posted
If you spend most of the day working with fonts, matching existing typestyles and recreating logos, you eventually become quite proficient at identifying them on sight. One of the biggest headaches these days is some fonts have naming issues: major type-foundrys have their fonts trademarked which includes the name, someone comes along and knocks it off and changes the name slightly and voila! lots of fonts that resemble each other but not exactly. Then you have a bazillion new fonts being added to the web each day with all kinds of bizarre names, alot of those fonts are variations of existing fonts, so you have to wade thru those.
Back when I was in college, in our typography classes, we had access to type foundry spec books: a big catalog with the fonts printed out. from there we had to pick certain fonts and then recreate all the characters by hand, rendering them in pen and ink. You end up learning more than you ever want to know about typefaces!
As far as tips or tricks, I try to identify characteristics of a few special characters and try to match those. "a,s,e,g,etc..." usually they have a unique style, and then I look thru lots of font books that have the full range of characters printed out. Once you go thru this process a couple of times, you can spout off font names with the best of them!
"My name is Michael, and I'm a font-a-holic...."
-------------------- Michael Clanton Clanton Graphics/ Blackberry 19 Studio 1933 Blackberry Conway AR 72034 501-505-6794 clantongraphics@yahoo.com Posts: 1737 | From: Conway Arkansas | Registered: Oct 2001
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Making the simple complicated is commonplace; making the complicated simple, awesomely simple, that's creativity. — Charles Mingus Posts: 6779 | From: Mendocino, CA. USA | Registered: Nov 1998
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-------------------- Mario G. Lafreniere (Fergie) J&N Signs Winter did show up! Posts: 1257 | From: Chapleau, Ontario | Registered: Jun 1999
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posted
I only remember my favorites. Seems like there are so many similar letterstyles now~a~days....I remember the unique ones and wacky ones.
Posts: 3729 | From: Seattle | Registered: Sep 1999
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posted
I can recognize tons of them and find them in the directory by remembering that a certain font starts with a "p" and so on. I remember most names of fonts from the distant past, but the short term memory is gone. I'm glad my browser remembers my name and password or I would have to look that up. Starts with a "d" I think.
-------------------- Wright Signs Wyandotte, Michigan Posts: 2786 | From: Wyandotte, MI USA | Registered: Jan 1999
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posted
My first job was in a typesetting shop - we did sub work for printers. I learned a lot of typefaces in those days and still recognize and can name most of them - but not by their 'puter based names - and there are thousands of variations now on the old timers thanks to the hackers.
Posts: 1859 | From: / | Registered: Nov 1998
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