You're Out of Line!

Maybe I’m overthinking this. Let’s just cut to the chase. This is the inspiration for this blog, Futura Licht. Paul Renner. 1932.

Need to find more information on it. Did find a discussion on Typophile about how Futura Inline doesn’t exist.

This is a slow movin’ blog. I didn’t forget about it. Been collecting research. Lots of interesting examples, just taking my time.. This is another nice inline, Kress-Versalien, 1926. (1923?) Versalien being German for ‘large captials’. Again found via Jens Jørgen Hansen. MyFonts has a take off of it called Ashley Inline. I haven’t tried it.. This is Ashley Inline from Linotype. Not sure about that D. Ashley is based on a design by Ashley Havinden not the creator of Kress-Versalien? Hmm. More digging..

McGill University lists Oskar Kress as designer of Kress Versalien.

“Also called Oskar Freiherr von Kress. He ceated the pointed heavy biline font Kress Versalien (1926, Schriftguss AG). Note that Ashley Inline (Agfa) is a clone of his font. His font also inspired Nick Curtis to make Not Mary Kate.”

The Opentype guy has a picture of Drescher Versalien, 1927.

Check this typeface out. This is Erler Versalien?

This is Schaefer Versalien, 1927. This one’s weird ’cause it only comes with this funny stripey background. Or maybe it’s not that weird…maybe in the 1920s a display face like this was desirable. I’m liking it right now:

I’ve been learning about Typotheque’s History project recently. I kind of love this idea. A skeletal system where different styles are imposed on a Roman capitals base. So if I’m getting this right it can act as 21 different OT faces or 21 layers as a group (given common widths, etc.) Of course most interested in Koch’s Prisma which serve as reference for numbers 14 and Bifur which they’re not referencing?

Speaking of big families.. I’ve also been checking out Ellen Lupton’s type oscars and her nod to Jeremy Tankard’s ’superfamily’ Trilogy. Woah. £2000 for the whole mega set. I like the sample.. but can you imagine juggling all 89 or how ever many of these? Overload.

I contacted Linotype recently and they were nice enough to point me to this biography of Gudrun Zapf von Hesse on the Linotype website. A Flickr perusal turned up the images of the Smaragd metal type below! These were taken by Jens Jørgen Hansen of Workshop for Letterpress Printing & Type Studies in Denmark.

I feel like one of my main tasks here is to corral a lot of disparate or non-existent or forgotten information. Have you met Castellar, Smaragd or Open Romulus Kapitalen?

Castellar –

1957. John Peters for Monotype. Display. Based on carved lettering on a Roman column dedicated to Augustus, and named after a town in the Alps.

Everyone sells this one. Here’s sellers. I’m personally skeptical of FontMarketplace’s $4.99 TT version. Note too that FontShop carries Castellar Std Roman and Castellar by Adobe Roman which look the same to me though at different prices.

Smaragd –

1953. Gudrun Zapf von Hesse. Linotype. Hermann Zapf’s wife. Clearly a wider, more open font compared to Castellar. I find this one more charming as well. Note the broadening widths down into the serifs. Lots of people sell this also. Btw, Smaragd is German for ‘emerald’.

Romulus Open –

1937. Jan Van Krimpen for Monotype and Enschedé. Seems to be out of circulation. Made as the last of the Romulus family by P. H. Raedisch at Enschedé foundry. There’s a nice discussion of Romulus in the context of serial type families on Typotheque.

If anyone had any links or information or thoughts about these three inlines, I’d be most happy to hear. I’ll spare the conjectures about Roman stone carving. For now.

Wondering now how much further back I can trace inlines. It’s interesting how Castellar and Smaragd are both stand alone, capitals only. These days, given current font software, a number of type designers seem very intent on making the largest families possible. That’s potentially a really good thing. Designers then have more options/weights to mix and experiment with…but Smaragd Regular is kind of rad just on its own.  Look at the bottom of the ‘N’ for instance.

Inline fonts. In a nutshell, inline fonts are fonts with an interior line. Like an outline, but inside. Simple, right?

Robert Bringhurst, Elements of Typographic Style, has a nice definition of inlines. Why not, it’s a classic:

“A letter in which the inner portions of the main strokes have been carved away, leaving the edges more or less intact. Inline faces lighten the color while preserving the shapes and porportions of the original face.” (p.326)

The internet is offering me little to no additional information on inline fonts on a first cross. I started looking at foundries, blogs and font resources linked from I Love Typography and none of these have really any information on inlines so I’m going to have to look further. Several very well known designers have approached highlighting (and layered fonts). More on highlighting/layering in the future.

I might need to look at this issue in relation to individual specimens as some of the better and more readily available info comes from the designers and foundries themselves. As I get going with this, I hope to connect back to other blogs and get some feedback and input from the more experienced. I also feel I need to reference typographic library info.

For the benefit of some context, inlines maintain shape and proportion while outlined letters, as nice as they can be, “are fatter than the originals and have less definition.” (Bringhurst) Here’s a little outline distortion mayhem at 5pt, 10pt, 30pt stroke below.

For comparison:

The above is ITC Chino Black Italic at 200 pt. (Linotype were giving this one away for free which is why I have it!)

So we have from left: 1) Black Italic, 2) Outline Black Italic, 3) what Inline Black Italic might look like. And further, an inline could be 1) always white, 2) a seperate layer/highlight that can be colored or 3) transparent/clear.

This is some Illustrator fumbling. Pushing past a traditional inline (white), one could start to imagine a whole world of possibility around rebuilding a font as a set of lines or maximizing its negative space(s). This is really the core of my interest here. I most want to look at fonts created of multiple lines (multiline fonts) and literally open-ended line fonts and fonts with open space defined by lines. I like fonts with transparent components and they’re currently uncommon and uncategorized.

Hello! This is the blog You’re Out of Line. I feel like Julie Powell in Julie & Julia. You know…that movie didn’t really explain Julia’s reaction to the blog. Maybe I’ll look around on the internet to find out.  Hmm.

Anyways. This blog is about a couple of things. Let’s talk about inline fonts! I was born in the 70s/raised in the 80s so inline fonts captured my childhood imagination. I almost want to say they were peak popularity in the early 80s but I’ll be doing a whole mess of research into that.

The purpose of this blog:

1. A place to research and report back on the history of inline fonts. I want to know which ones are lost in the sands of time, which ones are good and, you know, which ones are best left undiscussed. I am thinking there’s a lot of inline stuff that’s super out of circulation. Maybe the whole category needs a comeback. Inlines are often an afterthought.. but could they represent more than thaT?

2. I’m currently working on a Futura version (which is sort of related to this inline area of type). I’m almost done with the medium so I’m hoping I can promote it, show it off, otherwise garner interest in my typeface. I want to talk about the history of Futura as well (because I’m interested and all).

3. Computer-aided design and emerging technologies are presenting opportunities for some new ideas in type. Inline fonts have some interesting 21st century potentialities. I aim to explore some of that as well.

That’s basically it. I hope to learn a lot. Maybe get a few views.

2010. Let’s do this.

Oh, and I’m Peter Jacobson. I’m currently a graduate student in digital design at Pratt Institute in New York. Follow my Twitter! http://www.twitter.com/peteaj