Compendium is a sequel to my Burgues font from 2007. Actually it is more like a prequel to Burgues. Before Louis Madarasz awed the American Southeast with his disciplined corners and wild hairlines, Platt Rogers Spencer, up in Ohio, had laid down a style all his own, a style that would eventually become the groundwork for the veering calligraphic method that was later defined and developed by Madarasz. After I wrote the above paragraph, I was so surprised by it, particularly by the first two sentences, that I stopped and had to think about it for a week. Why a sequel/prequel? Am I subconsciously joining the ranks of typeface-as-brand designers? Are the tools I build finally taking control of me? Am I having to resort to “milking it” now? Not exactly. Even though the current trend of extending older popular typefaces can play tricks with a type designer’s mind, and maybe even send him into strange directions of planning, my purpose is not the extension of something popular. My purpose is presenting a more comprehensive picture as I keep coming to terms with my obsession with 19th century American penmanship. Those who already know my work probably have an idea about how obsessive I can be about presenting a complete and detailed image of the past through today’s eyes. So it is not hard to understand my need to expand on the Burgues concept in order to reach a fuller picture of how American calligraphy evolved in the 19th century. Burgues was really all about Madarasz, so much so that it bypasses the genius of those who came before him. Compendium seeks to put Madarasz’s work in a better chronological perspective, to show the rounds that led to the sharps, so to speak. And it is nearly criminal to ignore Spencer’s work, simply because it had a much wider influence on the scope of calligraphy in general. While Madarasz’s work managed to survive only through a handful of his students, Spencer’s work was disseminated throughout America by his children after he died in 1867. The Spencer sons were taught by their father and were great calligraphers themselves. They would pass the elegant Spencerian method on to thousands of American penmen and sign painters. Though Compendium has a naturally more normalized, Spencerian flow, its elegance, expressiveness, movement and precision are no less adventurous than Burgues. Nearing 700 glyphs, its character set contains plenty of variation in each letter, and many ornaments for letter beginnings, endings, and some that can even serve to envelope entire words with swashy calligraphic wonder. Those who love to explore typefaces in detail will be rewarded, thanks to OpenType. I am so in love with the technology now that it’s becoming harder for me to let go of a typeface and call it finished. You probably have noticed by now that my fascination with old calligraphy has not excluded my being influenced by modern design trends. This booklet is an example of this fusion of influences. I am living 150 years after the Spencers, so different contextualization and usage perspectives are inevitable. Here the photography of Gonzalo Aguilar join the digital branchings of Compendium to form visuals that dance and wave like the arms of humanity have been doing since time eternal. I hope you like Compendium and find it useful. I'm all Spencered out for now, but at one point, for history’s sake, I will make this a trilogy. When the hairline-and-swash bug visits me again, you will be the first to know. The PDF specimen was designed with the wonderful photography of Gonzalo Aguilar from Mexico. Please download it here http://new.myfonts.com/artwork?id=47049&subdir=original

There is plenty of lyric and literature about looking over one's shoulder in contemplation. What would you have done differently if you knew then what you know now? This is the kind of question that comes out of nowhere. When it does and whether its context is personal or professional make very little difference. It's a question that can cause emotions to rise and passions to run hot. It can trigger priority shifts and identity crises. It's never easy to answer. Three years ago, I published a font called Semilla. My aim with that was to distill the work of Bentele, a lettering artist from early 1950s Germany. Picking such an obscure figure back then was my way of pondering the meaning and efficiency of objectivity in a world where real human events and existences are inevitably filtered through decades of unavoidably subjective written, printed and oral history. And maybe to pat myself on the back for surviving surprises mild and pleasant. Having been fortunate enough to follow my professional whims for quite some time now, I took another, longer look at my idea of distilling Bentele's work again. I suppose the concepts of established history and objectivity can become quite malleable when personal experience is added to the mix. I say that because there I was, three years later, second-guessing myself and opining that Bentele's work can be distilled differently, in a manner more suited to current cultural angles. So I embarked on that mission, and Bowling Script is the result. I realize that it's difficult to reconcile this soft and happy calligraphic outcome with the introspection I've blathered about so far, but it is what is. I guess even self-created first world problems need to be resolved somehow, and the resolution can happen in mysterious ways. Bowling Script is what people who like my work would expect from me. It's yet another script loaded with all kinds of alternation, swashing and over-the-top stuff. All of that is in here. These days I think I just do all that stuff without even blinking. But there are two additional twists. The more noticeable one is ornamental: The stroke endings in the main font are of the typical sharp and curly variety found in sign painting, while the other font complements that with ball endings, sometimes with an added-on-afterwards impression rather than an extension of the actual stroke. In the philosophical terms I was mumbling earlier, this is the equivalent of alternate realities in a world of historical reduxes that by their very nature can never properly translate original fact. The second twist has to do with the disruption of angular rhythm in calligraphic alphabets. Of course, this is the kind of lettering where the very concept of rhythm can be quite flexible, but it still counts for something, and experimenting with angular white space in a project of a very dense footprint was irresistible. After playing for a bit, I decided that it would interesting to include the option of using optically back-slanted forms in the fonts. Most scripts out there, including mine, have a rhythm sonically comparable to four-to-the-floor club beats. So the weirdly angled stuff here is your chance to do the occasional drumroll. Everyone knows we need one of those sometimes. Bowling Script and Bowling Script Balls fonts comes with 1600 characters and features extended Latin-based language support. There are also a basic version of both fonts without all the alternates and extra OpenType features. Bowling family ships in cross-platform OpenType format. We also want to present “Mute”, a visual essay narated by Tomás García and Valentín Muro, about digital life created specially to introduce Bowling Script.

Offense is an unyielding rectangular slab-serif face designed with consistently balanced letterforms and a refined finish. It’s extremely angular geometric form commands attention in display settings, yet is also legible in short text blocks. Numerous alternate character sets allow room for customization, while the expanded ligatures push letter combinations to the limit. Stylistically, Offense’s almost crude, sharp-cornered construction is balanced by it’s sophisticated finish and attention to detail, often unrealized in similar faces of this genre. The upright weights are complimented by pairings of true italics, completely rebuilt, slightly narrower in width with modified letterforms, increasing their contrast and flow. Features include: Precision kerning Standard Ligatures set including 'f' ligatures (fi, fl, ff, fh, fj, ffl, ffi, ffj) Discretionary Ligatures set including (ft, rt, ae, oe, st, ft, ct, oc, oo, ry, AE, OE, AL, TH, HE, AK, AN, TT, HD, AM, AP, AR, NF, NE, NH, NL, NB, FL, ND, FE, AB, OB, OD, OF, OG, OH, OK, OL, OM, ON, OO, OP, OQ, OR, OU, AH, UE, UF, UB, UD, UH, UK, UL, UM, UN, UP, UR, UU, MP, XY, YX, KY, WY, VY, AF, FF, FI) Alternate characters (O, o, S, s, a, h circumflex, @, ®, ¶, $, &, _, and various ligature alternates) Case forms (shifts various punctuation marks up to a position that works better with all-capital sequences) Capital Spacing (globally adjusts inter-glyph spacing for all-capital text) Slashed zero Full set of numerators/denominators Automatic fraction feature (supports any fraction combination) Extended language support (Latin-1 and Latin Extended-A) *Requires an application with OpenType and/or Unicode support.

Vala™ dances across printed pages and shines on screen. This is a high-energy design that blends the grace of an English Roundhand script with the gravitas of an extra bold Bodoni. There is even a bit of romance in the design. Vala speaks with a resonant voice – and knows few bounds. The typeface enhances print headlines, subheads, cover art and packaging. The design also brings its distinctive melding of verve and poise to banners, headings, navigational links and branding in web sites, blog posts, games and apps. Oscar Guerrero found inspiration for Vala in shop window lettering near his home in Bogotá, Colombia. “The capital A, R and V caught my attention and I photographed the window for future reference,” he explains. “Later I started to draw more letters inspired by the ones in the window.” Guerrero admits that he has always admired the work of Giambattista Bodoni and allowed his classic Didone designs to infuse Vala. Striking contrast in stroke weights, lively ball-terminals and a large x-height give Vala the grace and force of a Waikiki wave. Not satisfied with just a basic character set, Guerrero also took advantage of OpenType’s capabilities and drew a complete set of swash capitals, a bevy of fancy ligatures, and a suite of lowercase alternative designs. The result is that Vala easily emulates custom lettering in posters, headlines and logotypes. The “romantic” part of Vala? Guerrero dedicated the design to his girlfriend, Valentina, and named it after her.

TA Regresso PRO graphic presentation at Behance TA Regresso PRO font is inspired by Didon and Bodoni fonts. A combination of a little Bodoni and a little Didon elements and a unique style and Text, Display, Subhead and about 80 styles, it is a font that gives the user a choice. TA Regresso font supports Greek, Hebrew, Cyrillic and Latin alphabets. After starting work on the font since February of last year, the font is ready today with constant revisions. Being open to learning, I sought help from experienced designers. I must mention that Yulia Gonina, the founder of Schrifteria Foundry, also helped me a lot to make Regresso good. With her knowledge and advice, the flaws in the font were eliminated. By the way, Viktor Baltus also helped me with his valuable advices. I did some research about the alphabets of the supported languages so that Regresso is good. I paid a lot of attention to the correct design of the letters. I will fix the problems I missed in the next updates of the font. I would be happy if you send me your work when you use my font. I'm very interested in where you use my font. TA Regresso PRO contains 200+ Latin and Cyrillic, Greek, Hebrew languages. TAFT produce retail typefaces, create custom fonts and even do Greek, Hebrew and Cyrillization. Our mission is to create and distribute only carefully drawn, thoroughly tested, and perfectly optimized typefaces which are available to a wide range of customers. If you're looking for a type or logo → t@taft.work

The courageous Russian author of the best seller Anastasia, Vladimir Megre, once said that this remarkable woman would inspire creative people around the world to produce their best work. Since I consider myself a creative person who has been deeply touched by her story, I sincerely hope that this will be true for me also. Anastasia talks a lot about God, the wonders of the natural world and how all things have been created so perfectly. This belief in universal perfection, however, is not confined to mystics alone. Many great mathematicians and scientists, including Albert Einstein, were of the same opinion. Having read Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code, I became quite fascinated with the so-called Fibonacci series; "a sequence of integers in which each integer (Fibonacci number) after the second is the sum of the two preceding integers; specif., the series 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, . . ." (Webster’s Dictionary). These mysterious numbers, which are said to give divine proportions, are found throughout nature in everything from a rose to a spiral galaxy. Many believe that this reinforces the argument that there is a divine intelligence back of creation. With that in mind, I thought it would be interesting to see if I could somehow create a font using these numbers in the design process. If I have succeeded - even partially - in attaining these mystical proportions, it will definitely have been worth all the hard work. And, I sincerely hope that many will enjoy using this font in producing their own best work.

Lomo, PLC is a Russian optical manufacturer, whose cameras have built up an international cult following since 1992. Swiss designer Fidel Peugeot recently tapped into this phenomenon, creating an astounding series of pixel fonts for use in a variety of applications-from websites to mobile phone displays. Now available as a single family from Linotype, Lomo's versatility extends itself across 37 various faces. Whether on screen or online, Lomo's different weights deliver great legibility at low resolutions. Additionally, the amazing breadth of this family allows these pixilated faces to crossover into print, bringing a contemporary technology feeling to your more traditional pieces, too. Worth experimenting with is the Lomo Wall series, of which 14 of the Lomo family's 37 fonts belong to. In graphics applications like Adobe's PhotoShop of Illustrator, the Lomo Wall fonts may be layered over top of one another in various combinations. For example, Lomo Wall Chart 50 could be colored red, and layered behind Lomo Wall Pixel 50. The text in Lomo Wall Pixel 50 would then looked like it had been painted over top of a brick wall. With 14 fonts, and millions of colors in your application's color palette to choose from, the combination possibilities for this layering technique are endless! (If you really like this layering feature, check out what Karin Huschka, another Linotype designer, did with her Chineze Dragon family.) Convinced? Give the unlimited possibilities of Lomo a spin today! The entire Lomo family is part of the Take Type 5 collection, from Linotype."

Well suited for headlines, packaging and display applications, AE Prosperity will be a robust and versatile addition to your script library. It’s purposefully designed to infer the visual connections of letters for a hand-lettered feel. Some characters will connect, and others will guide your eye to the next letter from, making it highly legible. In 1779, the schooner Prosperity sailed the high seas. Commissioned by a young continental congress, with 6 guns & at twenty tons, she sailed under a Letter of Marque for patriotism and profit. Look lively, because with contextual and alternate glyph sets (contextual glyphs, alternate lower case glyphs and an extended set of alternate capitals), this robust typeface is as inspiring as her namesake and adapts to whatever winds may blow. Prosperity is designed as a free-flowing script, for a spontaneous and historic aesthetic. Contextual glyphs include variations on tt (short and longbar), t longbar, ll, cc and other characters. Contextual features change ascender heights and descender styles. Alternate glyphs (set 1) include variations on b,d,f,g,h,l,o,p,r,s,t,y. Alternate capitals (set 2) include a complete set of alternate upper case letters. Most useful with Adobe® InDesign®, multiple variations of letter combinations can be achieved by selecting Contextual glyphs, and/or set 1 and set 2 from the Character Palette: OpenType: Stylistic Sets menu. Alternate glyphs and contextual characters will be available based on the OpenType support of your application. AE Prosperity™ is available exclusively in OpenType format.