It all depends on what you're looking for. Do you want a face with a lot of features, or do you want a face that's a bit more subdued and versatile? I am a big fan of Sebastian, but it definitely has a lot of features and has a smaller x-height than many other humanist faces.

If versatility is what you're after, I'd say go for Nexus.

Hrant, as far as I know, Mac OS X can only read PC Truetype fonts. But I know you're a big fan of Legato, and I understand why. Perhaps I should look into a price break for buying a license for both Mac and PC...

I suppose I am looking for something that's more neutral and not too terribly unique. Some might say that I'm looking for the Minion of sans serifs. I suppose that's why Stella appeals to me so much -- it's simply quiet and well-made.

I think that there is a lot of diversity in your initial three suggestions, that's why I ask.

Legato looks a little bit "different" to us because we're hypersensitive to fonts. Laymen think it's Arial. Especially at text sizes. This doesn't mean more than one font on this planet is a "luxury" (how preposterously animalistic), but it does mean it won't be consciously rejected by the reader; it just applies its functional and aesthetic attributes "below the radar" - like any good text[ish] font.

hhp

Fedra Sans?

What about Bliss?

or Fresco Sans and Fresco Sans Informal?

Ooooo, I forgot about Fedra Sans -- I just got out my copy of Indy Fonts...

Priority, huh? This is why I love these forums.

1. Humanist
2. Roman proportions (this and 1. kind of go hand in hand, don't they?)
3. Neutral
4. OpenType

I put OpenType last since technology, I suppose, shouldn't dictate my decision -- a good font will be worth the investment for Mac and PC.

Bliss is excellent, but not humanist enough. (Boy, I sound picky!) I had forgotten OurType -- looks good...

Not humanist enough? I need to go back to school and re-learn defnitions.

tbiddy, you're probably right. I've emailed FTF and asked about purchasing both licenses.

Tiffany, I'm sure I'm misusing the term because I don't know the word to use. I guess that's a case where I'm referring to "more roman proportions" maybe? What did you think of PTF Costa (you actually designed the specimen, right?)? I know it's not very neutral, but it looks very nice.

Fresco Sans is really nice -- I've downloaded the PDFs.

Mario is a nice fellow.

pedant a person who is excessively concerned with minor details and rules or with displaying academic learning.

Thanks, Tiffany. ;)

You guys are the only people that I "talk type" with, and sometimes I have to wonder if I really know what I'm talking about.

Haha!

Why on earth would you want to dip into an overused well? I wouldn't recommend FF Meta to Addison.

Sorry to hear that :(

Si

Aw, Dan. I was hoping you were going to say Beret by Typophile Edwardo Omine.

I had never heard of either Diverda or Beret -- I knew this thread would show me something new.

Dan, always the Linotype salesman. :) Oh, and while I've got your ear, do you think you can convince the people at Linotype to start using more glyphs from their fonts in the PDF samples? I make decisions on typefaces by certain select characters. It'd be nice if they included more in their samples.

Well, I didn't want to jump in until Simon prompted me.

We are revising our entire catalog at the moment. Both our catalogs, and our PDFs are auto-generated by databases. After the catalog is complete, I'll try to make the next step the PDFs. The new catalogs will be more detailed in their display than any of our older auto-generated ones. In theory, with the PDFs, anything that can be programmed can be done.

Linotype's new OpenType font standard has a character set of somewhere between 300–375 glyphs (all Western, CE, and a few more, sorry for not having the exact number handy) instead of the old 256. So we are looking for ways to bring out these new standard glyphs into our displays.

In other words, we're working on it… the leader of our e-commerce team will be at TypeCon. I'm sure that he would love to hear any suggestions that you (or anyone else) have.
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www.typeoff.de

Dan, that's awesome. I did notice some major changes, particularly on that Frutiger Next PDF. Sorry for being off topic...but I have a Vialog question. Vialog seems to be somewhat humanist (it seems based on Frutiger Condensed). I read somewhere that it was based on European road typography...where in Europe is it based?

BTW...Addison, did you actually purchase your full font set, and was the deal to your liking?

Oh...so how come nobody mentioned Thesis? Its a very well designed humanist face...or do any of you feel its over used at the moment?

Terry, I haven't licensed Vialog myself, but I've gotten to design with it twice. A few years ago, when I was first just an exchange student in Germany, Linotype and the school I was studying at collaborated on a project. Students in this project created advertising & brochure proposals for the Vialog typeface (Werner Scheider, Vialog's designer, was the school's retired typography professor). So the fonts were given to the school for our use.

Since working at Linotype, I have designed a few small ads and marketing materials (posters for conferences, etc) for Vialog.

I don't think that Vialog is directly based off of any traffic signs. In the 1980s, Werner Schneider created a proposal for a European Highway signage face that was not put into use. During the 1990s, he reworked this face into Vialog, which became the house face of the Munich transit system before it became available for licensing. Since 2001–2, everything related to public transportation in Munich is set in this face (from signs down to the fold-up maps that fit in your pocket). This completed face, already tested and optimized for Munich, is available from Linotype as part of its Platinum Collection.
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www.typeoff.de

I just received FTF Stella and it's everything I hoped for -- really top-notch stuff. Mr. Feliciano is indeed a very nice guy.

For anyone interested, FTF is working on OpenType and Stella has new weights in development.

Since this thread became a very useful list of the best contemporary sans serif faces, I wonder if we all could start elaborating a similar list about the best contemporary serifs out there.

Let me start (in no particular order):

• Fedra Serif
• Dolly
• Sauna
• Enigma
• Delicato
• Andulka
• Collis
• Borges
• Whitman
• FF Quadraat
• Andralis
• Proforma
• Aquila
• Farnham
• Arnhem

Hello! I just discovered this thread and I wonder why Versa Sans hasn't been mentioned yet. You can get it from Ourtype and there's also a serif version. Oh- and I think it's a beautiful font :-)

I was recently sent the brochure for Agilita, and it does look nice. It's new, well-crafted and complete - but most of all it's not utterly boring as the typical hum-sans is.

hhp