kleine@iraul1.ira.uka.de (Karl Kleine) (05/16/88)
In article <612@odyssey.ATT.COM> gls@odyssey.ATT.COM (g.l.sicherman) writes: .... >Haas Helvetica is merely boring. Univers is UGLY. Mandrill rules! .... as it seems i started that Helvetica vs Univers debate, another note on that issue: Helvetica is used all over the place and more or less became a generic term for `outsiders' for a sans serif type face. yes, many -- including me -- find it boring. Univers belongs to the collection of constructed face designs, like Kabel and Futura, just to name some, and i can well understand that many people find it outright ugly. i don't like it either, but i prefer it to Helvetica. Furthermore, Univers is not just a single font, but a reasonably well designed collection. that makes it particularly suitable for headlines and printed labels. sans serif fonts are useful as display type, they are't to be read anyhow. setting a whole book in such a font should be regarded as a criminal offense. as an aside, i also noted Univers in this forum, as it became available from Linotype / Adobe recently for Postscript printers, and i like having alternatives. but now for the sans serif fonts that i prefer to those two above: Optima, my first choice, and Gill Sans. both belong to the `linear antiqua' group of type faces. compare for instance the upper case G of Garamond and Gill Sans versus the one of Helvetica. Optima is now also available from Adobe, but that's a case, where i have certain objections. most postscript printing is done on 300 dpi lasers, and that's just much to course for this fine type face. Optima was designed by Herman Zapf for photo composition and it needs high resolution for rendering its delicate variations of stroke widths. so, PLEASE, do not rush out to Adobe, and get it for your laserwriter, but restrain yourself, and get access to a suitable output device (>1000dpi) first. it is too fine a font and too fragile for course printing; it must also not be overused, but that's true for all the beautiful things in life :-) [my words on necessary high resolution for Optima are based on my aquaintance with the type face set on traditional typesetting equipment. the warning against its use on lasers are conjecture, but i do have very strong feelings here. this holds of course for standard reading sizes (<14pt), title pieces (>24pt) may be a different story, but even here i have my doubts. could anybody who has the font on a low resolution printer (300dpi) please send me a sample of 9, 10, 11, 12, 24, 36 pt text? --- thanks] finally, could we settle the Univers vs Helvetica debate by this note, please? Karl Kleine, Forschungszentrum Informatik Haid-und-Neu-Str. 10-14, D-7500 Karlsruhe, West Germany