Seven segment display typefaces
I’m a product designer undertaking a project at work which will essentially be the development of a small computer interface with a basic LCD seven segment display (like a heart rate monitor, bike computer etc).
In order to take the display from a boring ’sourced straight from china’ watch display, I’d like to look into using a more interesting 7 segment font. I realise there are significant restrictions on segment shape etc in order to maintain readability.. just wondering if anyone had dealt with anything similar in the past?
Any ideas, leads etc are most welcome...
Cheers.
18.Sep.2007 11.00pm
It’s not seven segment, but Underware did some interesting stuff recently.
19.Sep.2007 3.46am
I can hook you up with some clever 6-segment designs, if infinitesimal power savings appeal to you.
19.Sep.2007 4.38am
infinitesimal power savings interest me greatly! I would be interested to see the approach for 6 segment...
19.Sep.2007 8.35pm
A friend of mine designed a few variations on a concept that eliminates the middle segment (and requires a small zero).
Contact him to ask about it: kturtle (ατ) houston.rr.com
I also have one of my own that legibly eliminates the bottom segment and can use the same coding as a normal display:
19.Sep.2007 8.46pm
You might find some interesting examples here — I did a search for “LCD” on MyFonts:
http://www.myfonts.com/search?search%5Btext%5D=lcd
20.Sep.2007 2.12am
I also have one of my own that legibly eliminates the bottom segment and can use the same coding as a normal display
Thanks cerulean - i like your approach in eliminating the bottom segment - esp. given it can be retrofit around an existing display architechture - which is of particular concern for this project as developing a new display layout with diferent segments, you need to re-program the IC chip and i think need to produce some ungodly amount like 100k units to make it worthwhile for the factory... so if we could go with an existing IC chip and just re-design the font.. that’s a little easier to swallow.
Certainly some good food for thought.. i wonder if a fairly geometric typeface like DIN could be modified to become a ’somewhat-respectable number-of-segments’ display.. Here’s an example that’s heavy on the segments..