The Lair

People insist that it’s not the cover of the book that matters, but the content. But that’s not true. It’s not the content, it’s the typeface. It doesn’t matter what you type, so long as you choose the proper typeface.

All of you guys are idiots. Really. Just go away.

You just blinked at that and kept on reading, amirite? Ha! First anecdotal point proven. Well, not really.

This then, is my somewhat dramatic introduction to a programme I saw last night. The programme was a mini-feature named Helvetica - all about the Helvetica typeface or in lay terms, the Helvetica font. Why is it that an entire film has been made about the history of this still ubiquitous and surprisingly popular font? Because of its influence on subsequent font design, partially - and also because it gives a fascinating insight into the psychology and the thought processes behind the design of a type face. The feeling of a pure message, of calmness, of neutrality - all of those things can be (and were) purveyed by a simple choice of typeface for a sign or advertisement.

I really like this font. Not sure why.

See, the choice of font for any project is not straightforward. I too feel that there is a correct typeface for every job and strangely enough, my eternal search for the ideal programmers font coincides with the birth of this belief. The font that you choose to stare at for hours on end (be it on screen or on paper) has a huge influence on your perception of what is being read, on your general feeling of comfort (I hate handwriting fonts because they’re hard to read) and a general feeling of symmetry.

That last point is a little bit hard to explain - fonts need to feel right when displayed on the screen. Not all of them do - for example, this one doesn’t work for me. nor does this one. I also dislike the practice of using monospaced fonts for my editor, regardless of what the best practice may be. Sans-serif (with the rounded edge) works best.

I spend a lot of time staring at a LCD, but not so much time reading the same font in print. The method by which fonts are displayed on screen also differs between operating systems. (slightly out of date Windows discussion).

So, essentially - although it might seem very strange to actually look around for a film on the history of a typeface - that’s exactly what I intend to do when I get some spare time.

There is a footnote to this. If English typefaces are decent, that is the consequence of years of design work. The fledgeling Sinhala typefaces, unfortunately, have had considerably less attention paid to them… and it shows. The font I currently have installed looks horrendous when bold formatting is applied to it. And my ick-factor at having to use the font grows.

Update: There’s more. There are apparently four types of Sans-serif fonts. I personally prefer Calibri, Trebuchet MS. My editor usually contains Gill Sans (suck it, haters). Oh and when I absolutely must use a fixed width font - I like Consolas (since WinEdt seemingly has problems with Inconsolata)