The famous roman type cut in Venice by Nicolas Jenson, and used in 1470 for his printing of the tract, De Evangelica Praeparatione, Eusebius, has usually been declared the seminal and definitive representative of a class of types known as Venetian Old Style. The Jenson type is thought to have been the primary model for types that immediately followed. Subsequent 15th-century Venetian Old Style types, cut by other punchcutters in Venice and elsewhere in Italy, are also worthy of study, but have been largely neglected by 20th-century type designers. There were many versions of Venetian Old Style types produced in the final quarter of the quattrocento. The exact number is unknown, but numerous printed examples survive, though the actual types, matrices, and punches are long gone. All these types are not, however, conspicuously Jensonian in character. Each shows a liberal amount of individuality, inconsistency, and eccentricity. My fascination with these historical types began in the 1970s and eventually led to the production of my first text typeface, Iowan Old Style (Bitstream, 1991). Sometime in the early 1990s, I started doodling letters for another Venetian typeface. The letters were pieced together from sections of circles and squares. The n, a standard lowercase control character in a text typeface, came first. Its most unusual feature was its head serif, a bisected quadrant of a circle. My aim was to see if its sharp beak would work with blunt, rectangular, foot serifs. Next, I wanted to see if I could construct a set of capital letters by following a similar design system. Rectangular serifs, or what we today call "slab serifs," were common in early roman printing types, particularly text types cut in Italy before 1500. Slab serifs are evident on both lowercase and uppercase characters in roman types of the Incunabula period, but they are seen mainly at the feet of the lowercase letters. The head serifs on lowercase letters of early roman types were usually angled. They were not arched, like mine. Oddly, there seems to be no actual historical precedent for my approach. Another characteristic of my arched serif is that the side opposite the arch is flat, not concave. Arched, concave serifs were used extensively in early italic types, a genre which first appeared more than a quarter century after roman types. Their forms followed humanistic cursive writing, common in Italy since before movable type was used there. Initially, italic characters were all lowercase, set with upright capitals (a practice I much admire and would like to see revived). Sloped italic capitals were not introduced until the middle of the sixteenth century, and they have very little to do with the evolution of humanist scripts. In contrast to the cursive writing on which italic types were based, formal book hands used by humanist scholars to transcribe classical texts served as a source of inspiration for the lowercase letters of the first roman types cut in Italy. While book hands were not as informal as cursive scripts, they still had features which could be said to be more calligraphic than geometric in detail. Over time, though, the copied vestiges of calligraphy virtually disappeared from roman fonts, and type became more rational. This profound change in the way type developed was also due in part to popular interest in the classical inscriptions of Roman antiquity. Imperial Roman letters, or majuscules, became models for the capital letters in nearly all early roman printing types. So it was, that the first letters in my typeface arose from pondering how shapes of lowercase letters and capital letters relate to one another in terms of classical ideals and geometric proportions, two pinnacles in a range of artistic notions which emerged during the Italian Renaissance. Indeed, such ideas are interesting to explore, but in the field of type design they often lead to dead ends. It is generally acknowledged, for instance, that pure geometry, as a strict approach to type design, has limitations. No roman alphabet, based solely on the circle and square, has ever been ideal for continuous reading. This much, I knew from the start. In the course of developing my typeface for text, innumerable compromises were made. Even though the finished letterforms retain a measure of geometric structure, they were modified again and again to improve their performance en masse. Each modification caused further deviation from my original scheme, and gave every font a slightly different direction. In the lower case letters especially, I made countless variations, and diverged significantly from my original plan. For example, not all the arcs remained radial, and they were designed to vary from font to font. Such variety added to the individuality of each style. The counters of many letters are described by intersecting arcs or angled facets, and the bowls are not round. In the capitals, angular bracketing was used practically everywhere stems and serifs meet, accentuating the terseness of the characters. As a result of all my tinkering, the entire family took on a kind of rich, familiar, coarseness - akin to roman types of the late 1400s. In his book, Printing Types D. B. Updike wrote: "Almost all Italian roman fonts in the last half of the fifteenth century had an air of "security" and generous ease extremely agreeable to the eye. Indeed, there is nothing better than fine Italian roman type in the whole history of typography." It does seem a shame that only in the 20th century have revivals of these beautiful types found acceptance in the English language. For four centuries (circa 1500 - circa 1900) Venetian Old Style faces were definitely not in favor in any living language. Recently, though, reinterpretations of early Italian printing types have been returning with a vengeance. The name Vendetta, which as an Italian sound I like, struck me as being a word that could be taken to signifiy a comeback of types designed in the Venetian style. In closing, I should add that a large measure of Vendetta's overall character comes from a synthesis of ideas, old and new. Hallmarks of roman type design from the Incunabula period are blended with contemporary concerns for the optimal display of letterforms on computer screens. Vendetta is thus not a historical revival. It is instead an indirect but personal digital homage to the roman types of punchcutters whose work was influenced by the example Jenson set in 1470. John Downer.

The ITC Franklin™ typeface design marks the next phase in the evolution of one of the most important American gothic typefaces. Morris Fuller Benton drew the original design in 1902 for American Type Founders (ATF); it was the first significant modernization of a nineteenth-century grotesque. Named in honor of Benjamin Franklin, the design not only became a best seller, it also served as a model for several other sans serif typefaces that followed it. Originally issued in just one weight, the ATF Franklin Gothic family was expanded over several years to include an italic, a condensed, a condensed shaded, an extra condensed and, finally, a wide. No light or intermediate weights were ever created for the metal type family. In 1980, under license from American Type Founders, ITC commissioned Victor Caruso to create four new weights in roman and italic - book, medium, demi and heavy - while preserving the characteristics of the original ATF design. This series was followed in 1991 by a suite of twelve condensed and compressed designs drawn by David Berlow. ITC Franklin Gothic was originally released as two designs: one for display type and one for text. However, in early digital interpretations, a combined text and display solution meant the same fonts were used to set type in any size, from tiny six-point text to billboard-size letters. The problem was that the typeface design was almost always compromised and this hampered its performance at any size. David Berlow, president of Font Bureau, approached ITC with a proposal to solve this problem that would be mutually beneficial. Font Bureau would rework the ITC Franklin Gothic family, enlarge and separate it into distinct text and display designs, then offer it as part of its library as well. ITC saw the obvious value in the collaboration, and work began in early 2004. The project was supposed to end with the release of new text and display designs the following year. But, like so many design projects, the ITC Franklin venture became more extensive, more complicated and more time consuming than originally intended. The 22-font ITC Franklin Gothic family has now grown to 48 designs and is called simply ITC Franklin. The new designs range from the very willowy Thin to the robust Ultra -- with Light, Medium, Bold and Black weights in between. Each weight is also available in Narrow, Condensed and Compressed variants, and each design has a complementary Italic. In addition to a suite of new biform characters (lowercase characters drawn with the height and weight of capitals), the new ITC Franklin Pro fonts also offer an extended character set that supports most Central European and many Eastern European languages. ITC Franklin Text is currently under development.

Every year, more and more text is read directly on a computer screen in office applications, or from freshly printed sheets from a copier or laser printer. Clear, legible text faces are more imperative to office communication than ever before. Yet every worker desires a small bit of personality in the corporate world. Most office environments are only equipped with a few basic fonts that are truly optimized for use in text, with laser printers, and on screen. The Linotype Office Alliance fonts guarantee data clarity. All of the font weights within the individual family have the same character measurements; individual letters or words may have their styles changed without line wrap being affected! All numbers, mathematical signs, and currency symbols are tabular; they share the same set character width, ensuring that nothing stands in the way of clear graph, chart, and table design. In addition to being extremely open and legible, the characters in this collection's fonts also share the same capital letter height and the same x-height. The production and reading of financial reports is duly streamlined with the Linotype Office Alliance fonts. The Neuzeit Office family is designed after the model of the original sans serif family Neuzeit S, which was produced by D. Stempel AG and the Linotype Design Studio in 1966. Neuzeit S itself was a redesign of D. Stempel AG's DIN Neuzeit, created by Wilhelm Pischner between 1928 and 1939. Intended to represent its own time, DIN Neuzeit must have struck a harmonious chord. DIN Neuzeit is a constructed, geometric sans serif. It was born during the 1920s, a time of design experimentation and standardization, whose ethos has been made famous by the Bauhaus and De Stijl movements in art, architecture, and design. Upon its redesign as Neuzeit S in the 1960s, other developments in sans serif letter design were taken into account. Neuzeit S looks less geometric, and more gothic, or industrial. Separating it from typefaces like Futura, it has a double-storey a, instead of a less legible, single-storey variant. Unlike more popular grotesque sans serifs like Helvetica, Neuzeit S and especially the redesigned Neuzeit Office contain more open, legible letterforms. Neuzeit Office preserves the characteristic number forms that have been associated with its design for years. After four decades, Neuzeit has been retooled once again, and it is more a child of its age than ever before. Akira Kobayashi, Linotype's Type Director, created the revised and updated Neuzeit Office in 2006. His greatest change was to retool the design to make its performance in text far more optimal. Additionally, he created companion oblique to help emphasize text. The other three families in the Office Alliance system include Metro Office, Times Europa Office and Trump Mediaeval Office.Some weights of the Neuzeit Office are availabla as soft rounded versions. "

In the world of typography, there’s always a desire for something new and innovative that can make your design stand out. If you’re looking for a typeface that is as unique as it is bold, look no further than Ulian. Ulian is a striking display typeface that fuses the best of two worlds: the flat sides of traditional blackletter and the contemporary shapes of modern letterforms. The result is a typeface with a refreshing twist that is sure to capture the attention of your audience. One of the most striking features of Ulian is its distinctive flat sides. These straight lines give the typeface a bold and confident feel, perfect for grabbing attention and making a statement. But Ulian doesn’t stop there; it also features elements of modern typefaces, including curved serifs and varying thickness in the strokes. The squared geometric typefaces have also been incorporated into the design, adding a touch of sleekness and modernity. This combination of traditional and contemporary design elements creates a unique visual impact that is both striking and memorable. Ulian also comes with a range of variants, including Regular, Italic, Bold, and Bold-Italic. This versatility allows you to use the typeface across a range of applications, from logos to headlines and everything in between. But Ulian doesn’t just look good—it’s also functional. In OpenType-capable applications, you can access old-style lowercase numerals, giving you even more flexibility in your designs. Overall, Ulian is a one-of-a-kind typeface that is sure to elevate your design game. With its distinctive flat sides, modern letterforms, and unique flair, it’s the perfect choice for anyone looking to make a dauntless statement. So why settle for ordinary typography when you can have Ulian? Most Latin-based European writing systems are supported, including the following languages. Afaan Oromo, Afar, Afrikaans, Albanian, Alsatian, Aromanian, Aymara, Bashkir (Latin), Basque, Belarusian (Latin), Bemba, Bikol, Bosnian, Breton, Cape Verdean, Creole, Catalan, Cebuano, Chamorro, Chavacano, Chichewa, Crimean Tatar (Latin), Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dawan, Dholuo, Dutch, English, Estonian, Faroese, Fijian, Filipino, Finnish, French, Frisian, Friulian, Gagauz (Latin), Galician, Ganda, Genoese, German, Greenlandic, Guadeloupean Creole, Haitian Creole, Hawaiian, Hiligaynon, Hungarian, Icelandic, Ilocano, Indonesian, Irish, Italian, Jamaican, Kaqchikel, Karakalpak (Latin), Kashubian, Kikongo, Kinyarwanda, Kirundi, Kurdish (Latin), Latvian, Lithuanian, Lombard, Low Saxon, Luxembourgish, Maasai, Makhuwa, Malay, Maltese, Māori, Moldovan, Montenegrin, Ndebele, Neapolitan, Norwegian, Novial, Occitan, Ossetian (Latin), Papiamento, Piedmontese, Polish, Portuguese, Quechua, Rarotongan, Romanian, Romansh, Sami, Sango, Saramaccan, Sardinian, Scottish Gaelic, Serbian (Latin), Shona, Sicilian, Silesian, Slovak, Slovenian, Somali, Sorbian, Sotho, Spanish, Swahili, Swazi, Swedish, Tagalog, Tahitian, Tetum, Tongan, Tshiluba, Tsonga, Tswana, Tumbuka, Turkish, Turkmen (Latin), Tuvaluan, Uzbek (Latin), Venetian, Vepsian, Võro, Walloon, Waray-Waray, Wayuu, Welsh, Wolof, Xhosa, Yapese, Zapotec Zulu and Zuni.