Variable Font for my Bachelor Thesis, all feedback welcome

berquin_design

Hello, for my Bachelor thesis I'm making my first variable font. The font is for Pivovar a techno organisation that organises raves in an old brewery. This is my first font so I'm new to font design that's why I only did capitals and numbers.. At the moment I'm only using the x-height as variable but I will be adding a weight and width variable. I wondered if anybody had some advice or tips for me? 

This is my regular font:

This is my flat master
This is my long master

Craig Eliason

I like the concept and the nice bits of asymmetry. If there’s no lowercase than there’s no “x-height.”
Thin diagonals in K and S are too thick.

Flat forms of S and Y are too dark and collapsed looking.
I like the shape of zero but it winds up looking light and narrow in the Flat master. Flat four is also light, but wide looking. I’d consider a three with a notch shape on the right side. 

Essentially, since the length of the”thickened” parts is arbitrary, I’d suggest being willing to shorten them or lengthen them differently in different masters so the overall color stays more consistent. 

You might find the replies on this twitter thread about height as a variable axis useful. 

Sander Pedersen

I like the seemingly random nature of some of the weight placement between the letters, it helps to break up monotony in the systematization.

The T could use some weight placed at the base, it looks more bare than the rest.

The thickened diagonal parts of X and 4 are too light. You can also see in some letters that short, thick parts become small nubs that seem lighter than the rest, like the bottom of V and W, or the flat master O. I think you could try to push those elements to become optically equally dark as the other thickened parts. Equal stroke width≠equal color.

The little tail of the Q feels a little out of place to me. It’s a “safe” legible solution, but I reckon you could try out something like making the whole lower right corner black, and checking if it works in context of words.

Craig is right about the S and Y in the flat master, but I wonder if it would be more interesting to try pushing the rest of the letters to be similarly dark and dense – but it can be a challenge to make it work between masters.

berquin_design

@Craig Eliason , that's right it should be cap height. Thanks for the feedback, it's very useful! I'll work on it. Thanks a lot

@Sander Pedersen, thanks for the feedback, it helps me a lot! I'll work on it!

berquin_design

@Sander Pedersen You think one of these Q's would be a better option?

Sander Pedersen

I like option 2 best. It puts the most emphasis on the tail, fits in well, and is unambigously a Q.

berquin_design

Allright, thank you!