A Garamond rather Garamond

mauro sacchetto

In reference to the previous thread I started here (https://typedrawers.com/discussion/4338/a-garamond-non-garamond), I followed many of your suggestions and made over 200 changes in general.

I slightly changed the graces of the "straight" letters (|i|, |l| etc.) and redesigned those of the curved letters (|C|, |c|, |s| etc,).

I changed the form of several glyphs (|a|, |g|, |V| etc.).

I adequated the Cyrillic stems to other ones and changed the metrics slightly.

Furthermore, I have made a test here using the Grecs du roi (on which I still have to make several interventions).

Finally, I still have to round some corners: but this is a detail that I will be able to realize as soon as I have reached the final shape of the glyphs.

As in the previous tread, I specify that there is yet no kerning or correction of the positioning of the diacritics, which I will do as soon as the definitive shape of the glyphs is established.

I look forward to your evaluations.

Thank you!

Christian Thalmann

Your specimen (and previous thread) suggest that «contemporary» is your main design goal... in contrast, I'm getting a rather old-fashioned impression from it. I think it has to do with the «knobbliness» of the serifs, the frequent thickening of strokes towards their ends («clubbing»?) where I would expect straight strokes, and some rather hand-made looking shapes (like /a/, /e/, /g/). I would rather expect a contemporary Garamond to be crisp, clean, and sexy like Adobe Garamond (which has by far the best /a/ of all Garamonds, IMHO):

But then, I don't have a classical education in type design, so take my opinion with a grain of salt.

Jasper de Waard

I like the vibe! Lively yet legible, a little quirky. I think u could use some work, and the dots on i and j could go up a little. Some areas, like the top of T and middle of E, are unexpectedly sharp.

Why aren't you showing the italic? Also, it might be time to start developing a bold

Good luck!

mauro sacchetto

As I said, my starting point is the Simoncini, especially that of the original version of Einaudi, which I intended to resume without distorting it.

It features curved lines and particularly accentuated graces, as well as a wide range of irregularities (I don't know whether or not intended). I know that Simoncini, thinking of lead printing, had foreseen the irregularities generated on the page by the ink by "deforming" the glyphs in advance to prevent these irregularities from appearing later on the printed page. Today, with digitization, this concern no longer has any foundation.

I have reduced and changed the shape of the graces, while maintaining a certain visibility. I eliminated the curves from the stems, while retaining the thickening of strokes towards their ends. I have regularized the drawing in most of the glyphs.

I would not like to enter into a purely nominalistic dispute, but I can already find "contemporaneity" in the original design by Simoncini, who renounces the Renaissance flavor of the Premiere (and the very similar EB Garamond). Now I see in what direction to operate to further simplify the lines (in this sense the work on the Greek is still to be done).

On the other hand, I don't quite understand the observation that «I would expect [...] some rather hand-made looking shapes».

Thank you

PS The simplification is the one I made, for example, regarding the glyph of | r | compared to Simoncini (by Einaudi):

mauro sacchetto

The dots are part of the diacritics and in fact I have to fix the anchors: but I was expecting to produce a "more definitive" version of the basic glyphs.

The Italic is in development, I still have to fix several things, but in a while it arrives.

I have a "mechanical" version of the Bold to work on a lot, but my goal is to have roman and italic in both base weights.

I refer some technical questions to appropriate threads

Mikhail Vasilev

It is a descent typeface as said. But... what is up with the /a/ ?
Note, I don't take 'preserving the original' in account, just comment on what I see.

Unless you really have to preserve it in its original form (if it comes from the orginal?) consider remaking the /a/ completely.
I am sure that a 'proper' /a/ will improve the image dramatically. Note the structure. Currently it is strangely distorted. If you don't mind lets have an experiment - try this /a/ and see the specimen compared:

Overshoot and undershoot is intentional here, it compensates for the 'vertical' nature of /a/. So basically the more you departure from this structure, the worse it will be.

/i/ : the dot will optically merge with the foot at small text size. I think worth moving it up a bit.

/g/ : I'd at least try to reduce some fat in the lower story to balance out the contrast.

Caps

/E/ - the middle stem serif is too big and the stem itself too thin. Upper right serif looks weird, add some flesh in the fold area.

---

In general I am not a fan of such stroke width variation in capitals. I know it is historical as well, but e.g. /U/ looks so unnatural with left and right side so different. And e.g. N's thin legs, meh.

Cyrillic

Will not comment much on Cyrillic, also because you use Latin /a/ here.

First off, simply scaling down the caps to achieve lowercase will not work in general.

Major thing I have noticed:

/ж/ : You made it virtually an asterisk. Start over from a proportion of a copy-reflected /к/.
Reduce the serifs of the middle stroke and make it thinner. Then see how to reduce the weight and width but just  a little.

/л/ : increase the angle and move the join lower, add some flesh on the apex. Optical gaps on the sides can be regulated by bearings and kerning later - overlapping letters is better than disfigured shape.



/д/ : I dislike the triangular /д/ in general, IMO any rectangular /д/ will work and look better. I see you have it as an alternative, but it is too narrow. It is ok for the capital /Д/ but not ok for the lowercase.

/ю/ : can be extended a little bit just by moving apart the stick and o.

Overall I see some weight inconsistence among some letters but maybe leave for later.

Jasper de Waard

I have to say I disagree with a lot of @Mikhail Vasilev's comments. The current 'a' for example, has a slightly odd weight distribution (the top-left of the bowl is relatively thick), but I think those kind of details give this typeface its warmth. It's not a problem but a feature. The key is to preserve that feature while smoothing out the kinks in the design!

mauro sacchetto

@mikhailvasilev
Thanks for the precise observations.

About |a|, undoubtedly the one present in the specimen is anomalous with respect to the classic descending form. I have to evaluate better, that is, try to create one or more different glyphs to compare, especially for the top.

In general, I specify that my tendency (captured by @JasperdeWaard) is to round and widen the shapes: you can see it for example not only in |b|, |d| and the like, where the eyelet is quite wide (but here in line with the original Simoncini, which is even more rounded), but also and above all in |s|, which in the original is very narrow; similarly for |E| and |F|, which are generally much narrower, in all Garamonds, than the other glyphs.

The dots of |i| and |j| go up a bit.
As for |E|, I also check the print result of the middle stem.

The speech on stroke width variation in Capitals is more problematic. The thin strokes of |M|, |N| and |U| are typical of Garamond and intentionally introduce a strong contrast of thicknesses. Those of my |N| appear in skewed effects and therefore need to be fixed. But in general I don't understand your speech very well. What alternatives are there to a |M| or a |U| who has "more or less" this shape?

For example:

The first |M| is mine, the second one is from EB Garamond.

The same for |U|:

The first |M| is mine, the second one is from Adobe Garamond.

On the Cyrillic: I also find the pointed forms of |Д| and |Л| not clear to the eye. I was pointed out by @JohnHudson that Lazurski's approach consists in backdating the script to renaissance styles, consequently adopting the triangular Д and Л. Here clash the historicist claims of some instances (loyalty to the Renaissance) and the more pragmatic ones of @JasperdeWaard. This is even more true for the Greek. In my case, I must recognize that the |д| rectangular is too narrow, mainly due to the excessive high shoulders (the "half" serif: sorry, I don't know the exact English technical term), which make it look like a bull with huge horns. Already my own I had expanded the space in Ю.
You add to the conclusion: «Overall I see some weight inconsistence among some letters but maybe leave for later». I would be very happy if if you wanted to at least hint at these "inconsistencies" that you detect.
Thanks again for your availability

Mikhail Vasilev

Jasper de Waard said:

The current 'a' for example, has a slightly odd weight distribution (the top-left of the bowl is relatively thick), but I think those kind of details give this typeface its warmth. It's not a problem but a feature. The key is to preserve that feature while smoothing out the kinks in the design!

especially given that it is a book font. I would not look at 'warmness' of a single letter but I definitely would not like a book with even single letter standing out so strong. Thinning down the bowl upper stroke wont help much with that.

Mikhail Vasilev

mauro sacchetto said:

About |a|, undoubtedly the one present in the specimen is anomalous with respect to the classic descending form. I have to evaluate better, that is, try to create one or more different glyphs to compare, especially for the top.

try this:

comparison (its pixel-art so no precise positioning):

Mikhail Vasilev

mauro sacchetto said:

But in general I don't understand your speech very well. What alternatives are there to a |M| or a |U| who has "more or less" this shape?

The same for |U|:

The first |M| is mine, the second one is from Adobe Garamond.

Your U looks too synthetic, as if you just draw two lines in a vector editor, then an arc and scaled down vertically. Don't you see the difference? these are totally different structures -the bottom-left part especially.

As for stroke width difference in /U/ in particular - I don't understand why it is needed, apart from historical reasons. Maybe slight difference helps to reduce the symmetry, but not that much. 

Mikhail Vasilev

mauro sacchetto said:

You add to the conclusion: «Overall I see some weight inconsistence among some letters but maybe leave for later». I would be very happy if if you wanted to at least hint at these "inconsistencies" that you detect.

Those you took from latin I guess : /eacp/ are bolder. But can it be you havent noticed yourself?

Mikhail Vasilev

Mikhail Vasilev said:

mauro sacchetto said:

You add to the conclusion: «Overall I see some weight inconsistence among some letters but maybe leave for later». I would be very happy if if you wanted to at least hint at these "inconsistencies" that you detect.

Those you took from latin I guess : /eacp/ are bolder. But can it be you havent noticed yourself?

to be precise - /a/ looks bolder, in latin too, but in cyrillic it is more noticable. /p/'s bowl looks a bit too bold but I would not say it really needs corrections. /ec/ just very little but maybe I am hallunicating, sit too much by the monitor these days

mauro sacchetto

Criticisms are always useful, whether they can be shared or not: the perplexities of others force us to ask ourselves more accurately about the quality of our work.

Agree to the design of the | U |, which I will now review, as well as re-evaluate the glyphs you indicate to me.

The bowls are the same in |b| |d| |p| and |q|.

About the lowercase Cyrillic: the letters are almost all "rectangular", and the few that recall the Latin alphabet stand out from the others. Some fonts simply reuse the Latin glyphs. I tried it by reducing the overshoot, but perhaps there are other characteristics that need to be modified to achieve greater homogeneity. Now I work on it.

mauro sacchetto

Here is a new test of the roman.

Compared to the previous one, I have introduced about 200 changes, between minor and major ones.

Missing some glyphs (.alt) and other small corrections and, as always, the correct placement of accents and kerning.

Here I have restored "my" Greek, but I am also working in parallel on the GDR: for the moment I leave both possibilities open.

I am submitting this new version to you, while soon I will also post the first version of the italic.

Thanks in advance for all the remarks you want to make.

Jasper de Waard

I liked the previous 'a' a lot better!

mauro sacchetto

I tried various designs: in fact the |a| the previous one perhaps appeared more integrated in general "thickness" with the rest, but it was not a "descender" glyph. Open question, I will make other attempts

Craig Eliason

This /a, to me, with the emphasis on the parallel diagonals of top, middle, and bottom (and tail) feels a bit “skewed”.

My eye catches on the left bottom quadrant of /g. At first I thought the issue was with the link, but it might just be that the left side of the bottom bowl carries too much weight.  

Perhaps serifs on the straight strokes of /Theta/Xi/Phi/Psi could be quieter. 

mauro sacchetto

I repeat, on the | a | I have to experiment again in both descending and non-descending forms.

The axis of the Psi and the relative serifs are identical to all the others (of the I etc.): should it be differentiated?

Speaking of Theta and Xi, I see what comes out of thinning the transverse signs.

Craig Eliason

mauro sacchetto said:

The axis of the Psi and the relative serifs are identical to all the others (of the I etc.): should it be differentiated?

Your /Phi looks crowded in the closeness between the serifs and the round bowl. Lessening the serifs could assist with that. You could alternatively create more whitespace between the bowl and serifs (or both).
Your /Psi has similar crowding at the top between top of arms and serifs. There too the serifs could be fudged in—or what about a structure where the arms head outwards at the top? I do think your current curved part of /Psi is much more lyrical and soft than any of your other Greek caps.