Tag Archives: Typography

Butterick’s Practical Typography, a new online book

Skilled Workman Posted on by

A new typography resource, beautifully done Graphics.com gave a link today to an online book, Butterick’s Practical Typography [shareware, to use an old term] which looks to have some excellent pieces. I just read the first article: Drowning the Crystal Goblet. It is quite good. In it, the concept of invisible typography is taken apart. As I have taught that for years, it was good for me to hear the counter arguments. The second article: Typography in … Continue reading →

Font Speciman Book for the new fonts

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These are the fonts produced for the new book The 15 fonts developed for Practical Font Design With FontLab 5 are being released as part of book release. These are superior fonts for book design incorporating what I have learned in 40 years of graphic design and over 20 years of font design. I published the specimen book with InDesign CC’s Publish Online ability. You can download a free PDF if you would like one. The Librum Production … Continue reading →

New version of InDesign CC 2015.2 released today!

Skilled Workman Posted on by

Click on the image to find links to download the free trial, buy a subscription, or whatever. This is always a big day for me. I’ve been working getting ready for the changes, so I can help you with any questions. Again, this go-round, there’s not much for book production. OpenType and Glyph Features There are new features to help with OpenType glyph choices. They are available from the Font Menu, from contextual menus when selecting characters [right-click], and there’s … Continue reading →

A short note about ebook licensing for your fonts

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As a font designer, Monotype is the biggest and best. They have all the top sites: fonts.com, myfonts.com, itc.com, and several more. They are the sites used by the pros, primarily. At the least, the pros sell their fonts there also. These places are where my fonts are sold, in most cases. Ebook licensing is very new I have the entire Adobe library and several others, maybe 4000 fonts total. None of them are licensed for anything other … Continue reading →

Enhanced typesetting and new inaccessible Kindle format?

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Back to scratching mud Aaron Shepherd is convinced that this is true. The .kfx (which Aaron believes stands for .kf10) is a post-uploading process done to your books over the first month or two after uploading. What it means as far as he is concerned is this: In practical terms, this means there is no longer any effective way to proof your book before or after publication. You can get it looking absolutely perfect in a KDP proof, and … Continue reading →

More on Kindle Problems…

Skilled Workman Posted on by

A continuation of the Kindle formatting issues On one of the Facebook groups I participate in, there’s been some general poo-pahing over my most recent posting on the problems with Kindle formatting. I can understand it because many in that group only upload very simple novels. But the problem may be worse than I thought. So, I thought I better give some samples. In the process I found that Kindle has indeed destroyed the Kindle version of this … Continue reading →

Is it time to bail on Kindle?

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Aaron Shephard is close to giving up in Kindle. [You may need to search as I could not find a post-specific link.] He’s found evidence that Amazon might, and probably will, destroy your formatting well after it has been published. As you can read below about the new KFX format, Amazon simply does that to your book. It’s out of our control and we have been given no tools to produce KFX files.   I suspected all of this, … Continue reading →

Canva adds a nice type glossary

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I got an email today about a type glossary at Canva. It’s nicely done. I even learned a new term: Gadzook I wish they’d used a prettier pair of ligatures. They can get real pretty (though the ones from Contenu below have quite a ways to go to reach that level). So, who knew and who cares? These are all terms you need to know to discuss type, fonts, typography and so on. These terms are a good … Continue reading →

Readability is the prime virtue of book design

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I decided I needed to beat an old drum. Readability is the focus of book design typography. This was the core of curriculum in my digital publishing degree. It’s the center of my graphic design and book design efforts. Without comfortable, readable content, your book has a severe handicap. What is readability? This is all about book design typography. Here’s a little graphic to show you some of the things that influence how easily you can read a … Continue reading →