for the full interactive experience. Washington […]
(Artemis) Fowl Font Friday
From Wikipedia: Artemis Fowl is a series of eight children’s fantasy novels written by Irish author Eoin Colfer, featuring the criminal mastermind Artemis Fowl II. The series has received positive critical reception and generated huge sales. It has also originated graphic novel adaptations.
Feds Font Friday
Another great article from typeroom.com, detailing the release of the first official typeface of the United States of America. Public Sans: It’s official. The US government released its own free font.