Typeface Font Creation Tips

1. Fluent Shapes – Clean Curves
2. Spacing – inner and outer White Spaces
3. Readability – Low contrast for display use, high contrast for text
4. Proportions – Ascender height should be as big or bigger than the cap height
5. Kerning – Define a positive or negative different space in between characters
6. Ligatures – Such as ‘fi’ and ‘fl’

1. Fluent Shapes: always take the curve in a natural way.
2. Spacing: The white spaces inside and in between letters are defining the rhythm
3. Readability. Many decisions can influence that contrast, length of ascenders and descenders, the rhythm, the blackness of a type, the strength of the curves and the bowls, etc.(e.g. Low contrast for display use, high contrast for text)
4. Proportions: Extremely short descenders will give a strange look to a text typeface. Even worse, they might not be visible at all anymore. But extremely short descenders can also be a smart decision, while creating a display or headline type. For a text typeface the ascender height should be as big or, even better, bigger than then cap height to give a optical pleasurable result (see drawing).
5. Kerning: When one certain character is followed by another character you can define a different space in between these two characters. The difference can be positive or negative.
6. Ligatures: Such as ‘fi’ and ‘fl’. It’s another obstacle on the road to perfection!