Unnamed Geometric Sans

Lewis MacDonald
Lewis MacDonald Posts: 12
in Type Design Critiques

I’m trying to finish off an old project that I’ve been sporadically chipping away at for a while now. It’s a pretty simple geometric sans (sorry) that’s very much indebted to Johnston.




I’d like to think that I’m not too far off completing it: everything that I plan to include is drawn, and the metrics are all pretty much done.


As well as all general refinements needing done, a few specific issues that are on my to-do list:

• Can’t settle on /G design; can’t get the heavy master looking good

• Diacritics weak/boring? Too light in heavy master? 

• /5 is ugly

• /2 and /2.osf are ugly

• Aperatures of /e /g /y.ss01 /5 are too tight in heavy master – but reluctant to stray too far from design of lighter weights

• /æ and /œ are too dark


Feedback on any aspect would be most welcome – thank you in advance.


—


I’ve attached a PDF with glyph charts for each of the masters – and a PDF with texts generated for all the languages available on the very useful JAF test text generation (http://justanotherfoundry.com/generator). If the text samples say anything offensive then blame Tim Ahrens; if there’s something witty in there then I take full credit.  ;) 





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Comments

  • Adam Jagosz
    Adam Jagosz Posts: 689
    I like it!
    Cedillas look placed too far to the right for my palate. Not a native reader, though. But the vertical joiners placed at the centre make the whole diacritic weigh on the right.
    The capitals are amiable! I only find the crotch og the /M a little uneasy.
  • James Puckett
    James Puckett Posts: 1,992
    You’ve got some weird shit going on that makes this look like a funky Miller & Richard grot. The closed up C and e, the wide R and w, that funky r. If I were you I’d go study some of Miller & Richard’s stuff and try to make this typeface weirder. 

    Neither S works, and they’re too different. The uppercase is too bottom heavy, the lowercase is leaning right.

    The upper portion of 4 is small; it looks like someone chopped the top off. 

    The 8 needs optical compensation. Right now it looks like a gorilla. 

    Q looks like a refugee from a humanist sans.
  • Lewis MacDonald
    Lewis MacDonald Posts: 12
    Thanks @Adam Jagosz. I agree about the /M – the crotch has changed a few times and I still don't like it. I do like the upright, rational cedillas I ended up settling on – but agree that they need to be better balanced.


    @James Puckett: for the uppercase /S I kinda wanted something slightly awkward and top heavy, à la Futura, but I struggled to make the design translate to the lowercase – agree they need work.

    With the /4, are you saying that you expect it to look more like the version on the right? I definitely prefer the shorter vertical stem.



    I'll take another look at that /8, try putting him on a diet.

    I cycled through a few different designs for /Q, but I settled on that one a while ago. I suppose I've been looking at it for too long to see it as an anomaly, but if the design sticks out to you then it's worth me considering other directions.
  • Niche.
    Niche. Posts: 86
    edited November 2017
    The 8 needs optical compensation. Right now it looks like a gorilla. 

    Q looks like a refugee from a humanist sans.
     :D 
  • Adam Jagosz
    Adam Jagosz Posts: 689
    edited November 2017
    The Q brought my attention at first sight, but being a letter lover more than a letter specialist I rather liked it. Is the bottom groin a little heavy? It crossed my mind that the top looked like it was missing some overshoot in context of P and R.

    Bringing the crossbar on the 4 a tiny little down instead of protruding the stem might help while preserving the spirit.

    Lining /two leans left.

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