Book Description
This book is a hands-on guide to the entire process of making logos and fonts and even icons, all of which, essentially, start with the ability to draw letterforms. The intent of the book, in fact, is to enable the user to end reliance on "OPF" (other people's fonts) and learn to draw your own custom logos, fonts and lettering! There are many books on the market that simply display collections of logos and fonts, and that give the history of logos and fonts. But Logo, Font & Lettering Bible is unique in that it teaches you how to create logos and fonts from scratch using traditional tools as well as the computer programs Adobe Illustrator and Fontographer (plus a bit about FontLab). The book provides all the traditional rules and tips about letter formation relating to proportion, shaping, balance, spacing, composition and actually teaches five different methods of drawing letters on computer using bezier curves.There has never been a book like this one that goes into so much detail about drawing letters and takes such a fun and irreverent approach while doing so. The book is also full of inspiration and analysis of tons of great examples of vintage and current lettering from old manuscripts to graffiti. Logo, Font & Lettering Bible also shows you how to create fancy drop shadows and other type effects. And finally, the last section provides straight talk on the business of being a logo and font designer, from advertising your work and pricing to dealing with difficult clients (aren't they all?).

This book has been almost unanimously acclaimed by professional letterers, logo designers and font creators, bothyoung and old. It is currently in use as a text in many typography programs and several Design college educators have stated it is one of the few texts that "students are actually happy about having to purchase." ... Read more

Customer Reviews (37)

Great book, great presentation
I've recently purchased this book based on online reviews. I've seen good and bad reviews, but I decided to give it a chance. I was amazed by the quality of the print, and the layout of the content.

The looks: The content is beautifully arranged, the layout design and the cover are done by the author herself. It has nice images, full color on every single page. The paper is of great quality. The hardcover size of the book is larger than the usually type of books and it resembles an album art format.

The contents: The book has some big chapters that it deals with. Has good information on how to develop a logo and font design process , about thumb-nailing, brainstorming ideas, drawing by hand and using bezier curves in illustrator. It says what a logo is and what a logo is not. It has some info about how to run a design business as well. The content is very easy to read and understand, from cover to cover as well as a reference material.

The price: very good price given the quality and the presentation.

Typefreaks Choice
I read glowing reviews of this book before my purchase. They were accurate, the author's passion for type and logo design is evident. A definitive work for the serious designer. No filler in this book. I would go as far to say that this reference work should be mandatory for all graphic design students. As the Bible is indispensable for the believer so this book is indispensable for the true type freak.

Joe Typefreak

JUST BUY IT!!!
This book made me LOVE type the way no other book did. trust me just buy it!

My secret weapon!
Not only is it a terrific and easy-to-understand how-to book, but a fabulous idea-starter and it doubles as a coffee table book because it's beautiful to just thumb through.

An Excellent Book for a Typophile!
As a design instructor, I found this book an excellent resource for ideas and examples. It has a thorough explanation of Bezier curves, which is invaluable in understanding how vector based applications like Adobe Illustrator, work. Fine examples of type design are included as well. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Excellent read
I thoroughly enjoyed the author's approach to a beautiful storyand her ability to demonstrate in a tangible way the message and meaning of Lourdes.This is a story told through the eyes of a person of great faith and insight.

I could not wait to get back to it!
Elizabeth Ficocelli has writen a wonderful blend of history and spiritual truth that has come out of the print and captured my heart. It is a incredibly balanced book on events that lead this believer to examine her own heart and how her own personnel healing came about. ... Read more

Book Description
This reference is a fascinating and complete guide to using fonts and typography on the Web and across a variety of operating systems and application software. Fonts & Encodings shows you how to take full advantage of the incredible number of typographic options available, with advanced material that covers everything from designing glyphs to developing software that creates and processes fonts.

The era of ASCII characters on green screens is long gone, and industry leaders such as Apple, HP, IBM, Microsoft, and Oracle have adopted the Unicode Worldwide Character Standard. Yet, many software applications and web sites still use a host of standards, including PostScript, TrueType, TeX/Omega, SVG, Fontlab, FontForge, Metafont, Panose, and OpenType. This book explores each option in depth, and provides background behind the processes that comprise today's "digital space for writing":

• Part I introduces Unicode, with a brief history of codes and encodings including ASCII. Learn about the morass of the data that accompanies each Unicode character, and how Unicode deals with normalization, the bidirectional algorithm, and the handling of East Asian characters.
• Part II discusses font management, including installation, tools for activation/deactivation, and font choices for three different systems: Windows, the Mac OS, and the X Window System (Unix).
• Part III deals with the technical use of fonts in two specific cases: the TeX typesetting system (and its successor, W, which the author co-developed) and web pages.
• Part IV describes methods for classifying fonts: Vox, Alessandrini, and Panose-1, which is used by Windows and the CSS standard. Learn about existing tools for creating (or modifying) fonts, including FontLab and FontForge, and become familiar with OpenType properties and AAT fonts.

Customer Reviews (6)

Great book lots of errors though
This is a terrific book for the technically minded person either designing type or dealing with its use from a technology perspective. I read the English translation and found the writing good and informative. My problem is that there appear to be numerous typos particularly in the hundreds of code examples. This may only be in the translation since I have not seen the original French. I hope the publisher can give it a thorough proof reading!

Nothing short of a masterpiece.
I ordered this book to help me with character encodings in our digital library files.That is fully covered, but there is so much more.Chapter 11 - History of Latin Fonts - is worth the price of the book.It makes sense that this book would be written by a European because of the great number of languages in Europe.I am very thankful that it was translated from French to English so I could have access!

What a Wonderful book!!
'Fonts & Encodings' by Yannis Haralambous is one of the most complete books I've ever read on a single topic. But surprisingly and opossite to most computer-related books, this one is perhaps the most easy to understand.

This is not a book just for the web developer or the typesetter. Nor it is for the graphic designer or for the software programmer. This is also a book for everyone interested in how computers work, in how data is converted into a graphical interpretation readable by humans.

Being a graphic designer and publisher for 30 years and a web designer and programmer for the last 10, I really enjoyed the history section, which transported me to those days when personal computers did not even exist and typography had to be hand-made as well as its continuous evolution to get the state as we know it now: Fonts & Encodings.

The way this book is structured make the novice readers find the subject of interest without having to go into the complicated technical stuff, while making the techs and versed find and easily understand the most complicated issues regarding the topic.

Special credits to P. Scott Horne for a so brilliant translation. Those who speak several languages will agree with me on how difficult is to translate a book mostly technical without getting lost in translation.

Daniel Ajzen "WEBstationONE" (San Diego, CA, USA)

The Ultimate Fonts & Encodings Reference
'Fonts & Encodings' by Yannis Haralambous is about as complete a book as you will find on any computer topic, bar none.Rarely are expectations exceeded when it comes to anything in life, but this book goes way way way beyond what any other fonts/encodings book has done in the past.Packing 1000+ pages of content into this text, the author discusses all the relevant topics as hand, from history to font creation and specification to math involved in creating these typefaces we use every day... truly to infinity and beyond!!!

If you are a developer or user of fonts and want to learn more about the history of how difficult and non-trivial even the most basic characters were to get on your browser window, this book is for you.If you need this pertinent information and are in the business of creating fonts yourself, this book is for you.If you are just interested in the topic of one of the most basic computer technologies, this book is (you guessed it) for you!!!

With 14 chapters and 6 appendices, this book truly puts the U in Unicode and is a must read for anyone that wants to learn more about this exciting topic!!

***** HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

VERY VERY HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!!
Are you a software developer, web developer or graphic artist who needs to know how to get typography and fonts to work properly? If you are, then this book is for you. Author Yannis Haralambous, has done an outstanding job of writing a book that shows you how to use fonts and typography on the Web and across a variety of operating systems and application software.

Haralambous, begins with a history of codes and encodings, starting in antiquity. Then, the author presents an introduction to Unicode. Next, he explains the internal workings of encoding. The author also focuses on the following three mechanisms: normalization, the bi-directional algorithm, and the handling of East Asian characters. He continues by addressing a specific problem: how to produce a text encoded in Unicode. Then, the author discusses not the fonts themselves, but their management. Next, he deals with the use of fonts in two specific cases: the TEX typesetting system and Web pages. The author also describes three methods for classifying fonts: Vox, Alessandrini and Panose-1. Finally, he describes the existing tools for creating fonts.

In this most excellent book, the reader is offered a certain number of tools to confront various problems with fonts. Here, the author does not concern himself with all aspects of the electronic document, just those pertaining to characters and glyphs that diirectly and inevitably affect encodings and fonts. ... Read more

Book Description

Customer Reviews (6)

THE TYPEIS WAY TOO small
Very nice book that's just WAY TOO SMALL!!!, it's MORONIC to publish an encyclopedia of "anything" that measures 7x7 inches, serifs and other details are negligible.....it cannot be considered a definitive font reference book at this size, THE PRINT IS TOO SMALL!!!!,which is frustrating because that's exactly why I did (or you would) purchase this book. If they make the letters bigger it's a classic, at this size it's almost garbage.

big book, lots of fonts
It is a large book with lots of fonts but the fonts are so small you can hardly see them. This is more of a reference font book than anything.

Not exactly what I was expecting
I guess I didn't read the other reviews as carefully as I should have.I was looking for a book which would list the various fonts and give a complete (A-Z) example.

This book does that, but the author is primarily concerned with the history of fonts, which I don't really have any interest in nor is it relative to my needs.I wanted an alphabetical listing of fonts so I could flip through the book and find a font that fit my project.I haven't really figured out her organization, it's supposed to be by style and historical order, I think, I don't have the time or interest to figure it out.It's annoying.Finding examples of the fonts I have is tedious.I have to look them up in the index then find them in the book.Doesn't allow for the quick flip through I wanted to aid in font selection.

I decided to look up my fonts and hi-lite them, but this is a slow process and the ink hi-liting doesn't dry as quickly as I'd like causing the opposite page to pick up some of the color which may be confusing later.I've also found many of my most interesting fonts are not in this book.Plus sometimes her examples look nothing like my font with the same name, like architec.Her example is much heavier and nothing like the font I've seen in so many places.There are no dingbat fonts either, which I was really hoping for.

Considering it's girth it is amazing that so many semi-common fonts are left out; fonts often used in commercial layout.

A Beautiful Book and Great Reference
This is one of my all-time favorite type specimen books. It's beautifully designed and printed. Easy to handle and has about 12,000 of the best of the digital typefaces. Includes designer's name, date, foundry, etc. One of the features is that complete alphabets are shown plus a specimen line. All are the same size for easy comparison. It'd be nice if the Italic "companion" fonts were shown but as one soon realizes, that wouldn't be possible. This book is 1-1/2" thick (nice paper!). Indexes include a listing of the designers so that one can find all the type faces a person designed. Highly recommended. Use it as Gwyn Headley intended it to be used and you'll find why I think so highly of it. I've worked with type for nearly 65 years and as you can imagine I've used a lot of type books over the years. This is ranked very close to the top.

Ridiculously small printing- hard to see important detail
The printing was quite UNNECESSARILY small, and it is very difficult seeing the details clearly with the naked eye on many of the more elaborate fonts. Mr. Headley may have done a nice job putting this book together (the two stars are for him and him alone), but the publisher has cheated both the editor and the reader by apparently trying to save an extra buck where printing costs were concerned. I was extremely disappointed with this volume. ... Read more

Book Description

Customer Reviews (1)

You Can Almost Hear The Ringmaster!
Circus fonts have always been fun to use and a number of these are unique. Dan Solo had a huge collection of great old and new type faces. You'll find 24 of them here. The fonts are in both Windows True Type and Macintosh formats. The pages have the complete alphabets and a character chart. Be sure to notice the "extra characters" that are offered in some fonts. ... Read more

Book Description
New in paperback!

If you’re searching for a font that goes beyond ho-hum, this book is for you. Today’s computers provide a selection of fonts that serve reasonably well for workaday letters and publications, but have become utterly boring from overuse. If you want your project to attract the reader’s attention, you need an original font.

Indie Fonts provides a showcase collection of over 1600 diverse fonts from 19 18 of today’s hottest digital type foundries and features the best work of these designers. Indie Fonts will help readers find some of the highest quality fonts available today.

The type styles range from the best of Matthew Carter’s classic designs to the latest irreverence of ingoFonts. Designers searching for unique typefaces will find what they are looking for, whether historical revivals or futuristic techno faces. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (5)

This book is great!0 Stars for Amazon though... Consider Yourself Warned!
I bought this book from Amazon thinking that I'd have better luck than the Oct. 2005 shopper... Boy was I wrong! Not only is the book all broken in/cover torn & scratched... the CD IS MISSING!!! That's part of the reason I bought this book. I purchased this book "brand new" from Amazon (triple-checked my receipt to confirm).

The book itself is great, but please do yourself a favor and DO NOT buy this book from Amazon--you'll be thoroughly disappointed.

bad for business
this item was described as brand new in plastic wrap, which is why i purchased it as a gift for a friend. not only was this item CLEARLY used, it was falling apart. the book was shipped to me with a broken spine, the paper sover had marks all over it and there was NO plastic wrap protecting the item. i am very upset with the service i received, and will NOT be shopping with amazon again!

Resource for graphic artists and web designers--wonderful
This is an unusual volume; you get a book with 408 pages of various resources, organized by font foundry. You can sample the work of each foundry and get an idea of their product line.

Best of all, the front of the book has in index in alphabetical order showing each font. So you can locate a font you like and then look it up for additional information.

You can also find the AIGA's guide to the Use of Fonts, important for understanding copyright in using fonts in your work.

The bonus CD has 33 fully-licensed fonts. Not all of them are unique--you can find some of these gratis on the web, but the collection is handy for those who can't get enough fonts. I only found a few of these really worth having.

American Spirit
Charaille
Lovesick
Nightmare
Scrawm
Sunspots
Transponder
Fridayluck
Patching Compound
Snipple
Schnookems
Black Widow
Sparkly (Fontdiner.com, a fave of mine)
Loungy (also fontdiner.com)
Bowl-o-rama
Eric sans and sans italic
Sinsation
P22 typewrites
Cusp Three Opp
PRR Sinel
Faceplate sans A and C gauge
Atomic Suck
Stunner Leather Jackts
Screwtop regular and negative
TX Manifesto
Cyphor7
Strenuous 3D

My faves are of course from fontdiner.com--the best retro fonts out there, I think.

Indie Fonts
Wow! "Indie Fonts" is indeed a quality book both in the information it provides and the workmanship afforded in the making of the book itself.Few publishers take pride in making such a quality product as this...like the bookbinders of yesteryear.You can see the workmanship as soon as you lay eyes on it.You can feel the wokmanship the moment you pick it up.A work of Art!Highly recommended.Enjoy!

Indie Fonts Brings Unseen Type to the Masses
The book's hardback permanence and $$$ ($$$ from Chank, that scoundrel) list price make it more of a reference than a catalog. Bound in stunning red cloth, Indie Fonts' exterior brings to mind the solid albums of ATF and Linotype. With class and substance, this volume lends credence to each firm it represents.

Up front is a style index with a one-line showing for each font and page number referring to the corresponding full specimen.

Generally well-planned specimen pages organized in foundry sections make up the bulk of the content. Each foundry created its own section page with a company bio and ordering information. Each shop also designed its own specimens based on Grieshaber's templates, resulting in showings of slightly varying quality. On the whole, the type is given ample room for full character sets, although things get a bit tight for foundries with more fonts to show. Text faces are often shown in paragraph form with a tiny column measure. It would be nice to see how they perform in more extensive settings. The font name, designer and year of design are listed in the sidebar. Some foundries opted to include notes on the font's use or origin in this margin and those specimens are better for it.

Trailing the foundry sections is a glossary, a reading list, and a handy character reference chart. Also included is the AIGA's guide to the Use of Fonts which covers some font copyright and ethical use concepts misunderstood by most designers. A simple index of font names and designers rounds out the book.

Tucked into the inside back cover is a CD of 33 "Bonus Fonts" which are fully licensed for immediate use. Some are true commercial goodies and add value to the book, others are available for free elsewhere, and a few are pure poop.

Not Seen on TV

Any collection of independent typography is subject to a wide variety of style and quality. In no other book can one find the classic work of regal Matthew Carter directly followed by the irreverant fonts of Chank. Indie Fonts proudly hails both the king and the court jester. But the unexpected is what makes the volume so valuable. Much of this type has never been used by a magazine or multi-national corporation. These are fonts not seen on TV. These are mass-culture virgins. To a designer struggling to make an impact in a world over-saturated with the same old look, this stuff is gold.

Most of the typefaces in Indie Fonts were already unveiled by their respective foundries in those previously mentioned corners of the web, but there are a few that will be new, even to surfing typoholics. Fresh Fountain fonts made their debut in Indie Fonts before the redesigned web site went live. Peter Bilak's multi-descendered Fedra Serif (still in preview form at Typotheque) is displayed beautifully in one of the more thorough specimens of the book. Without a website or distributor, much of Matthew Carter's Carter & Cone library (Fenway, Big Figgins, ITC Galliard CC, Ionic #1, Sammy Roman, and Wilson Greek) is on display here for the first time, as far as I know. And It's a relief to see all of the Test Pilot Collective in one accessible place, their website still repelling hopeful visitors after years of being AWOL.

Worth a Spot on the Shelf

Indie Fonts isn't quite on par with the master of all specimen books, FontShop's FontBook. But it's more of a companion to the catalogs of the large distributors than it is a replacement. In the end, those who rely only on the big boys are overlooking a valuable set of typefaces - many of which are effectively set into motion by this very worthy tool. ... Read more

Amazon.com
Fonts can make or break a layout, and good designers know it. Knowing what a bitmapped font is might not seem like a big deal...until you go to print it. The author, Robin Williams, explains how a font that is bitmapped will have very different results on a printer than one that is not. How to Boss Your Fonts Around will also show you the merits of investing your time in organizing your fonts through a font manager.

In a day when there are now "Beat Generation" fonts for the Mac, good font use and management is essential. Williams, Mac expert and the author of bestsellers such as The Non-Designer's Design Book and The Little Mac Book, goes into great detail on the origin and creation of great fonts. Did you ever wonder why so many fonts are named after big cities (such as New York and Geneva)? Turns out, they're all in the same font family, and knowing the characteristics of that grouping will enhance how you use them. Williams provides a full glossary of terms, and the book is rich with visual examples. She treats fonts as the tools they are, showing the reader all the necessary care and maintenance to allow for great design and for the text to shine through. --Jennifer BuckendorffBook Description
Fonts. They seem to have a life of their own. And they can cause no end of heartache to the harried desktop or webtop publisher. Perfectly lovely documents on screen can suddenly transmogrify into a perfect nightmare when printed. So how can you control these willful beasts? Get a copy of this book and end your power struggle with fonts forever.

How To Boss Your Fonts Around has been completely revised and updated for the Second Edition. It's a must-have primer on font technology and font management for anyone who works on a Macintosh. It's updated for Mac OS 8, and includes all new coverage of how to work with and manage fonts for the Web. You'll learn to identify and work with all the different kinds of fonts available, from PostScript to TrueType to Type 1, bitmapped to screen, outline to printer, resident to downloadable and more. There's coverage of Adobe Type Manager, ATM Deluxe, Suitcase, Master Juggler, Font Reserve, new font management tools and utilities, installing fonts, and solving font conflicts. A detailed reference section answers common questions and problems, tells you how to acquire fonts, and offers an amazingly detailed glossary. This is the essential troubleshooting guide to taking control of fonts and learning to use them efficiently and effectively. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (5)

Mac-Oriented Book
Although the Amazon editorial review calls Williams a Mac expert, it doesn't make clear that this book is pretty exclusively Mac-oriented.Some of it will be useful to Windows users, but there are surely other, similar font books on the market more useful for Windows users.If I had realized this before I started making notes in the margins, I would have returned it.

Everything you wanted to know about fonts...
As a typesetter in a large corporation I found this book very helpful when I recently had to organize our fonts on 12 computers. It clearly explains the difference in the various types of fonts and how to use them properly. It also covers in detail all the different type management software (ATM, Suitcase, etc.). After speaking with several designers, it appears that fonts can be the single biggest nightmare and this book would be an asset to any designers library.

Not so good...
I bought Robin's book aobut 2 weeks ago and I have read it over and over.I found that the book was not helpful in getting my fonts organised.I am left with fundamental questions unanswered and a lot of frustration.I am still looking for a book that will show me how to sort my fonts what to keep what to throw and how to do it.This book has some good back ground informationon the benefits of ATM, and the history but what about open fonts, and master fonts? It's dated and not helpful.

Probably the best writer on typography around.
Except for her mild endorsement of grunge (why have we spent hundreds of years designing typefaces that are both readable and beautiful only to have a generation of" designers" design deconstructed faces that arelikely to be used only once in a lifetime), Robin Williams is probably themost articulate and literate writer on typography around, digital ortraditional. She is sensitive to those qualities that have somehow beenlost on those who have been brought up facing a monitor rather than a typebook, type case or drawing board. Too many people in business have been ledto believe, and accept the idea, that a typist is automatically atypographer/designer. Every designer who has grown up on the computershould have all of her books at their side, along with Strunk & White,Fowler's Modern English Usage, Roget's Thesaurus and a good dictionary.

Excellent design and crash avoidance techniques
"He who dies with the most fonts wins," is a fact of life for a lot of desktop designers for print and the web. However, having tons of fonts of every weight, format and variety gobbles up lots of system memory, and corrupted or conflicting fonts cause crashes. This book tells all on how to get your collection under control, and keep your fonts organized, in good shape, and zipped in place for when you need them. This book is also well written, and will keep you alert and interested, which is most refreshing because I've found many how-to design/computer management books must be read with toothpicks propping up your eyes. It's also just the right length, concise and everything is clearly, not condecendingly, explained. It's a must read for any Mac designer, from the newest newbie to the most advanced. ... Read more

Book Description
As someone who works with fonts every day, you need to know exactly howfonts work in Mac OS X. Long-time Mac author Sharon Zardetto Aker hasthe answers you need, explaining where your fonts reside, why they arethere, and what to do about duplication and long Font menus. Oncethat’s under control, you’ll learn things like the ins and outs ofdifferent font installation methods; how to use Font Book to manage,validate, and organize fonts; ways of dealing with legacy Mac OS 9fonts; and how to make the most of character-rich Unicode fonts. And tohelp with those maddening font problems, Sharon providestroubleshooting steps and real-world advice for solving problems fast.If you’ve experienced seemingly inexplicable trouble with charactersdisplaying incorrectly, an inability to type a particular character,fonts missing from Font menus, confusing behavior in Microsoft or Adobeprograms, Font Book crashing, or Character Palette misbehaving, RealWorld Mac OS X Fonts has the help you need.

In this book, you’ll find the answers to questions like these:

• What types of fonts can I use with Mac OS X?
• In what order does Mac OS X access fonts from all their possible locations?
• How can I figure out what characters are available in a Unicode font?
• How can I minimize font-related troubles when sharing documents across platforms?
• How do I go about troubleshooting a font problem?
• How do I enter special characters?
• How do I print font samples?
• How do I work with legacy fonts?
  

Customer Reviews (9)

CONCISE EXPLANATIONS for Real World Usage
When OS 9 Classic was retired, it forced a radical transition to reorganize and manage fonts without the ATM.

This book is the clearest and simplest guide for OSX users to understand how font functionality has altered in the OSX environment. Also vital to crossplatform users, the author Zardetto Aker simplifies the complex nature of sharing fonts between two platform radicals (Windows and APPLE).

Those who earn their living in computer design using real world situations would benefit from buying this book.

One analogy that describes it best:

Any graphic project is like the recipe for a perfect pot of "CHILI"
FONTS are the spices going into that pot.
If you don't manage the spice in your chili, like not managing the fonts in your project .... You wind up with disaster.

MUST READING ... Zardetto Akers' Font Management in OSX takes the confusion out of the font dynamics restructured on OSX.

A guide through the labyrinth
I love my Mac, & I love typography. What I don't love is the mind-numbing complexity of OSX's font handling. Although I don't lament the passing of the ever-crashing OS9, it's framework for fonts was beautifully simple. There's a price for progress.

This book provides what's needed to understand the foundation concepts and terminology, and to deal confidently with common font issues. Thoroughly explained, it's made apparent that the font framework of OSX is not so incomprehensible after all. For any tech-savvy graphic artist or designer, an indispensable volume for your reference shelf.

Making the Mac Safe for Fonts
What a splendid guide! Even if you are content to useTIMES ROMAN all the time, you should still look at this book to see a model of how to write a computer guide. None of the breezy self conscious humor you find in some books (the Dummy series or Scott Kelby's otherwise informative PhotoShop books). But friendlier and more attuned to the reader's anxieties and potential mistakes than the standard dry guides (e.g. the Missing Manuals series, which are not bad). Aker seems to sense exactly what you might need to know at just the right moment, but yet does not overwhelm you without a lot of detail all at once.

I recently switched from a PC (since 1980)to Mac, which is as everyone said so much more elegant, stable and better in almost every respect.But the font system is just as complicated and eccentric in OS X as in Windows XP.You need to do some housekeeping even if you are not a font maven. Follow the steps carefully laid out in Chapter 2 (rather tedious but precise), and your system will run more smoothly and you will know a lot about where your fonts are, and how to keep them behaving well.

I am almost never moved to write reviews here, and certainly not of computer books. But this is an exceptional contribution.

Solved the mess!
I do graphics and own Macs from October, 1985. I passed thru all the font technologies that were done into the computer... from enlarging 72pt bitmaps and correcting them, the early times of Adobe's ATM and so on.
But --maybe I'm getting old-- with the introduction of Mac OS X, typography went almost out of control for me. Althought I do not use per se Office I need to install it to open others files... and it destroy any organizated fonts folders that you had managed,
Then, in a desperate move, I bought Zardetto's book!
And everything came back to order: clear instructions lead me in a clever and consistent way. I confess I did it twice. First time I said myself: "I'm an old macintoshian..." But then I realized that following the step-by-step instructions was more inteligent. Then, with everything in order, I was back "in control".
So, my advice --for newbies and oldies-- follow the instructions and then personalize your fonts. OK, first buy and read the book!

Fix font problems - Flawlessly
Face it - you'd think just putting your fonts in the FONT folder would be sufficient. But, strange things do happen.And, for me it is never at a good time.Like when you upgrade Adobe CS ... which made half my fonts DISAPPEAR.
Thanks for the info and instructions about AdobeFntXX.lst alone - made this book a must have in my library.
And,that was just one small enlightened moment Aker's offered ... Read more

Book Description

Customer Reviews (1)

A wealth of examples
As all of Heller's books, a beautiful presentation. My own preference for historical referencing of type especially endears this book to me. It will be a valuable library addition for whoever appreciates historical type, & post modern typography. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (5)

Funny book to read for fun, not good reference book
If you read the text, you will be laughing so hard! This man is very funny. He knows how to make other graphic designers laugh about how we feel.
However, if you want to use it as a reference book for the names of fonts and where to find them, well, it's pretty random. Note to the author. I really wish you'd make a new edition which has fonts organized by type library (who sells it) and where to find, then by style. And I would rather that you put them in styles such as the styles in "graphically speaking," where they are organized by descriptive words like "humorous, youthful",and "powerful,"
I think maybe I should buy Adobe Type Library instead. That is all I own. I can't afford all these fonts this guy has in this book!

Not for IDing Type Faces!
This book is done in a unique fashion and I wasn't disappointed with it. If you are simply looking for type faces, it fills the bill rather nicely. If you are trying to identify a type face, it doesn't offer enough for a comparison. Unfortunately, there are few capital letters shown so one cannot tell how the type face appears when composed in all capital letters. In a few instances, the name of the font isn't the font that is shown! Yikes! In any event, it is a helpful addition to your library since many of the type faces shown in this book can be found at no other single source.

The Quick Brown Fox is Done Jumping
Carter's laid out the fonts by category:
Comic book, retro, calligraphic, block letter, roughish, display, pseudo cultural, grunge, script, technological, illustrated and kids stuff, type-label-stencil, ornamental, others sans, other serif. The organization is clean.

Instead of using the boring text sample that litters the letters sampled in font catalogs, "The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog," Carter gifts us with vignettes. The font Scotty Normal is shown with the sample, "Would I have been a PGA Champion?" This could be read as a stream-of-conscious novel if it weren't a font book. With each sample, he lists the name and which type house sells it. The sources for the fonts are listed at the end, including several listings for free fonts.

It is indispensable for a new designer, or a student of typography. For me, as someone who uses typography as a secondary part of my job, I found it a strong tool for familiarizing myself with font families. I'd say a seasoned might not find it as useful, as much of this kind of information can be found elsewhere.

Anthony Trendl
editor, HungarianBookstore.com

Good for browsing fonts, less so for identifying fonts.
This is a book of font samples. You won't find any information on making your own fonts or installing and using them on a computer. This book won't outline font history or anatomy. It won't tell you how to design with fonts. It's simply page after page of sentences or sentence snippets, each rendered in a different typeface. Each font's name and manufacturer is listed below each sample.

The book is great if you're a would-be font designer and are looking for inspiration. It's great if you're looking for a font to add pizzazz or personality to a graphic or flyer. It's also great for the casual typeface fan who simply enjoys looking at typefaces.

I agree with the author's statement in the book's introductionthat he wanted a font book that "didn't have one mind-numbing sentence repeated time after time" throughout the book. While pangrams such as "The quick brown fox..." are standard and useful in that they (by definition) show every letter in the alphabet, it can become tedious to see the same words again and again. Having the fonts set in different sentences also adds interest to the look of the pages, and benefits those who wish to see how a font looks in a different combination of letters.

There are a few of problems with the book:
1. Fonts are listed by general category and then alphabetically by name. This makes it difficult and time-consuming to search for just one font if you don't know its name and have only a limited idea of what it looks like.

2. There just isn't enough sample text to truly get a good taste the font. The sentences and snippets probably average 8 words long and consist of a dozen different letters, which, in my opinion, is not enough to truly get a sense of the typeface.

Identifying fonts using this book will inevitably prove difficult. Each passage is unique and does not use every letter in the alphabet. So if you are relying in the distinct gap between the strokes of the letter G in a font to help you ID it, you may be out of luck if the sample text doesn't have words with G.

Ideally, font samples should display every letter twice (in capitals and lowercase forms), numbers, and punctuation characters. Granted, it's not realistic to expect that a book covering 5,000 fonts would be able to accomodate such thorough samples.

Of course, these are only problems if you're relying on the book to ID fonts for you. And in this book's defense, these weak points are common to a lot of font books.

Onthe whole, I found this book a welcome change from other font books that seem to think themselves pieces of art and are bent on showing me how modern and cool typography can be. If you just want a really big font book that will show you nothing but ton of samples, this is the book for you.

Hard to find fonts.
This book is creatively written, but has been really no use to me in finding specific fonts.I wish the book were laid out with the same sentence "The Quick Fox Jumped Over the Lazy Brown Dog" instead of a bunch of free-flowing sentences.I'm not able to find fonts in this book because I can't pinpoint a single letter. ... Read more

Book Description
The must-have resource for finding the highest quality fonts available today

If you're searching for a font that goes beyond ho-hum, this book is for you. Today's computers provide a selection of fonts that serve reasonably well for workaday letters and publications, but have become utterly boring from overuse. To attract a reader's attention, you need an original font.

This third volume of Indie Fonts provides a showcase collection of 1,600 new fonts from today's hottest digital type foundries, and features the best work of these designers. As with the first two volumes, Indie Fonts 3 will help readers find some of the highest quality fonts available today.

Type styles range from the best of Matthew Carter's classic designs to the latest irreverence of ingoFonts. Designers searching for unique typefaces will find what they are looking for, whether historical revivals or futuristic techno faces. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Great Sequel
Greta follow-up to Indie Fonts 2 - the CD with free fonts alone is worth the rest of the cost! ... Read more

Book Description

Customer Reviews (1)

A Must Have for Type Designers
If you work with type, you'll want this book. Dan Solo had a huge collection of great old and new type faces. You'll find 24 of them here. Some, you might already have, and some are so nice that I believe if you find one gem here, it makes the price worthwhile. The fonts are in both Windows True Type and Macintosh formats. The pages have the complete alphabets and a character chart. Be sure to notice the "extra characters" that are offered in some fonts. ... Read more

Product Description
In their continued hunt for a house to haunt, Grandpa Edgar, Audrey and Garrett face mystery and adventure while exploring an abandoned mining town with a century old puzzle and buried secret. A hand-drawn map, an elusive stranger, and a chain of clues lead the Fonts to a forgotten world where they race against time to help an entire town and its amnesia-stricken residents, and if they fail they ll become another forgotten face in Fakersville. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

A Delicious TreatFor All
Combine Doyle's unparalleled storytelling with a little guidance from the spirit world and the result is this ingenious literary concoction second in sequence only. In the forward readers are greeted with a letter from the author, which explains the origin of the story and includes a special note of thanks to his ghostly housemate, thus setting the stage for a magical reading experience.

Audrey and Garrett Font had been certain this would be the most boring summer ever--but that was before their week long Lighthouse adventure. Now, they were just as excited as dear ol' grandpa to explore the beautiful, colonial-style house tucked into the base of a towering waterfall. Following Great Grandpa, Leo Font's drawings, the trio make their way into the vast forests of Northern California in search of Fakersville. But after sixty years, Grandpa's memories of this picturesque area seem to be the only thing left of this once vibrant mining town. How could they find the house grandpa was so anxious to explore if they couldn't even find the town?
The first, of the new characters to be introduced is the cantankerous, president of the Inventor's Club, Mr. Howard August. Listening to his stories the Font's learn a great deal about the history of Fakersville, from thriving quartz mining area to a deserted ghost town of sorts, where curiosity seekers simply disappear.
Following a series of clues and solving puzzles, with the assistance of a new friend, the Font's begin to uncover the towns long buried secrets. But is it too late? Can they rescue their beloved grandpa and prevent the Mayor from writing another chapter in the mysterious story of Fakersville.
There's a lot going on in this story, much of which has been skillfully layered, so that educational and moral lessons are brilliantly disguised as entertainment. Among the themes beautifully woven into this work are the dangers of scientific irresponsibility, unthinking conformity and the power of choice. Adding depth and realism to the adventure are a myriad of unique drawings throughout the story. The novel is populated by a cast of colorful characters that are complex, three dimensional and well developed. There's an almost tangible innocence in Doyle's writing that allows him to reach across the cynicism that comes with age and transport young and old alike into the wonderful, whimsical world of Edgar Font...if only for a few hours.

At the end of the book there's a puzzle waiting to be decoded, along with an intriguing picture said to be the third destination on Grandpa Font's list of possible haunts. I can't wait!

Happy Reading!

A WONDERFUL book in a GREAT series!
Edgar Font's second adventure (The Fakersville Power Station) is a wonderful book for summer, fall, winter and spring. I purchased it for my daughter just before school started and she has already turned in a book report on it (B+ Yeah!) and now she can't wait for number 3. I highly recommend this and the first Edgar Font book to all mothers, teachers and kids. Especially with Halloween and Christmas coming up. ... Read more

Book Description
As the biggest and best font catalog for electronic publishing, Version 5.0 includes almost every commerically available font in the English-speaking world.Displayed are over 13,000 font samples from over 60 font foundries; from classic to contemporary, traditional to trendy, and simply unusual to absolutely bizzare.Includes full alphabets, history and designer information, and a comprehensive index with page numbers and foundries.This is an essential desktop reference for all typographers, designers, desktop publishers and typophiles. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (6)

No need to pay more than $39.95
You can buy this book brand new at
http://www.precisiontype.com/

An indespensible tool
This is an invaluable tool for the graphic designer, production artist or art director! One of the most challenging aspects of a designer's life is selecting the right typeface to convey the mood and feeling of your message, this book is the most comprehensive volume I've run across. There is a short introductory section explaining the language (and terminology) of type which includes a description of how the book is laid out. Then, the main section contains page upon page of alphabets arranged by font name in alphabetical order. There is a short section with foundry ads. This is followed by an index listing font names alphabetically divided by foundry. If you've ever found yourself trying to match a typeface from a pre-existing design or couldn't find the name of that cool font you saw somewhere and wanted to use this is the book for you. This is one of those books which should be a part of the library of anyone that loves typography. I keep waiting for the next edition to arrive (my v5.0 has a publication date of 2000 on it).

Font Reference Guide a Typesetters must!
I highly recommend!! It is an excellent font reference book for anyone that uses many fonts for production or personal use. Having an extensive "visual" of fonts makes matching up new client fonts so much easier. A must have for typsetters and graphic designers.

Identify A Font
The title sums it up. This is a reference for fonts. The sample print is very fine quality displaying listed fonts at their best. This is a book that has a place on any graphic artist's bookshelf. I thumb through this like a dictionary. So many fonts are listed this book would be huge if not for the fine weight of the paper it is printed on. This makes the book fragile for a frequently handled reference. This is my only regret.

Great Reference guide
I think this book is an excellent reference for designers who constantly need typographic inspiration. The dingbat collections are excellent to use as graphics. The book does not actually contain the fonts, so don't buy it thinking you're going o get thousands of fonts. ... Read more

Book Description

Customer Reviews (2)

A must purchase for every tatto parlor
You think I'm kidding, but I am not.I do not know how many times I have searched the calligraphy books for "Old English" for proletariats who wished just the correct typography to permanently stain some dopey word to their body, apparently to guarantee a lifetime of minimum wage employment.This is just what they are looking for.100 pages of fonts, one of which is guaranteed to meet the victim's expectations.So, you do not need to be a calligrapher to buy this book.A tattoo parlor or even a public library will find this book indispensible.I'm not kidding.

perfect book
lots of complete fonts, Capital, lowercase and numbers. has everything i wanted so i could practice and master any style i want. ... Read more

Book Description
Type Specific shows designers how typefaces designed for a specific purpose succeed by exploring each of the features that must be considered. These include letterforms, counterspaces, cross sections, ascenders/descenders, and junctions and how they work, in both print and screen, across a range of applications: posters, directories, newspapers and magazines, CD covers, packaging, signage, and film titles-including The Kitchen's organic paintbrush front for the promotion of Levi's Vintage Clothing and Saturday's elegant stencil-style face for the Chen Pascual identity. The whole gamut from free-from to precision is explored. ... Read more

Book Description

Customer Reviews (1)

Great refrence book for different kinds of fonts to make good stencils
This book is really great as a reference and as a stencil tracer for words and names in different fonts.They are very clear and easy to copy.I recomend this book to every tattoo artist and want to be tattoo artist. ... Read more

Book Description

Customer Reviews (1)

ADORABLE!
I use these fonts all the time!!!Not only for posters in the classroom and newsletters home, but I also use the Modern Print with lines to help my younger students practice their printing!!!The only drawback is the price - there should either be more fonts on the disk or a lower price :) ... Read more