Tainted Sans - a homage to cassette futurism (my first font)

DeadLettering

So I have only started on my type design journey and after doing the Viktor Baltus course I had a couple of friends ask me if I could take a piece of lettering I did recently and turn it into a display font.



As I worked to expand and evolve it, I was inspired by cassette futurism, Y2K, and cyberpunk.  Movies like Blade Runner, Alien, Star Wars (especially the ligatures within the logo), as well as games like Wipeout (and the designers republic as a whole) were also some of my inspirations. 

This in turn evolved into the font on the pdf. The key concept to me was that the sans serif should look as connected as possible, a kind of sans script.

The circles in the an and e came about when I noticed an issue with my æ, as the old a made glyph look like œ). This I in turn carried into the s. 

Though some legibility problems remain. One suggestion I got was to include ink traps (which made it look even more like the wipeout logo).


Which I think works and also serves to make each letter in the ligatures more recognisable. But I am still on the fence about it.



I am also contemplating put a dot in the circle of the o to make it more consistent with the a and the e. Which also allows me to do a fun ligature with the capital O and the word Off. 


Another issue I am aware of is tapering the arches of the h, n, m (as the joins with the stem look swollen). Though I am not sure how much I need to taper them atm.

I apologise if this post seems rambling with lots of disconnected questions. I am very new to this, and any advice would be amazing.

P.S. The weird glyphs in the pdf are Galactic Standard from the Commander Keen games. It was a stylistic alternate I wanted to include.

DeadLettering

I doubt there is anyone that can give me some advice?

Craig Eliason

I like the feel of this, and the dots and half-dots work well. Check that you don't make the ligated letters too close to each other. And work on smoothing the straight-to-curve connections: those are tricky to get right but simply gluing quarter-rounds to straight lines always looks to abrupt and bumpy. 

Thomas Phinney

I think you could benefit from studying the various kinds of optical corrections that are generally used and needed in type design. This includes the straight-to-curve connections Craig points out, as well as vertical vs horizontal stroke thicknesses, thinning at joins, and more!

This video I made uses FontLab Studio 5 (which is ancient now), but don’t let that put you off! The principles apply with any font editor. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LR-CG5eB3nQ

DeadLettering

Thank you @Craig Eliason and @Thomas Phinney. This really helps, I will watch this training video and get back to you.

Igor Petrovic

Hi,

Aside from optical corrections that are already mentioned, it looks nice in general. You have some successful solutions (low /a for example).

The thing is that this is an ultra-display typeface, very infused with a specific graphical style, so it is not easy to give type design advice.

For example, there are spacing problems. In the word "multiverse" we see a pretty loose "ult" part, next to a very stiff "tiv" part. In classic type design that would be a problem. But highly conceptual/experimental typefaces might sacrifice that for the purpose of a concept. So it is not easy to distinguish what can be solved and what should be sacrificed.

/ro ligature is too tight and not clearly legible. In general, you sacrificed a lot of legibility because of ligatures.

In type design, the legibility of numerals requires special attention because for letters, one can assume the problematic letter based on the surrounding context (i.e., co_text) but can't assume the problematic numeral (94_561). Your /9 might look like /3, and /7 might look like /1.

/v might look like /u.

/g might not need stem overflow (top right corner of the letter) since it is the only such occurrence in lowercase.

Cheers!  

Cory Maylett

I admire the experimentation. Do you primarily view the font as an art project or as usable typography?

As an artistic exercise in balance, rhythm, and the interplay of negative and positive space, it's very interesting. However, as usable typography — at least in the traditional sense — it seems you have prioritized form over function to the extent that it's almost illegible.

I'm curious about your thoughts on this.

DeadLettering

Thank you @Igor Petrovic, that gives me a lot to think about. Also yes this is very much an ultra-display typeface. I have purposely sacrificed legibility for the concept. As @Cory Maylett also mentioned, form has taken precedence over function.

I see it mainly as an experiment and an art piece to train myself to use Glyphs, since I am completely new to the program. As well as a challenge to myself to create glyphs which follow the same design language regardless of the consequences. If I can make a usable font from this then that is bonus.