The “Latin Capital Letter Sharp S” is just the uppercase letter to “Latin Small Letter Sharp S”. The lowercase letter (ß) was always part of the western codepages. Just the uppercase letter is new.

Isn’t Tosche asking about small caps/Kapitälchen?

Small caps never have a unicode number assigned but are invoked by formatting features (OT preferably), except if small capitals are used in some (e.g. phonetic transcription) alphabets as letters with distinct meaning. “Capital Esszet” is not even used in any official orthography in the world, and of course neither is the small capital form of it used in any phonetic alphabet. Therefore you don’t have a Unicode codepoint for it.

Szabolcs

Isn’t Tosche asking about small caps/Kapitälchen?

Oh, I see.
The Small Caps Eszett doesn’t get a Unicode.

I was of the impression that there are no standardized unicode encodings for small-caps in the typographical sense at all. Only for small-caps that have a particular meaning in some language, such as ’LATIN LETTER SMALL CAPITAL R’ (U+0280), which is the lower case of ’LATIN LETTER YR’ (U+01A6). But such codepoints have a different semantic then those typically encoded in the private use area of opentype fonts. Consequently, a smallcaps form of the capital SZ would be placed in that private use area too as it doesn’t have semantics in the linguistic sense.

I wasn’t aware of the capital SZ being standardized. I think this is cool and also very ironic as the latest reformation of German orthography almost entirely abandoned the need for the SZ at all.

Ralf, I just saw the samples you provided for the German Wikipedia page on the capital ß. Neat stuff! I really like some of the interpretations those faces offer, especially P22 Underground’s version.

Thanks everyone!
I didn’t know that only some small capital letters have proper Unicode (and those are for phonetical use or some kind of thing, right?), and that there are free private use area. I might forrow your advice, thank you Lars! In fact I’m not familiar with technical issues of digital typography, though I know much more about typography itself (especially Japanese).

In gratitude, I would like to show you the small cap ß that I made later.

Traditionally, Small Cap Postscript fonts have ss in the eszett place to allow for graceful substitution. Everyone seems to have accepted this except Zuzana Licko and Rudy Vanhderlans (see the specimen book for Mrs Eaves). Presumably esszett in OT translates to SC/ss ?

Presumably esszett in OT translates to SC/ss ?

Absolutely — and it’s nothing new to OT either.
Since there has been a code point for the eszet for ages, all-caps fonts had to put something there. If you check Trajan and Lithos (random first links copied), you will find a double ’SS’ in the place reserved for ’german double s’.

All OTF (Pro) fonts I have at the mo’ with a regular eszet display them as ’ss’ in small caps. (Just checked:) and as ’SS’ in All Caps.

It may give rise to an interesting discussion. Should conversion (if that’s the word) from eszet to double-s be a font designer’s decision, or should it be at the typesetters’ end?

Do the fonts actually contain an SS-glyph, or is the caps/smallcaps conversion in the font set up to replace a single ß-glyph with two consecutive S-glyphs?

I would guess in anything except OpenType there is an actual single “SS” glyph. Translation of single-to-multiple glyphs is something very recent.

I was going to mention plain old Courier as a test case, because a monospace font may only be called that if all glyphs are the same width. I know from experience you should switch ligatures off in monospaced fonts (in the future, before the book is printed, not afterwards), because Courier has “fi” and “fl” ligatures, and they are the same width as a single character.
But someone thought ahead, and provided a modern OTF variant, so the “ß” single width glyph translates to double-width double-S on capitalisation.

(Even checking further:) Oh, okay: my Courier doesn’t have a single “SS” glyph. It must be the software that did the translation (and thus prohibiting ’capitalized-ß’).

I see really interesting discussion going on.
By the way, here’s what I said.

As I understand it, there should be nothing in the OpenType small cap feature (smcp) that converts ß to small cap eszett.
However, caps-to-small-caps (c2sc), which is implemented as part of the “all small caps” menu item, should access the small cap eszett. It may be a good idea to have some other means of changing ß to small cap eszett, for instance in a stylistic set or as a stylistic alternate.

**

Is this just a gimmick, product of the restless minds and historical ambitions of Unicode developers (and chore for font designers), or will it find, or create, any real-world usage?
I mean, how many times are we going to see that 1954 book cover?

… or will it find, or create, any real-world usage?

It will definitely be used for proper names (once the most-used fonts are updated). There are around 2 million people in Germany who have an Eszett in their family name or in the name of their home town.

It will definitely be used...once the most-used fonts are updated.

I very much doubt it. The character is too hard to access. “Shift-ß” will continue to set SS.
Implementation via stylistic set or stylistic alternate is both too obscure in layout applications, and inconsistently handled in fonts.

I’m not sure that the most-used fonts are going to be updated. This isn’t like the euro currency symbol. There was a very impending need with this… font makers had to update their fonts, because the currency hit the ground running in a dozen countries on a single day!

But even when font makers updated their fonts to include euros, these font updates were not distributed free-of-charge to licensees, at least not by the larger distributors. The best case scenario was that some foundries released “euro fonts,” which were fonts with just the new euro symbols in them, in various fonts or styles…

I wouldn’t expect average computer users—or even average graphic designers or CS users—to have cap (or small cap) eszetts in their most commonly-used fonts any time soon, if ever. Perhaps when OpenType fonts are supplanted by whatever technology will come around next, and everyone will needs re-license their old fonts/license new fonts/etc. Maybe some of these will have cap and small cap eszetts…

I’m putting it in all my new fonts, and in the OpenType upgrades to the older ones.
Why? Because it’s an interesting design challenge, and, lacking precedents in the “most commonly-used” typefaces, there’s a fresh feeling when working on it.

I am doing the same, Nick. I don’t know how many users will require it but, like you, I enjoy the challenge.

ChrisL

Here is one I am working on now:

Enjoy the challenge!
(I’m looking forward to your solution for Oneleigh, Nick!)

But, to be honest, most people in Germany don’t even know how to make proper use of the lowercase ß (which even has its own key), so – don’t expect to see it anywhere ... ;)

Nick, the way the German keyboard layout is arranged, shift-ß gives you a question mark - so much for people entering it manually. For a capitalized charcter stlye it’s good to have though, albeit many people will expect ’SS’ instead of capital-ß, so making it optional (stylistic set? not sure about the technical implementation) seems reasonable.

While you are at design challenges posed by the German language, how about adding fffl ligatures for beauties such as “Sauerstoffflasche” (oxygen bottle). The only font I know of that has this is Requiem (because Bringhurst mentioned it). Coincidentally, H&FJ get it wrong in their sample and misspell it “Sauerstoffflachen” ;). With the 1996 rules, an fff-ligature for “Schifffahrt” (boat trip) may also be in order. However, and now I’m getting totally off-topic, someone had the ingenious idea of making orthographic rules about ligature. These rules (in general) state that a ligature should not be used when compunds are formed (which is often the case in the German language). Thus, the use of an fffl ligature in “Sauerstoffflasche” would be considered an error by that rule ;)

In another thread, where Ralf and others already provided a lot of interesting background on this topic, it was suggested that a new type of ligature was called for. Kind of a non-connecting ligature. In a font where the f reaches far to the right (e.g. Bembo) setting a word like “auflegen”, for which the rule states not to use an fl-ligature, results in such letterspaceing that it reads like “auf_legen”. That is if you don’t want the f and l glyph to clash.

Thus, the next German type design challenge would alternative ligatures for use at German compound boundaries which are designed so that the glyphs in the ligature don’t touch. I wonder if German users would be interested in such fonts ;)

Oh, and while we’re at it, include an f that looks good in front of diacritics.

I’m not saying that the f should “swallow” the left dot on the u-umlaut, but I also think they are too close so an alternate version of the f with a shorter arc might be a solution... (maybe this is just my bad taste)

It’s really no argument to say it can’t catch on, because there is no keyboard shortcut. That’s like someone would have said a 100 years ago, we can’t invent planes, because there are no airport terminals ...
When people will start using this character, they will also create the demand for font updates and better input methods. It wont go as fast as with the Euro character, but it doesn’t have to be. Who knows if we use the same kind of keyboards and operation systems in 15 years from now?

BTW: You can already install alternative keyboard drivers which enable the Capital Sharp S with the shortcut Option + Shift + ß (Mac) or AltGr + Shift + ß (Windows).

That’s like someone would have said a 100 years ago, we can’t invent planes, because there are no airport terminals

No, it’s like saying people won’t fly because they have no idea how to get to the airport.

Lars:

http://www.typophile.com/node/40439

Two real-world examples:

Ralf, nice... what is the Max Goldt cover set with? Some sort of sort of Caslon?

Heh...you know, just as an alternative to writing out a double ss, it seems like a useful shortcut. Why doesn’t English do that?

As for the f before ü, i agree that a discretionary ligature w/ a shorter arc would be a good idea.

Peace,
JT

Ralf, that’s more like it!

Lars, there is a partial cure to fü used by Matthew Carter for example, viz., a small positive kern.

Chris, I am wild about your capital esszet. It is by far the most organically convincing solution I have yet seen. Brilliant thinking, showing a real sensitivity to the reader’s eye.

Thanks Bill!

ChrisL

I still maintain that a more “rectangular” form of capital ß would be better, along the lines of my proposal at
http://typophile.com/node/33647

The curved top left corner is illogical and only makes sense if the top left color of F is curved as well, a la Handel Gothic. Through the analogy, if the lowercase longs looks like a lowercase f without the bar, then the (nonexistent) uppercase longs should look like the uppercase F without the bar, i.e. like the Greek uppercase Gamma. And this should be what the left side of the uppercase ß looks like.

Remember that there should be clear, obvious visual distinction between a lowercase letter and an uppercase letter. The curved-top uppercase ß proposals all look like hybrids between uppercase and lowercase, they’re not sufficiently different from the normal lowercase ß.

A.

Remember that there should be clear, obvious visual distinction between a lowercase letter and an uppercase letter.

Of course, but in what way? Many letters in the Latin alphabet have extremely similar shapes across case, differentiated by other qualities, in particular stroke weight and size. Now admittedly, the cap and lower case eszett are nominally the same size, which is potentially problematic, but if the weight and proportions are suitably “upper case”, then there won’t be confusion. Context must count for something, and this letter never starts a word, and is usually surrounded by other capitals. In Ralf’s samples, it is simply illogical to assume that when all other letters are upper case, the eszett is lower case, and in those fonts, it is sufficiently big and with matching stroke weights that it doesn’t give that impression. However, I do think that in the Max Goldt cover, the character is too fussy for a capital, with that upward “flick” of a stroke towards the top right.

Adam, I second you. This is absolutely my opinion as well as I have already put it forward earlier.

Nick, with this argument “In Ralf’s samples, it is simply illogical to assume that when all other letters are upper case, the eszett is lower case, and in those fonts, it is sufficiently big and with matching stroke weights that it doesn’t give that impression.”
you could just continue using lowercase ß in all-caps setting, as NUßBAUMER’s ß would be clearly recognized as uppercase, as “it is simply illogical to assume that when all other letters are upper case, the eszett is lower case”... ;-)

Szabolcs

Well, I have looked at the interminable thread referenced, and all the examples, and I still find Chris’s example is the only persuasive one. I don’t know why, and I don’t know whether the approach would work in a serif font, and I’m not entirely happy with Chris’s normal, lowercase eszett. Of all the serif models proposed here and in the previous thread, I find them annoying, illogical and too noticeable.

The superb thing about Chris’s uppercase design is that it is practically unnoticeable - - the traditional goal of all typography. You’re seeing a character you’ve never seen before, yet you don’t even have to pause to recognize it. You know at once what it is. Transparency is operating on several synergistic levels here. This is a remarkable achievement. This is what type is all about.

P.S. Adam, without having any positive ideas about how to solve this problem for serif fonts, what I dislike about the rectangular form you proposed for Garamond PP is that the form has a pronouncedly Kyrillic flavour which I fear will be found uncongenial.

Szabolcs, you’re right, my logic was flawed.

In fact, readers don’t make assumptions about whether a character has an upper or lower case shape—which is why unicase isn’t too hard to read.

So the only thing that matters is the typographical aesthetic—does the glyph harmonize?

With that criteria, I’m afraid I don’t like the “rectangular” cap Eszett Adam proposes. It’s too busy, a crowded shape.

My reasoning for the form I used was an attempt to have a reader simply accept the capital as an Eszett with as little debate as possible. This for me is a daunting task because I am not a native German speaker who is used to seeing German text. My hope is that if enough type designers make an attempt and put something out there to be seen, that the German speakers will discuss all the options and we will eventually have a range of forms that are acceptable. Right now, there is very little out there for a proper dialogue to ensue. As for myself, I am just hoping for more input from the German speaking community.
I can completely understand Adam’s logic in treating the cap F without a crossbar in the same way as we treated the long s of old. The trouble is as I attempted to use it, was that it kept separating itself too much from the rest of the text. It looked either too angled, too Greek (or Cyrillic as Bill says), to constructed or just too awkward. I felt as though a reader would have to go through the logical steps of figuring out the longS as an F and then saying, “Oh, that is what he means” rather than just reading Eszett without further ado. The long s in lowercase is so rarely seen that many people may not even attend to it as anything familiar to begin with. In the cap form, it never existed so there is no visual memory, only right-brained extrapolation and reconstructed logic, A similar thing to extreme might be to use bull’s head line drawing inverted as an A for a new glyph called the double bowled cap A. We may know the origin of Aleph but the connection no-longer reads without analysis. I was just trying a way to just have it read without needing interpretation.
In the eyes of German speakers, I may have failed—this I do not deny. I admit I have been greatly influenced by reading Ralf’s posts here and on Flickr regarding this over recent years since he seems to be one of the few to invite the dialogue and prompt his fellow Germans to respond. I am an interested observer who knows little of the German language but seek to participate in the dialogue not only because I attempt to design typefaces but that the idea of a new letterform intrigues me greatly. I admit I do feel like an interloper who might have been tempted to draw a U to go with the Trajan inscription :-)

ChrisL

I disagree with Adam’s logic.
Most importantly, ß is definitely a ligature of long-s and s, not f and s, and that’s the same story with uppercase. I think there’s no connection between ß looks like fs and capital ß should be like FS. It’s not FS ligature, and it should look like SS ligature.

> Most importantly, ß is definitely a ligature of long-s
> and s, not f and s, and that’s the same story with uppercase.

I was never arguing that ß is a ligature of f and s. I said that the capital ß should be a ligature of a capital longs and a capital s. Since the capital longs never existed, it needs to be imagined though reverse thinking. Since the lowercase longs is the lowercase f without the crossbar, it is only logical to assume that the capital longs could look like a capital f without a crossbar, i.e. like the capital Greek gamma. In other words, the relationship of Γ and ſ and of F and f is the same. Since ß is a ligature of ſs, it is a logical consequence that the capital ß could be a ligature of ΓS. This is _pure logic_.

Then, one needs to examine the practicality of the solution. And there, one arrives at the conclusion that since ß can be drawn as a ligature of ſs or as a ligature of ſƷ, the clearest distinction between the uppercase and the lowercase ß can be achieved if you draw the uppercase ß as a ligature of ΓƷ and the lowercase ß as the traditional ligature of ſs.

I maintain that the ΓƷ shape is very “masculine” and very appropriate for a letter that is inherently uppercase.

A.

>This is _pure logic_.

So was the roman du roi. So was Romulus italic. Where are they now? (Matthew Carter once wrote something to the effect that the only typeface with a theory behind it that was persuasive either as theory or type was Meridien.)

Chris, as far as I’m concerned, your place in type history is secured by being the first to design a great cap fz. Do you think you could try and top that with a seriffed solution?

>My reasoning for the form I used was an attempt to have a reader simply accept the capital as an Eszett with as little debate as possible. This for me is a daunting task because I am not a native German speaker who is used to seeing German text.<

This is classic American thinking of the best kind. Being respectful of the historical context but not being burdened with it, so able to get the job at hand done.

>So was the roman du roi. So was Romulus italic.

Yeah, and so was Dürer’s Roman Capital.

This is why I’m not saying, use pure logic. I say, use logic as your startpoint, apply natural laws to it (like, ease of drawing the symbol by hand) plus your craft and talent.

Chris’s capital ß looks like it’s coming from Handel Gothic :) That type of curve is unheard of in the skeleton of the Latin uppercase letter, so it looks alien. It looks like three-quarters uppercase, like an eunuch of sorts (assuming that the uppercase is masculine, coming from static stone carving, while the lowercase is feminine, coming from freehand writing).

Take a shot and casual handwriting and come up with a cap-ß form that is easy and natural to write by hand.

A.

“That type of curve is unheard of in the skeleton of the Latin uppercase letter, so it looks alien.”
That’s exactly how I feel about the curved form. (Though I don’t like quite some of Adam’s examples where the lower bowl of the 3-shaped Z-component forms a 1/2 to 3/4 circle... It’s as someone noted too crowded. Go for descenders and more verticality within the 3-shape, like in J!
;-)

Szabolcs

I like the solutions Chris shows here. Like Bill I felt a Cyrillic reference when I first saw Adams thoughts worked out.

For what it’s worth ... here are my Versal Eszets:

I like these very much though I don’t like them quite as much as Chris’s. Trying to analyze my feelings I’d say at a rough guess that I prefer the more generous way he handles the top left curve and the more free way he handles the bottom right curve. But another factor is that I really like good ultra light sans designs. Ultra light seems to me the sweet spot for appreciating the intrinsic beauties of many sans designs. Not that we’re talking about beauty here, but I’m trying to factor in my prejudices. What you have shown, Jos, is that the principle has merit, and can be successfully applied to a variety of styles. Now we have to see if this principle stands up when used with a conventional serif face such as Garamond or Baskerville. Nobody should feel ashamed for not achieving an ideal cap esszet, considering how very many truly dreadful lower case esszets have been designed in the history of type! Either case, it’s a difficult character!

Chris’ and Jos’ Eszetts still have the problem, that there too much “B” in it, especially if your reading it in smaller sizes. The small gap and the short diagonal stroke just isn’t enough. This is true, even if the B looks very differently in those typefaces. We don’t read by comparing the letter forms. The neurons just fire, when they see a shape that matches the pattern. And the B neurons will fire when they see such capital Eszetts. Sure, the reader will usually correct that within the context of the surrounding letters, but it might be better to have a unique letter in the first place.
I usually solve this by making the character significantly wider than B, usually the width of a G. Such a design can never be mistaken for a B.

Jos,

your #3 looks good — in this particular typeface, with a strong calligraphic flair, it makes sense to give the cap-ß а descender and overall a more flowy, rounded shape. However, the letter is too dark compared to the regular uppercase letters.

But the other three cap-ßs just look like enlarged lowercase ßs. They don’t feel like uppercase letters at all — they’re too narrow and too complex in their structure. The uppercase of the Latin alphabet uses a very simple set of basic composition elements: vertical stroke, horizontal stroke, diagonal stroke and a half-circle. Even the letter S, which is a fairly complex shape, is still pretty simple. The letter J is the only one that does not use the standard building blocks — since it’s a “late arrival” to the alphabet. The other “late arrivals” like K and W have integrated nicely because they speak the formal language of the Latin uppercase.

The shape you guys are proposing lacks one essential aspect of the other Latin uppercase letters: robustness. The underlying skeleton of the Latin capitals is robust and flexible at the same time. They’re capable of taking any stylistic treatment you imagine, and they clearly stand apart from each other. The new member of the gang must bring the same qualities. It should look like it always belonged there.

Adam

Thanks Bill, Ralf and Adam for the kind feedback and thoughts about the Versal ß. This really inspires me to have another look at it. To be continued...

Ralf, I like your variation but I think you worry too much about B-ness. Character differentiation at small sizes is an issue in itself, one that affects all characters. b-ness, or Beta-ness, is also a problem that afflicts many of the badly designed lowercase esszet glyphs of the past (less for a German reader, who will always know that the near-Beta is supposed to be an esszet, than for everyone else). And none of that means that a near-Beta generic lowercase esszet is a good thing. All of that said, I still think your example is too wide, because it is out of proportion with the other characters. The right hand side is longing to be closer to the left hand side.

Adam, you speak of skeleta, flexibility, and robustness ... terms that are frustratingly inexact and reflect the implicit difficulty of a scientific approach. Still, the Chris Lozos esszet is still the only one that looks ’like it always belonged there.’ I see no reason why this should not happen at small sizes. Reduced to slushy 8 point newsprint, you might have problems, but you will have those for many other characters in the alphabet under such conditions and must redesign accordingly. The task here is more to come up with a general solution than to provide insurance for every possible optical condition. Since the displaying is at display size, it naturally makes sense for the design to be a display size.

Ralf, the more I look at your version, the more I like it. But it needs to be a trifle narrower, and though I love the upsweep of the curve in the final stroke, I think it is a mistake, because it makes the lower curve look like the illustration of a hook. One of the reasons Chris’s example works is that all the curve directions appear to be in the right place to signal the brain to get the message ”it’s OK”, its recognizable, it’s a friend, I know it.

’Hookness’ should probably be avoided to the extent possible. You can see Jos’s examples being on the edge of hookness, and just barely avoiding it.

Needless to say, like Chris, I’m on edge about giving my opinion about a German character to a German, but ’ . . . wenn man hoeflich ist’ !

The dilemma we face as type designers and type aficionados is that we are very close to form issues and very far from being naive readers. We tend to get inthralled with the nuance and detail that separates one typestyle from another and overlook the forest. Much of our discussion in this thread has been about the details of a typeface rather than the distinctions of a single new glyph in relation to the rest of the long established set. A reader is not looking for what will become a decision point of form during reading. Readers are not looking for any form issues. They just want the flow of reading to continue without intervention. Imagine what happened when the first U was made part of the Roman alphabet? It was a new odd form that had to find its place. There is no getting around this point in time. It may take a generation or 2 to have the new Eszett take an accepted place for readers. It is not a question of proportions of space or degree of curve. These are type design issues we all deal with. Something much more basic is at issue here, pointed upper-left corner or rounded upper-left corner, vertical stem drops below baseline or not, S curve or Z? While I might find Ralf’s form too wide and disturbing to color, it is basically the same as the one I have drawn or Jos has shown. There are way too many variations in type style that need to be allowed for to constrain anyone’s design by style. I also find the O he has shown in that same sample as being too narrow for the D or other letters but I still clearly see it as an O and not a zero. That would be a discussion he and I might have about designing a particular typeface but not about defining a new glyph. With ANY new glyph, the reader will struggle to decide f it is one of the older glyphs or not. This is a learning process we must go through and formal quality is not the issue for that, only structure.

I agree with Bill’s comments about abstract terms. I never knew about or even accept the gender description of Latin caps and lower case as being masculine or feminine. Likewise’ what exactly is “Robustness” and how does it come into play? These terms don’t help me understand the problem Adam is seeing. I hope Adam can find another way to describe the problem he sees.

Thanks for the kind words, Bill!

ChrisL

Having looked at the samples on these threads, I agree with Adam that the upper left corner should follow the style of other upper left corners present in the uppercase B D E F H I K L M N P R. I have been trying to upload my take on this, but I keep getting error messages no matter if I try to upload a jpg or png image.

JamesM

The dilemma we face as type designers and type aficionados is that we are very close to form issues and very far from being naive readers.

Yes, and that’s why we can continue this discussion forever – we will never agree on just ONE shape. Just make your Capital Sharp S and let the German readers decide what they like.
BTW: Were keeping a list of releases with this character on this page: http://www.typografie.info/typowiki/index.php?title=Versal-Eszett
If you have released a typeface with capital sharp s, please send me an image with a sample word.
(But please choose one with correct orthography. The one used in this thread is not correct. »Einfluss« is always spelled with double-s today. Here is a list with over 400 German city names that include an Eszett.)

“Here is a list with over 400 German city names that include an Eszett”

Thanks Ralf! I can certainly use that list :-)

ChrisL

Using a name from Ralf’s approved list :-)

ChrisL

Chris, in your heaviest weight the (upper right of) Versal ß seems to point up more then the lightest weight.

+++

Here’s a new attempt.

Thanks Jos! I think you are right. I will work on that.

ChrisL

I don’t know guys, the Eszett character has the general shape of a human ear (see Jimmy Typeface), so isn’t making it pointed a little too much lycanthropy? Maybe it’s just me, but that’s the fantasy-creature vibe I can’t shake.

On a purely typographic level, the acute top right shape doesn’t look like part of the character, but a go-faster glyph styling, like in Dynamo. But hey, at least Dynamo is a German design!

What you’re trying to say is that you find the uc shape a bit alienated?
That’s spock on (I hope Jimmy won’t mind).

LOL.

Beam me up, Jos!!! :-)

ChrisL

I think Mike Tyson can figure out a way to make the disfigured ear thing work as well as Spock :-)

ChrisL

Oh ... now ... that’s ... lycanthropic behavior. :-)

A lesser known fact is that 12 years ago Mike called me to eagerly ask if I could design Eszetts for his alphabet soup. Sadly for Evander I wasn’t able to finish this assignment on time.

More biting humor from Jos :-)

ChrisL

Another brand new real-world example:

A local newspaper that is distributed in over 100.000 households around the city of Gießen now uses a capital Eszett for their logo.
It’s not very well done and they also really need to get one for their headlines in Walbaum, but it’s still a sign that this character is already catching on.

Very nice, Jos, I think this vindicates Chris’s bottom right curve idea — there’s something about it that is crucially non-distracting. Nick, I think your solutions are absolutely beautiful but too distracting because of the too-faithful adherence to the bottom S-curve termination idea. However, that may be the best that can be done with the form. Had you tried Chris’s idea and found it wouldn’t work for seriffed type? Jos and Chris, I wonder if for both of your designs, the upper left hand curve can’t start a little sooner? But maybe that wouldn’t work? It wouldn’t make logical sense of course. Might it make visual, and psycho-visual sense? We’re dealing with extraordinary intangibles here but it’s wonderful to see how well people are rising to the challenge.

I fear Gießener Zeitung is exemplary of more atrocities brave German readers will have to face in future ...

I don’t dislike the idea of a capital Eszett per se (although I wonder how many circumstances I would end up using it in), but I think it’s worth pointing out that the courageous folk at the Gießener Zeitung may be treating it more as a curio or trademark than as a serious piece of typography. They identify their newspaper as “die mit dem großen ß” — “the one with the capital ß.” I wonder if they use it in any all-caps situation outside the name of the paper?

Christian A. Harder

Well, “die mit dem großen ß” exemplifies a theory that many font marketers, but especially German ones, have expressed to me - - that for the ’common man’ who buys a special type for his company, the way to sell the type to him is to say ’now you can say “I am the one with the special g”’ or the italic p, or whatever. And what’s wrong with that? I can’t imagine cap esszet ever becoming a crucially important typographic feature, but I would expect it gradually to become acceptable, and even expected, perhaps over a period of some decades. It’s really rather exciting. How often can one think of adding a new character to the alphabet that is actually accepted? Yet here it seems to be unfolding before our eyes.

At least everyone here is trying to think constructively and typographically about the future. What a contrast to the static situation of the untypographical eth where, as far as we know, a set of rules completely at odds with rational design and with typography itself, must be observed without the least possibility of reform.

...adherence to the bottom S-curve termination idea.

Firstly, in serifed type, some kind of stroke terminal is necessary, and one that fits the typeface.
As you surmise Bill, the terminal curls up to clear the serif:

Secondly, I like the way the terminal angle in the sans can align with other elements.

The main thing I’m trying to do is balance the proportions of the interior white space, so that the bottom counter is slightly larger than the top one. I varied the treatment in Figgins Sans, depending on the weight:

Nick I can’t think of anything better, but, thanks to your beautiful drawing, you’re helping me to see why I don’t like this form. The terminal curl brings your eye back to the left stem - - just where it shouldn’t be in left-to-right reading. I like that the Giessener Zeitung illustrates the Lozos method. I still think the upper left hand curve is too sharp, but I haven’t had the opportunity to experiment myself yet. I wonder who designed the GZ glyph?

“Jos and Chris, I wonder if for both of your designs, the upper left hand curve can’t start a little sooner? But maybe that wouldn’t work?”
Bill, my dilemma with that is fitting with other caps. As a concept, it is fine and may work with a very wide light face with open spacing. The compared busy look of the righthand side seems a bit awkward to space with the faces I have been working on. I suspect a higher contrast roman may be a better place to try it. I think the basic form agreed upon at some point in the future by German speakers will hopefully allow for a plethora of typographic styles already in use. I refer to the beginning point and severity of the curve being left open to suit the design as opposed to mandatory for all typefaces.

ChrisL

>fitting with other caps

Chris, when you say fitting here, are you worried about space, or consistency of form or both?

>as opposed to mandatory

You’re absolutely right Chris. The less mandatory the better.

Type is an inherently rigid mode of expression. We don’t need to make it more so. I dislike the little rules that parvenus and the insecure are so addicted to. The mentality that causes Type Guru A to tell Zapf that he can’t design a sterling sign with two bars. In the first place, Guru A is historically wrong. In the second place, nobody cares if he’s right outside of management who paid him and now has proof he’s worth it, third, it’s rude, fourth it’s too silly to think about, fifth it’s typographically irrelevant and sixth, even if it were, Zapf’s view is more important than Type Guru A’s. (tragic example drawn from real life)

It’s natural in a craft to want to have rules, to want to make rules. Learning the rules is one of the ways you learn the craft. But rulemaking, like power, corrupts! I want never to fall into this trap. Thanks for the reminder!

Not rules, but standards.

I experimented with different approaches...
http://typophile.com/node/33647

...but came to the conclusion that the one in the Andreas Stötzner proposal was best:
http://std.dkuug.dk/jtc1/sc2/wg2/docs/N3227.pdf
After all, it’s his baby.

But in the future, for other faces, I might change my tune. Having a standard is a good place to start, it will lessen the perplexity of those readers exposed to this “new” thing, and it will mean that designers who go their own way better have a good reason.

I like Toshi’s approach for an old-style (antiqua), shown above in this thread.
Having alternate forms suggests a richness, diversity, and history, which is something you get with other, well-established characters.

I did several rough sketches for a capital Eszett for my font and sent a picture of them in between other capitals to a friend of mine in Germany who then showed it around to a lot of his friends. They aren’t design freaks, but most all were graduate students so I figure they were using their brain in picking.

Anyways, after roughly tabulating their votes between “yes” “no” and “maybe but not really” or “maybe” etc. I came up with this conclusion (sorry for scrolling):

I attempted to do every variation I could think of so I could see what elements worked and what didn’t (the first one is of course the lowercase. It seems like the gamma top corner would be slightly more recognizable though not overwhelmingly so. Descenders were generally acceptable (the full curved descender matches the J in this font). Oddly enough (to me) the one after the C was seen more favorably than the following one (after Y) which i thought would have been more recognizable and preferred.

Variety of forms will be nice, I think the lc eszett has the most varying forms I can think of for a latin letter so it makes sense the uppercase will be equally as complex.

«El futuro es una línea tan fina que apenas nos damos cuenta de pintarla nosotros mismos». (La Luz Oscura, por Javier Guerrero)

Also here’s my Sutterlin and fraktur attempts. (I don’t have a sutterlin font yet I’ve worked on so it’s just outline sketches in OmniGraffle)

Of courrse neither were ever used in all caps so their design is totally moot but it’s interesting to think how they might have been formed. There are some other possibilities like doing a double S but in Sutterlin that looks like an M when written. The fraktur could likely go the opposite, with a long left stem down and a shortened Z.

«El futuro es una línea tan fina que apenas nos damos cuenta de pintarla nosotros mismos». (La Luz Oscura, por Javier Guerrero)

Ralf, I like your variation but I think you worry too much about B-ness. Character differentiation at small sizes is an issue in itself, one that affects all characters. b-ness, or Beta-ness, is also a problem that afflicts many of the badly designed lowercase esszet glyphs of the past ...

After looking again at all the designs made by designers from outside Germany, I must bring up the B-ness problem again. It is true that the similarities between between ß and β are no problem at all, because they will usually never appear in the same context. But B and the Capital Sharp S will appear in the same context all the time, when German texts are set in uppercase letters. And even worse: This can easily change the meaning of the text. For example: “groß” (big) is used all the time. But if you set it in uppercase letters and the Capital Sharp S is used, you can easily read is as “grob”, which means rude/crude/gross.
So it is really necessary to have a clear distinction between B and the Capital Sharp S. An increased width* might be one way to achieve this, but there might be other ways. Looking at the examples in this thread, I don’t think we have a sufficient solution yet.

*) I don’t think the design of the Capital Sharp S (or any other letter) requires certain proportions in a non-geometric typeface. What “feels right”, is just what we are used to. But since we are creating a new letter here, we can make up the proportions that will feel right in the future.

...designs made by designers from outside Germany...

I don’t accept that inference.
My designs follow the Stötzner model.

But continuing your line of thought Ralf, note that the feature of my glyphs which Bill has criticized—the “terminal curling back”—actually serves to disambiguate the letter from what could otherwise be interpreted as a “stencil” version of B at the bottom.

Really no offence indended. Note that I said that in my opinion WE (all) haven’t found a sufficient solution yet.
Actually I wouln’t be surprised if someone outside Germany would find the best shape. We Germans might not to see the wood for the trees. I just wanted to point out problems such as “grob” vs. “groß”, which might not be as obvious for designers who don’t speak the language.

This is greatly a problem with adding a new glyph when the others have been around for centuries. We can also confuse a P for an R or an R for a B but we won’t because we are quite used to them for years. The proposed cap Eszett form with a curve on the upper left is the only non-circular cap letter to have a curve in this position except the S (discounting G, C, O and Q as circular forms). The distinguishes it from the B as well as anything else. I don’t think proportions can be dependable a solution for distinction given the variability that we already have. Think of a condensed/compressed cut sans like Univers or Compacta and a widened cap form in one letter would just stick out too much and stop reading.

ChrisL

...no offence indended...

None taken.
IMO, Stötzner’s solution, as presently in the Unicode chart, is OK.
One alternate (see Toshi’s example, above) is OK for old-style.
And other treatments, such as Matthew’s, are worth pursuing.

There is a problem with the Stötzner model, however.
Not the basic shape (I agree with Chris’ rationale), but the way that the stress is rendered, which doesn’t conform to a simple broad-pen paradigm.
The top half of the right side is “reverse” stressed, as in Z, but the bottom half is normally stressed, as in B.
These two differing stress treatments are perhaps too close together.
So really it’s up to type designers to resolve this issue.
In Beaufort (see my Sept. 5 post), I followed consistent stress angle and made the diagonal thin in the Light weight, but somehow that didn’t work for me in the Bold weights.
There’s lots of scope for designers to tailor their cap-eszett glyphs to their typefaces.

Interesting discussion. I’ve been playing with different forms for my font Eternal (see in the serif critique section if you’re interested) and wonder if anyone can shed any light on my drafts for the capital eszett. You can probably tell it’s not a letter I use!
The angular bit seems to my eye to need to be thin, as the curve and the stem are both heavy. I tried both ways, which ones are best?

I rather like 1 and 7, but I think 1 might be a bit too dynamic. Because the R and 5 push upwards (tho not the B interestingly) I prefer the ones that have a slight upward swing on the top (1, 6, 7). Does your uc J descend? What would a combination of the left stem and top part of 7 look like with the lower part of 1? Number 4 the smaller S is just a bit too obvious to my eye. I think 5 or 6 would be a more “conservative” form if we can use that term yet :)

«El futuro es una línea tan fina que apenas nos damos cuenta de pintarla nosotros mismos». (La Luz Oscura, por Javier Guerrero)

I have attempted both ways, thinning the first version to make it not too dynamic, and combining the bits you suggested (though the stress is not really right on the infacing curve).
5 and 6 in my last post look kind of Cyrillic to me.

I don’t find the use of what is clearly a lower-case-sized s in the capital eszett design at all convincing. It’s pleasing to the eye, but it just doesn’t feel like a capital letter to me! So something like version 5 or 6 works better to my eye, even though it is not as pleasing a design.

Cheers,

T

I’m with Thomas on no. 5, except that I also think it’s the most pleasing. For what it’s worth I also strongly support the non-chirographic elements of the design.

Thanks for your comments. It is a hard thing to go with a less pleasing design because it fits with the other letters, but I guess that’s where the balance has to be brought in.
I fear it’s a case of “a beautiful collection of letters, not a collection of beautiful letters.”
I’ll keep tinkering!
:)

I like 5 and 6.
A.

I don’t think it’s possible to adequately appraise the choices without seeing them set in words.