![]() ![]() These fonts are so common that most computer users think of them as free, but the reality is that Verdana, for example, is probably the most expensive, labor-intensive font ever produced. ![]() This is the reason that webpage designers have long been more or less limited to a dozen or so fonts (Verdana, Georgia, Arial, etc.) that have been fine-tuned by hand so that typical text sizes (9–14pt) display well at low resolutions. And although there has been much discussion about high-definition computer monitors for decades, the fact of the matter is that my 5 year old mobile phone still takes photos with finer detail than my brand new computer can show on its screen. The letterforms are designed and stored as outlines, mathematically perfect lines and curves which look great at high resolutions, but can be distorted or even illegible when converted into groups of pixels, the on-or-off dots that make up a computer’s display. The problem is that typical modern fonts are not designed primarily for the 72–96 dpi resolution of computer screens, but for the much higher 1,200+ dpi resolution of print media. Now, almost 20 years later, hinting seems to be more relevant than ever. I have been designing type since the early 1990s, and for as long as I can remember, type designers have been saying that hinting would soon be made obsolete by new advances in hardware and software. Hinting, or screen optimising, is the process by which fonts are adjusted for maximum readability on computer monitors.
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