The Nov. 13, 1915 and Nov. 27, 1915 issues of Moving Picture World carried ads for Jesse L. Lasky Productions in which the titles of the upcoming films were hand lettered in an elegant Art Nouveau spurred serif style. This stylish alphabet is now available digitally as Movie Producer JNL in both regular and oblique versions.

Calligrapher Margaret Layson works in partnership with Australian typographer Harry Pears, bringing designs such as the wonderful Lindisfarne Nova family to life. They both work on the digital incarnation in a true collaboration. Originally from the UK, Margaret began her professional career as a geophysicist. After arriving in Australia in 1968, she began to work as a freelance calligrapher. Over the years she has maintained an interest in the history of writing, particularly the scripts and decorations in manuscripts.

Virtuosa Classicis the 21st century OpenType re-release of a classic Hermann Zapf design, his very first script typeface, Virtuosa. Based on the same sketches that would inspire Zapfino 50 years later, Hermann Zapf developed Virtuosa in 1948-49. It was originally released in metal in 1952. Virtuosa nova is an English copperplate script with character. The font includes two form variants for each capital letter, and there are a number of lowercase alternates and ligatures, too.

A charming font inspired by the Brazilian beloved album for children by Vinicius de Moraes, author of the bossa nova classic 'Garota de Ipanema' (Girl from Ipanema) with his partner Tom Jobim. The font has a cheerful cutout look, as does the original album cover designed by Elifas Andreato in 1980. Arca font is loaded with alternates for a nice natural look and has yet quite cool interlocks. Its complementary font brings handsome graphic elements to add some bossa here and there. Now let's dance!

Linotype Fresh Ewka is part of the Take Type Library, chosen from the contestants of Linotype’s International Digital Type Design Contests of 1994 and 1997. This fun font was designed by Polish artist Dariusz Nowak-Nova and each letter seems to be a work in itself. The fine hair lines are decorated with tiny squares and look like wires with nodes while the thicker strokes have indefinite contours and seem to have been made with a thick brush. Linotype Fresh Ewka is suitable for headlines in large point sizes.

Sistina, designed by Hermann Zapf in 1950 was first named Aurelia Titling. It is a heavy supplement to the Michelangelo Titling based on studies of inscriptions in Rome. First release in hotmetal at D. Stempel AG, Frankfurt in 1951. Sistina was originally an all caps font. The digital version from Linotype contains small caps. Hermann Zapf together with Akira Kobayashi, type director from Linotype had made a new revised version of Sistina now named as Palatino Imperial" in the Palatino nova type family, a Platinum Collection product from Linotype."

Robert Hunter Middleton drew the original design of Stellar for the Ludlow Typograph Company in Chicago. Work began in the late 1920s, when Middleton was asked to create a sans serif type family to compete with European imports of Futura and Kabel. Stellar was Middleton's attempt to raise the ante. Where Futura and Kabel were geometric in design and monotone in weight, Stellar was based on roman character proportions and stroke weighs were stressed. In the late 1990s, Dave Farey took on the task of reviving the Stellar design. While Ludlow cut Stellar in a full range of point sizes, the family was limited to just a roman and bold design. Farey's revival is twice as large a family. It ranges from a very light called Stellar Nova to a very bold called Zeta In between are Lyra and Epsilon.

Many typefaces are distinctive or attractive at the expense of legibility and versatility. Not so the Optima® family. Simultaneously standing out and fitting in, there are few projects or imaging environments outside of its range. Although Optima is almost always grouped with sans serif typefaces, it should be considered a serifless roman. True to its Roman heritage, Optima has wide, full-bodied characters – especially in the capitals. Only the E, F and L deviate with narrow forms. Consistent with other Zapf designs, the cap S in Optima appears slightly top-heavy with a slight tilt to the right. The M is splayed, and the N, like a serif design, has light vertical strokes. The lowercase a and g in Optima are high-legibility two-storied designs. Optima can be set within a wide choice of line spacing values – from very tight to very open. In fact, there are few limits to the amount of white space that can be added between lines of text. Optima also benefits from a wide range of letter spacing capability. It can be set quite tight, or even slightly open – especially the capitals. If there are any guidelines, Optima should be set more open than tight. It’s not that readability is affected that much when Optima is set on the snug side; it’s just that the unhurried elegance and light gray typographic color created by the face are disrupted when letters are set too tight. Optima is also about as gregarious as a typeface can be. It mixes well with virtually any serif design and a surprisingly large number of sans serif faces. The Optima family is available in six weights, from roman to extra black, each with an italic counterpart. In addition, the family is available as a suite of OpenType® Pro fonts, providing for the automatic insertion of small caps, ligatures and alternate characters, in addition to offering an extended character set supporting most Central European and many Eastern European languages. When you’re ready to find its perfect pairing, browse these fantastic matches: Monotype Century Old Style™, Dante®, Frutiger® Serif, Joanna® Nova, Malabar™, and Soho®.

Many typefaces are distinctive or attractive at the expense of legibility and versatility. Not so the Optima® family. Simultaneously standing out and fitting in, there are few projects or imaging environments outside of its range. Although Optima is almost always grouped with sans serif typefaces, it should be considered a serifless roman. True to its Roman heritage, Optima has wide, full-bodied characters – especially in the capitals. Only the E, F and L deviate with narrow forms. Consistent with other Zapf designs, the cap S in Optima appears slightly top-heavy with a slight tilt to the right. The M is splayed, and the N, like a serif design, has light vertical strokes. The lowercase a and g in Optima are high-legibility two-storied designs. Optima can be set within a wide choice of line spacing values – from very tight to very open. In fact, there are few limits to the amount of white space that can be added between lines of text. Optima also benefits from a wide range of letter spacing capability. It can be set quite tight, or even slightly open – especially the capitals. If there are any guidelines, Optima should be set more open than tight. It’s not that readability is affected that much when Optima is set on the snug side; it’s just that the unhurried elegance and light gray typographic color created by the face are disrupted when letters are set too tight. Optima is also about as gregarious as a typeface can be. It mixes well with virtually any serif design and a surprisingly large number of sans serif faces. The Optima family is available in six weights, from roman to extra black, each with an italic counterpart. In addition, the family is available as a suite of OpenType® Pro fonts, providing for the automatic insertion of small caps, ligatures and alternate characters, in addition to offering an extended character set supporting most Central European and many Eastern European languages. When you’re ready to find its perfect pairing, browse these fantastic matches: Monotype Century Old Style™, Dante®, Frutiger® Serif, Joanna® Nova, Malabar™ and Soho®.