Visual and Technical Aspects of Type

Book excerpt: Visual and Technical Aspects of Type gives an introduction to the rules of font design and describes how fonts and their metrics are managed by computers. The aim of this book is to provide insights into the production and rendering of digital type and to make traditional type design rules accessible to a wider audience. The first part contains an overview of the evolution of letterforms in their historical and cultural context. The second part is devoted to technical aspects of type; topics covered include character metrics, outline font fasterization techniques, and algorithms for various tasks. Finally, articles by Hans Meier and Fernand Baudin provide an interesting view of the progress of typefaces and page layout, and insight into future developments. This unique book will appeal to graphics designers, computer scientists, typographers and desktop publishers, who wish to know more about computer typography.