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No, I'm not talking about bling pasties... (Sorry, I had to.)
I'd like to compile a list of fonts where the dots of "i", etc. are shaped like diamonds (although not necessarily perfect ones). Here's a starter - OurType's Meran:
https://ourtype.com/#/try/pro-fonts/meran/
hhp
1 Nov 2012 — 1:14pm
Goudy Old Style
http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/adobe/goudy-1/
...and Goudy Catalogue, too
http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/efscangraphic/goudy-catalogue-sb/
1 Nov 2012 — 1:48pm
P22 Johnston Underground.
1 Nov 2012 — 2:46pm
Kabel
1 Nov 2012 — 2:49pm
Warnock Pro.
A great many quill scripts.
1 Nov 2012 — 7:40pm
Jenson Oldstyle also (but, incredibly, not Kelmscott Roman).
1 Nov 2012 — 8:50pm
Mason, both Sans and Serif
http://emigre.com/OT/Mason-Serif
http://emigre.com/OT/Mason-Sans
Priori Sans
http://www.emigre.com/OT/Priori-Sans
1 Nov 2012 — 11:25pm
Diamond Fantasy (Neale Davidson)
Diamond Gothic (Jim Fordyce)
2 Nov 2012 — 12:53am
Jeremy Tankard's Alchemy, Blue Island and Wayfarer.
2 Nov 2012 — 1:08am
Ocean Sans.
2 Nov 2012 — 1:13am
Storm Type's Aichel (triangular), Bhang, Hexenrunen, Libcziowes, Lokal Script, Malstock, Monarchia, Moyenage and Plagwitz.
2 Nov 2012 — 1:38am
http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/nicksfonts/duly-noted-nf/
http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/nicksfonts/spread-out-nf/
Diamond plus…
http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/nicksfonts/posh-soiree-nf/
2 Nov 2012 — 4:54am
Iowan Old Style
2 Nov 2012 — 6:49am
Wow, what a great collection so far - thanks guys. Keep it up!
BTW if the Italic of a face but not the Roman has a diamond tittle that's fine too.
hhp
2 Nov 2012 — 7:40am
What's the occasion, Hrant?
2 Nov 2012 — 10:44am
Fedra Sans, Fedra Serif A, Fedra Serif B, Fedra Mono
2 Nov 2012 — 11:18am
http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/tilde/geometr-231/regular/
http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/tilde/della-robbia/regular/
http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/tilde/caxton/book/
http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/bergsland/abwyn/
http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/tilde/seagull/
2 Nov 2012 — 12:58pm
A system font - Sakkal Majalla
2 Nov 2012 — 1:13pm
Marc, Simon just started giving it away... :-)
hhp
3 Nov 2012 — 3:49am
Italia, also, is like Jenson Oldstyle in this regard.
3 Nov 2012 — 8:22pm
Silex
http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/ourhousegraphics/silex/
3 Nov 2012 — 11:41pm
Damn!!!
n.
4 Nov 2012 — 2:46am
Tallys by Jos Buivenga.
5 Nov 2012 — 12:59am
Sumner Stone's Sator:
http://stonetypefoundry.com/satoroverview.html
22 Nov 2012 — 6:55am
http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/tipotype/quiroga-serif/
hhp
23 Nov 2012 — 8:06am
[Marc Oxborrow] What's the occasion, Hrant?
Probably it’s basis in writing with the broad-nibbed pen.
23 Nov 2012 — 10:49am
I never like curtailing speculation, but it's probably high time already:
It sort of has to do with chirography, in that this is about Arabic, and Arabic is conservative that way. But chirography per se is actually circumstantial here. Basically this query stems from an idea I got from Onur Yazıcıgil's presentation at the New Orleans TypeCon*, an idea that I elaborated in my ISType talk** in June: in order to express the glorious Arabic past of Turkish writing (something admittedly not all Turks are crazy about, but I think it's a key way of defending Turkish culture in a Western world) a nice subtle trick would be to make the tittles diamond-shaped. This would also extend to giving any Latin setting a gentle Arabic vibe.
* http://onuredy.wordpress.com/2011/05/20/hello-world/
** http://www.istype.com/?p=776
During my talk I showed the following image that proposes a quick mod to Carter Sans Italic for setting Turkish:
Quite contrary to the view of some Turks that evoking Arabic would be backwards, my view is that doing it subtly would in fact be... sophisticated.
BTW one "cosmic" thing that happened in Istanbul was that immediately after my talk Fred Smeijers started his own presentation and he was using Meran for the text! :-)
hhp
23 Nov 2012 — 10:41am
Those diamond tittles really clash with Carter Sans's flat-topped ascenders IMO.
23 Nov 2012 — 10:46am
Maybe the tittles can be turned a bit clock-wise and the ascender tops given a shear to match.
On the other hand for text work my view has long been that formal congruence is over-rated.
hhp
24 Nov 2012 — 10:57am
BTW one bonus here is the important role of the tittle in Turkish in diverging from the dotless "i".
It matters:
http://gizmodo.com/382026/a-cellphones-missing-dot-kills-two-people-puts...
hhp
25 Nov 2012 — 10:41am
I'm sorry, Hrant, but you are making something out of nothing, and I thought this during your ISType presentation too. Yes, of course the presence or absence of dot in Turkish matters, but its shape doesn't, and Turkish text looks like Turkish text to the people who matter, Turkish readers, without a design feature that is at once too subtle to be significant and too nostalgically suggestive of something for which there is no nostalgia. It's ironic that your demonstration word is 'sophisticated', since the result looks so naff.
25 Nov 2012 — 1:22pm
Thanks for being candid. You could've done it there too. :-) Seriously, there's nothing better for cultural progress than public challenge.
I admit that comparing the shape of the dot to no dot at all isn't entirely fair. But the shape does matter:
This is frankly surprising to hear from a text face designer. Maybe I've misunderstood this aspect of your approach to type design all these years.
And how could it be "naff" if it's too subtle?
I hate nostalgia. It's not my intent to leverage such a base emotion.* My angle is cultural preservation, especially in the context of possible admission into the European Union. And anybody who thinks Arabic has no relevance to Turkish culture is simply fooling himself. Walking around Istanbul completely confirmed this for me. I sent Alessandro some photos showing how engrained Arabic remains to Turks (for publication in his "mini interview" thing) but I won't show them here lest I steal his thunder. Calling the influence "decorative" is a convenient superficial escape.
* Although I do think that Turks who lean more towards Islam are more likely to yearn for the "good old days". And remember that -at least among some Muslims- the Qur'aan is only "official" in Arabic.
hhp
25 Nov 2012 — 2:33pm
I meant to subtle to be significant in itself to readers. Within the design, it is significant in formal terms, but as a single detail it is too insignificant to carry the weight of cultural implications that you want to load on it. I think there is often an odd disconnect between the grandness of your ideas and a kind of timidity in their application.
As for naff, I was referring to your Carter Sans illustration. At that size, the dots are far from subtle.
I too saw the large amount of Ottoman building lettering in in Arabic script in Istanbul (and also purchased a book on the subject that I have given to Tom Milo), but other than representing an official policy to preserve historical record I didn't see any indication that the script is important for modern Turks who cannot read it. I wouldn't even call the influence of these artefacts 'decorative'; I don't think there is an influence. I saw huge amounts of modern Turkish signage, and no trace of any connection to the older Ottoman cartouches.
26 Nov 2012 — 10:54am
@John Hudson:
I didn't see any indication that the script is important for modern Turks who cannot read it.
Well, the Tagala abugida is of interest to some Filipinos who can't read it.
Also, the overwhelming majority of Turks are Sunni Muslims, and I think this means that the Quran is only 'official' in Arabic for them - thus, while Turkey has mass literacy in the Latin script for the Turkish language, I would expect Arabic literacy to still be widespread in that country.
Even Muslim clergy of liberal political inclinations would need to engage in Quranic scholarship - in order to defend their positions.
@hrant:
I know this should go in an E-mail or something...
I see you've designed an Armenian-language keyboard layout, based on traditional typewriter layouts. I happen to have some familiarity with what has been done with typewriter layouts in the past, and thus I have the temerity to make some suggestions for improvement:
1) As you must resort to a third shift for the digits, due to the number of letters in Armenian, there is no good reason to keep them on the top row. As some Katakana layouts have done (image link), you should place them on the home row (ASDFGHJKL;).
2) Also, as this gives the AltGr third shift a very high degree of prominence in the Armenian keyboard, as opposed to keyboards like Canadian French or Brazilian Portuguese, where it is simply used for less-common accented letters or additional special characters and punctuation, you should offer the option of a reassignment of certain additional keys on the keyboard:
Left and right Ctrl keys -> AltGr
Caps Lock key -> Ctrl
Right Alt key -> Caps Lock
For those who prefer to keep Caps Lock where it is, just moving the Ctrl key to the right Alt key could be another option.
EDIT: I have sent an E-mail now about this to the appropriate party, Michael Everson.
26 Nov 2012 — 6:35am
I kinda guessed this was not just going to be a list of diamond tittled fonts. ;)
13 Dec 2012 — 6:42am
I love Orpheus Pro from Canada Type
19 Dec 2012 — 7:59am
Distefano, Slab and Sans
http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/tipo/distefano-slab/
http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/tipo/distefano-sans/
19 Dec 2012 — 9:32am
Note my comment on this post:
http://typophile.com/node/98965
20 Dec 2012 — 11:52am
20 Dec 2012 — 12:01pm
Oooh! Scary! Biscuits made from triticale, an artificial life form made by combining the chromosomes from wheat and rye!
20 Dec 2012 — 1:22pm
Looks like the packaging consultants dropped the ball on this one :-)
20 Dec 2012 — 8:52pm
As opposed to the old fashioned square kind. I found the joke less amusing than I could have.
11 Jan 2013 — 6:30am
http://www.fontfarm.de/themes/fonts/agendatype/index.php
hhp
22 Apr 2013 — 8:44am
Interesting: http://typophile.com/node/102437
hhp