Fonts: Reading PDFs and ebooks on screen

When I flew to the US recently for the WritersUA Conference in Seattle, I spent a LOT of time on planes, and hanging around in airports and hotel rooms. As I don’t sleep on a fight — even a 14 hour one — I need something to occupy my time. I’m not a big movie fan so I usually only watch one or two of the 40+ typically on offer, and maybe a TV episode or two. That takes care of about 6 hours. Likewise, I rarely read much fiction these days and rarely buy physical books or borrow them from the library any more.

Prior to leaving, I created a folder of all those PDFs I’ve been meaning to read and podcasts I’ve been meaning to listen to. On this latest trip, I mostly listened to podcasts while driving to/from the airport (it’s a 3+ hour drive, so I can usually knock off a few!). On the plane and when I didn’t have internet access, I read some of the PDFs.

And this is what I found: serif fonts are much harder for me to read on screen than sans serif fonts.

I was zooming the PDF text up to 125% or 150% so that I could sit back comfortably to read it on my laptop. Even at that zoom factor, the thin stokes of fonts like those in the Times and similar font families got lost against the white background. One factor for this lack of readability could have been that I had the brightness on my laptop turned down a lot so that the light from the screen didn’t disturb those around me too much. But it wasn’t just the thin strokes — the serifs also affected the readability as they added ‘noise’ to the text.

This is by no way a scientific study ;-), just a personal observation after reading some 500+ PDF pages on screen over many hours.

I guess the take-away from this is to consider how your reader will be reading the PDF or ebook you create. Do you expect them to print it out or read it online? If online, have you considered how the brightness settings and zoom factors may affect readability of the font you have chosen? You may not know or be able to find out the answers to these questions, but consider them when you are creating a PDF or ebook.

[Link last checked April 2009]

The perennial font argument: Serif or Sans serif?

Many studies have been done into whether serif or sans serif fonts are best for print or online. My personal preference is sans serif for both, but that’s a *personal* preference. If your corporate style guide dictates what you have to use, you don’t get a choice.

But what about those studies? What do *they* say about which style of font is most legible for a particular format? Well, that depends on which study you read!

Instead of reading all the studies and analyzing them, Alex Poole has done it for you: http://www.alexpoole.info/academic/literaturereview.html

Alex ‘reviewed over 50 empirical studies in typography’ and came to this conclusion:

… we should accept that most reasonably designed typefaces in mainstream use will be equally legible, and that it makes much more sense to argue in favour of serif or sans serif typefaces on aesthetic grounds than on the question of legibility.

Smooth fonts in Windows XP

Do you use an LCD monitor or laptop? Do the fonts look funny? In Windows XP you can set the display so that fonts are smooth (no jaggy edges).

Here’s how:

1. Go to Start > Control Panel > Display, then select the Appearance tab.
2. Click the Effects button.
3. Select the Use the following method to smooth edges of screen fonts check box, then select ClearType from the drop-down list.
4. Click OK to save and close all settings.

[This article was first published in the December 2006 CyberText Newsletter]

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Fonts, typography

For a good introductory book to typography, you can’t go past Robin Williams’ The Non-Designer’s Type Book. I read it a few months ago, and even though I thought I knew ‘a bit about type’, I still learned a lot. My assessment: You’ll never look at type the same way again!

While you’re at it, take a look at Robin’s other popular book, The Non-Designer’s Design Book. My assessment: Lots of “of course” moments, but that doesn’t detract from the book. Far from it. This book gives the reasons why some design elements work and other don’t. Lots of examples.

Video: Font conference

If you’re into fonts in any way, you should rank this clever video somewhere between ‘amusing’ and ‘brilliant’. I’m at the ‘brilliant’ end… Enjoy!

Video: http://www.collegehumor.com/video:1823766 (I think it runs for about 3 minutes)

(Thanks to Dave G for sharing it with me)

You want fonts with that?

Nathan Ford, over at unit interactive, has written a great blog post on moving a little outside the square when it comes to defining ‘font stacks’ in CSS, such as: font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;

He suggests that you define the stacks according to their purpose (context), specifying your ideal font first, then the alternative (or font that best fits), followed by a common font, then the generic one. While he suggests four, there’s nothing to stop you from defining six or ten fonts in your stacks. The ideal font you specify doesn’t have to be a font that’s installed on everyone’s machine, and he gives us some links to stats on what’s installed on computers around the world, as well as a comparison of the fonts mentioned in his article as a downloadable PDF document.

One thing he didn’t mention is the great Typetester tool where you can select fonts, specify their attributes (including dynamic color and background color), see how they display in your browser, then grab the CSS for the font combination you want. It sure beats changing the CSS, and refreshing the browser to test out every nuance!

That blog post again?
http://unitinteractive.com/blog/2008/06/26/better-css-font-stacks/

Like that font?

Have you seen a font you like but don’t know what the designer used? How do you find a font among the thousands that are available? Some websites have the answer! Take a look at these:

• What the Font? http://www.myfonts.com/WhatTheFont/: This site lets you upload an image of the font you like, then it uses some smart, behind-the-scenes, mathematical algorithms to figure out what font was used. You may have to confirm the letters used, then it displays fonts like those in the image.
• Identifont http://www.identifont.com/: Identifont offers two methods of finding a font. You can answer questions about its appearance, or, if you know its name, you can search for it and get information on how and where to purchase it, where it came from, and other fonts similar to it. The screen shot below shows an example of a search for the Frutiger font.

Install Vista/Office 2007 fonts on Windows XP

Microsoft has done some nice work on their new fonts. However, these fonts only come with Vista (and the Office 2007 programs). But what if you’re using Windows XP and Office 2003 and want to install these fonts? Well, you can’t get them easily using the standard things you’d think of, like going to the Microsoft site and downloading and installing them. That won’t work as Vista fonts can’t be installed on Windows XP (i.e. you can’t get a copy of a font installed on Vista, then install it on XP using the usual XP font installation methods).

What WILL work is downloading and installing the free file format conversion application—the program that allows Office 2003 users to view documents, presentations etc. created in Office 2007. That install the converters AND the new fonts!

Here’s where you get it (this link is REALLY long so I’ve shortened it with TinyURL, but it goes direct to the download page on the Microsoft website): http://tinyurl.com/y5a879

Has this tip helped you? saved you time? saved your skin? You can thank me by clicking on the cup and buying me a coffee. (An E-Junkie shopping cart page will open where you can pay for my coffee via PayPal.)