Month: July 2009

Useful links for font inspiration

There’s no question that carefully chosen and presented typography can help a design to convey its message. Choosing fonts for a piece of work can, however, be a bewildering process.

Here, I present some useful links for font inspiration, in the hope that they’ll help you to choose the right font for the right job.

  1. Die 100 Besten Schriften (The 100 Best Fonts of all time.)

    It’s a German language blog post, but it’s packed with (100, unsurprisingly) of the most recognised and often used fonts.

  2. 21 Most Used Fonts by Professional Designers

    A great list of 21 of the most often used fonts, with screenshots of their variants.

  3. Typefaces no one gets fired for using

    Well-known designer Cameron Moll gives his quick lowdown on his often used typefaces, and requests others do the same.

  4. Top 100 Types survey

    The results of Paul Shaw’s readers’ top typefaces.

  5. 30 Fonts That All Designers Must Know & Should Own

    Another good list of inspiring fonts.

  6. 40+ Excellent Free Fonts for Professional Design

    The cost of professional typefaces can sometimes be prohibitive for the casual designer or someone on a strict budget. Smashing Magazine has put together a great list of more than 40 fonts that are free to use in your designs, and don’t skimp on quality.

There’s no question that carefully chosen and presented typography can help a design to convey its message. Choosing fonts for a piece of work can, however, be a bewildering process.

Here, I present some useful links for font inspiration, in the hope that they’ll help you to choose the right font for the right job.

  1. Die 100 Besten Schriften (The 100 Best Fonts of all time.)

    It’s a German language blog post, but it’s packed with (100, unsurprisingly) of the most recognised and often used fonts.

  2. 21 Most Used Fonts by Professional Designers

    A great list of 21 of the most often used fonts, with screenshots of their variants.

  3. Typefaces no one gets fired for using

    Well-known designer Cameron Moll gives his quick lowdown on his often used typefaces, and requests others do the same.

  4. Top 100 Types survey

    The results of Paul Shaw’s readers’ top typefaces.

  5. 30 Fonts That All Designers Must Know & Should Own

    Another good list of inspiring fonts.

  6. 40+ Excellent Free Fonts for Professional Design

    The cost of professional typefaces can sometimes be prohibitive for the casual designer or someone on a strict budget. Smashing Magazine has put together a great list of more than 40 fonts that are free to use in your designs, and don’t skimp on quality.

New CSS demo for Snow Leopard

Apple continues to ignore Flash support for the iPhone, and perhaps because of this, it’s pushing ahead with new features based on HTML and CSS. The iPhone has supported proprietary CSS on its Webkit-based browser, but things are now starting to take off on the desktop, as demonstrated by this YouTube video showing CSS on a Snow Leopard OS nightly build version of Safari:

Apparently, the effects on show have been proposed for standard adoption, and if approved, we’ll be seeing this sort of thing on other browsers. Certainly impressive, and it reminds me of Firefox plugin Cooliris. If you haven’t already seen Cooliris doing its stuff, you should check it out. It’s amazing to think that this sort of effect may soon be widely supported by our browsers.

Apple continues to ignore Flash support for the iPhone, and perhaps because of this, it’s pushing ahead with new features based on HTML and CSS. The iPhone has supported proprietary CSS on its Webkit-based browser, but things are now starting to take off on the desktop, as demonstrated by this YouTube video showing CSS on a Snow Leopard OS nightly build version of Safari:

Apparently, the effects on show have been proposed for standard adoption, and if approved, we’ll be seeing this sort of thing on other browsers. Certainly impressive, and it reminds me of Firefox plugin Cooliris. If you haven’t already seen Cooliris doing its stuff, you should check it out. It’s amazing to think that this sort of effect may soon be widely supported by our browsers.