When Baka and Baka Too did very well commercially (Baka was named the Best Cursive Rough Script in 2005), I shied away from doing rough, handwritten scripts in fear as being seen as a one-trick-pony. A few years have passed and some early sumi-e brush ‘doodles’ kept appealing to me. I initially thought this new font would just fall under the Baka mantle and just become a new sibling, but as brush hit paper over and over again, the letters took on a different personality from Baka. This new font was turning out to be far more expressive, smooth and rough, tasty but sticky. This dichotomy demanded a new name. The rough and smooth texture suggested the name Fugu—oddly delicate while rough and functional.

ITC Astro is the typeface that proves you can get your work done while watching cartoons. “It all started as a series of doodles while I was watching The Jetsons,” recalls Sasa Petricic. “The show's impossibly simplistic vision of the twenty-first century cried out for a font that fit into that world -- a world where everyday objects can carry far more fun and personality than they should.” ITC Astro is the first commercial typeface design from Petricic, whose “day job” is working as a reporter for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. Petricic has filed stories from across Canada and around the world for CBC's flagship evening newscast, The National. His reports have also appeared on CNN and BBC Television. Petricic's work as a correspondent and video journalist have taken him to six continents, covering everything from famine and genocide in Africa to the war in Iraq. With such serious matters filling the hours of Petricic's day as a journalist, it's not hard to see why he conceived Astro as a welcome blast of whimsy. “As I began to draw the design,” he says, “I decided that every part of Astro should be a cartoon character unto itself.” Each character has its own baseline shadow (or coaster, or circular antigravity generator, depending on how you look at things). The angular caps dance jauntily, rocking from left to right, while a suite of companion small caps provide backup. The end result is a design quite unlike any other, with surprising charm and versatility. ITC Astro comes in a two-weight family of White and Black.

This dynamic athletic block has the need for speed. VT Gladius is a display typeface loaded with energy and ready to take off. Each letterform is built on a system of angles that generate a distinct rhythm, drawing the eye through the shape, making every word feel more dynamic. Further reinforcing this are the slightly thicker baseline-adjacent horizontal stems — alluding to the ink-pooling that lower strokes have in traditional penmanship — creating a “bounce” that gives each letter that much more personality. For further customization, the “Disable Speed Cuts” OpenType feature and discretionary ligatures serve as another fine-tuning tool. With five weights, a stencil version, and oblique styles for each, this 12-font family is ready to kick things in to another gear.

The monospace companion to Jim Lyles’ Prima Sans, designed by colleague Sue Zafarana at Bitstream.

Deadspace is a sci fi display typeface suitable video games, movie posters, logos and headlines.