Fonts on the WWW

Font Googling
By Deron Kazmaier

Lately I've been thinking about fonts, and the inter-platform usage issues that folks have had to deal with.

That got me to thinking about all the times folks have asked me where they can find fonts for PageStream. As a reminder, PageStream supports Type1 and TrueType fonts on every platform. Generally speaking, it doesn't make much difference which of these two font format you are using, but generally speaking TrueType fonts can offer more glyphs (aka characters) and better hinting. The keyword here is can. Doesn't mean they do.

Of course, the quality of the font is important if you are hoping to use the font at small point sizes or need extended characters. For the most part, you get what you pay for. If you are looking for display type (fonts used at large sizes) no problems with most any fonts that exist.

Luckily, the spread of free quality TrueType fonts is on the increase. Microsoft created a number of good TrueType fonts that at one time they let folks download from their website. While they no longer host those files on their site, the fonts are still legally available at a number of other sites including http://corefonts.sourceforge.net/.

Lately, Bitstream and Gnome have joined together to create a set of core open TrueType fonts. The serif fonts lack a true italics, but otherwise they seem to be a pretty good set. The family of fonts is called Vera, and they can be found at http://www.gnome.org/fonts/.

Gentium is a quality serif family with roman and italic fonts with a large collection of glyphs. Bold and bold italic variants are in the works, and the font is free for the downloading! Check it out at http://scripts.sil.org/cms/scripts/page.php?site_id=nrsi&item_id=Gentium.

When it comes to free fonts, the Internet has them in spades. One of my personal favorite font site is 1000 Fonts at http://www.1001fonts.com/ which has a nice interface, tracks favorites and categorizes the fonts.

For a collection of free quality fantasy fonts includes medieval, modern, celtic, gothic and various other fonts for you to download take a look at http://www.fantasyfonts.com/.

Other sites include Cheapskate Fonts at http://www.dustismo.com/ which is a font designers website for his free fonts. DaFonts at http://www.dafont.com/en/ tracks fonts with international characters and the Euro character. Other sites include FontFreak found at http://www.fontfreak.com/index2.htm. Dingbat Depot is at http://www.dingbatdepot.com/ and Highfonts is at http://www.highfonts.com/ (for Disney fans, don't miss the Walt Disney Script). Killer fonts at http://www.killerfontz.com/ is another of about 5 font sites (including Highfonts) that are cross linked and for all I know contain the exact same data.

 

Fonts on the WWW  Section  url:PGSguide/fontsonthewww
  created:2006-06-19 17:17:57   last updated:2009-03-15 12:15:28
  Copyright © 1985-2024 GrasshopperLLC. All Rights Reserved.

User Contributed Comments For Fonts on the WWW
Deron Kazmaier wrote...2009-03-15 12:16:23

Tony Cooke also recommends these sites:

http://www.1001fonts.com/fonts_overview.html?page=1
http://www.abstractfonts.com/
http://www.linotype.com/2221/blackletterfonts.html
http://www.creamundo.com/index.php?lang=en
http://www.eknp.com/fonts/
http://fontso.com/alph.php?l=d
http://www.getfreefonts.info/free_fonts.a.html
http://www.searchfreefonts.com/
http://simplythebest.net/fonts/index.html
http://www.urbanfonts.com/fonts/fonts-A.htm
http://neatfonts.com/
http://www.fontica.com/index.php?poz=2
http://betterfonts.com/
http://manfred-klein.ina-mar.com/
http://www.pcfonts.com/index.php

User Contributed Comments For Fonts on the WWW