sharke
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99.5% of fonts are pointless and shouldn't exist
I'm painstakingly going through a huge list of Google fonts for the headings on my new website. I reckon this 99.5% I've come up with is pretty close. Of those pointless fonts:
30% are so thoroughly hideous that you'd have to be making something look bad on purpose to use them
70% are so similar to other existing fonts that there is really no need for them at all.
At this rate I think I might choose Times New Roman just to be edgy.
JamesWindows 10, Sonar SPlat (64-bit), Intel i7-4930K, 32GB RAM, RME Babyface, AKAI MPK Mini, Roland A-800 Pro, Focusrite VRM Box, Komplete 10 Ultimate, 2012 American Telecaster!
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bitman
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Re: 99.5% of fonts are pointless and shouldn't exist
2016/09/06 23:39:39
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As long as I can still have impact then do whatever you want.
@sharke: I like dogs. what's your dog daycare website?
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craigb
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Re: 99.5% of fonts are pointless and shouldn't exist
2016/09/06 23:52:32
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Since you're a dog walker, Courier seems pretty likely.  I'm of the opinion that, unless a font can really compliment a special theme of the website, then any clean, easy to read font is best. A big addition to the new HTML5/CSS3 specification (or detriment possibly) is that any font can now be brought along with the website instead of having to reside on an end computer. Yay...
Time for all of you to head over to Beyond My DAW!
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bapu
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Re: 99.5% of fonts are pointless and shouldn't exist
2016/09/07 00:04:34
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craigb
A big addition to the new HTML5/CSS3 specification (or detriment possibly) is that any font can now be brought along with the website instead of having to reside on an end computer. Yay...
yay the crap factor websites is about rise exponentially.
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sharke
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Re: 99.5% of fonts are pointless and shouldn't exist
2016/09/07 00:45:05
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bitman
As long as I can still have impact then do whatever you want.
@sharke: I like dogs. what's your dog daycare website?
I'll post a link once it's finished. My current site I did back in 2010 so it looks super dated now, I hate it. It's not mobile-friendly and Google penalizes that now so I went from being on the first page of Google results for the most competitive keyword to being on the 2nd page - pretty much a death sentence as far as Google ranking goes. I'd been putting off designing a new site for ages because I hate the amount of work it is with all that fiddly HTML and CSS and getting it to work in all browsers. But recently someone said "why don't you just use a Premium Wordpress theme?" Thinking that Wordpress was all about blogs, and not wanting to use any kind of "template," I pooh-poohed the idea. However after looking into it I found that not only is Wordpress used just as much for regular sites as for blogs, but some of the premium themes are actually very powerful. So I bought the X theme, which comes with an amazing site builder called Cornerstone. The good thing about it is that if you're willing to delve into the CSS of the theme, you can pretty much customize it how you like. So it's a combination of moving elements around the screen and configuring them with custom CSS. And it looks the same in all browsers. It's been a revelation for me. However it's still a LOAD of work, but I'm enjoying it a lot more than last time.....except for the font hunting part. I hate that. I'm too stingy to pay for a web designer when I know that if I roll my sleeves up, I can pretty much do it myself. However I did pay for a new logo, and I love it....had a run of t-shirts printed and everything.
JamesWindows 10, Sonar SPlat (64-bit), Intel i7-4930K, 32GB RAM, RME Babyface, AKAI MPK Mini, Roland A-800 Pro, Focusrite VRM Box, Komplete 10 Ultimate, 2012 American Telecaster!
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sharke
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Re: 99.5% of fonts are pointless and shouldn't exist
2016/09/07 00:46:25
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craigb
Since you're a dog walker, Courier seems pretty likely.
I'm of the opinion that, unless a font can really compliment a special theme of the website, then any clean, easy to read font is best.
A big addition to the new HTML5/CSS3 specification (or detriment possibly) is that any font can now be brought along with the website instead of having to reside on an end computer. Yay...
Yep the theme I'm using comes with an inbuilt access to all Google fonts, and with an included plugin I can also import the Adobe Typekit ones as well.
JamesWindows 10, Sonar SPlat (64-bit), Intel i7-4930K, 32GB RAM, RME Babyface, AKAI MPK Mini, Roland A-800 Pro, Focusrite VRM Box, Komplete 10 Ultimate, 2012 American Telecaster!
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jamesg1213
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Re: 99.5% of fonts are pointless and shouldn't exist
2016/09/07 03:39:27
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After working as a signmaker for 23 years I used to be able to recognise and name most fonts. That's all gone now. Spent a few years in the early '80's tracing letters on sheets of lining paper from an overhead projector so the boys in the workshop could cut perspex masters from them for use with a pantograph. The days seemed like weeks...
Jyemz Thrombold's Patented Brisk Weather Pantaloonettes with Inclementometer
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bitman
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Re: 99.5% of fonts are pointless and shouldn't exist
2016/09/07 09:27:44
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sharke
bitman
As long as I can still have impact then do whatever you want.
@sharke: I like dogs. what's your dog daycare website?
I'll post a link once it's finished. My current site I did back in 2010 so it looks super dated now, I hate it. It's not mobile-friendly and Google penalizes that now so I went from being on the first page of Google results for the most competitive keyword to being on the 2nd page - pretty much a death sentence as far as Google ranking goes. I'd been putting off designing a new site for ages because I hate the amount of work it is with all that fiddly HTML and CSS and getting it to work in all browsers. But recently someone said "why don't you just use a Premium Wordpress theme?" Thinking that Wordpress was all about blogs, and not wanting to use any kind of "template," I pooh-poohed the idea. However after looking into it I found that not only is Wordpress used just as much for regular sites as for blogs, but some of the premium themes are actually very powerful. So I bought the X theme, which comes with an amazing site builder called Cornerstone. The good thing about it is that if you're willing to delve into the CSS of the theme, you can pretty much customize it how you like. So it's a combination of moving elements around the screen and configuring them with custom CSS. And it looks the same in all browsers. It's been a revelation for me. However it's still a LOAD of work, but I'm enjoying it a lot more than last time.....except for the font hunting part. I hate that.
I'm too stingy to pay for a web designer when I know that if I roll my sleeves up, I can pretty much do it myself. However I did pay for a new logo, and I love it....had a run of t-shirts printed and everything.
Maybe you know this but I just did our web site (and I m no web designer) but I know one and he told me to use Joomla. Joomla has a baby step template called protostar that if you use it will get a humph from those in the know, but you can booger up something that is responsive (mobile friendly) without ever dealing with CCS or html unless you want to. I even host it in my office on a box I can point to. It's not the best but google approves. <link removed>
post edited by bitman - 2016/09/23 11:08:42
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craigb
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Re: 99.5% of fonts are pointless and shouldn't exist
2016/09/07 11:15:29
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☄ Helpfulby BobF 2016/09/07 12:09:21
Hey Bit! The 1990's called, they want their website back!   (Here's one I made two years ago that's a Bootstrap responsive type: http://nwclips.com/clips/pc/home.asp - I'm about to redo my new company's website in the "one page" responsive fashion that will be a little flashier.)
Time for all of you to head over to Beyond My DAW!
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BobF
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Re: 99.5% of fonts are pointless and shouldn't exist
2016/09/07 12:09:55
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craigb
Hey Bit! The 1990's called, they want their website back!
(Here's one I made two years ago that's a Bootstrap responsive type: http://nwclips.com/clips/pc/home.asp - I'm about to redo my new company's website in the "one page" responsive fashion that will be a little flashier.)
I know you're being funny craig, but I find the simplicity quite refreshing.
Bob -- Angels are crying because truth has died ...Illegitimi non carborundum --Studio One Pro / i7-6700@3.80GHZ, 32GB Win 10 Pro x64 Roland FA06, LX61+, Fishman Tripleplay, FaderPort, US-16x08 + ARC2.5/Event PS8s Waves Gold/IKM Max/Nomad Factory IS3/K11U
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Jesse Screed
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Re: 99.5% of fonts are pointless and shouldn't exist
2016/09/07 20:18:47
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The font's a person chooses
Say much about them
I say a font for every man, woman, and child!
I would hate to eat the same font day after confounded day!
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bitman
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craigb
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Re: 99.5% of fonts are pointless and shouldn't exist
2016/09/10 20:16:34
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bitman
craigb
Hey Bit! The 1990's called, they want their website back!
Craig, where did I go wrong?
Besides posting in the Coffee House with the rest of us loony tunes?  Nah, the website works, it's responsive and is still usable on small screens. Those are the main things. It just LOOKS very, very dated (the repeating lo-res background, old fonts, overall style, etc.). But, like Bob says, so what.  I'm going to redo the websites for both my own company and the consulting firm I currently work for soon. I'll put up links so you can see the difference. Here's an example from the company a friend of mine used to work for. The ones I create will be simplified versions like this but using the branding, logo and style of my company and the firm I work for. In other words, less BS and more usable, but the theme's and approach will be similar. https://www.advisicon.com/
Time for all of you to head over to Beyond My DAW!
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bitman
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Re: 99.5% of fonts are pointless and shouldn't exist
2016/09/10 21:53:43
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sharke
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Re: 99.5% of fonts are pointless and shouldn't exist
2016/09/11 01:43:31
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craigb
bitman
craigb
Hey Bit! The 1990's called, they want their website back!
Craig, where did I go wrong?
Besides posting in the Coffee House with the rest of us loony tunes?
Nah, the website works, it's responsive and is still usable on small screens. Those are the main things. It just LOOKS very, very dated (the repeating lo-res background, old fonts, overall style, etc.). But, like Bob says, so what.
I'm going to redo the websites for both my own company and the consulting firm I currently work for soon. I'll put up links so you can see the difference. Here's an example from the company a friend of mine used to work for. The ones I create will be simplified versions like this but using the branding, logo and style of my company and the firm I work for. In other words, less BS and more usable, but the theme's and approach will be similar.
https://www.advisicon.com/
And it's actually very easy to put together a site like that with a Wordpress theme nowadays. I had always thought that by using a Wordpress theme it would be a bit like those old style "website templates" that your hosting provider included, a sort of "drop your logo in here and put your content here" kind of pre-made layout. In fact I'm finding that with the X-Theme that I'm using, I have as much control as I ever did when building a site from scratch with HTML and CSS, only it's way more convenient and there are fewer complications. For example, when doing my last site I ran up against so many problems because of the different ways that browsers handle things like margins and padding in the CSS. What looked right in Firefox would look off in Chrome, and you could forget about Internet Explorer. Even with the CSS framework I used, which included loads of helper classes to keep your layouts consistent between browsers, it was still a royal pain in the ass. Especially when you wanted to move your layout around to try different things. The X Theme comes with this amazing page builder called Cornerstone. I've used WYSIWYG page builders like Dreamweaver before and ended up reverted back to HTML and Notepad, they were that annoying. Cornerstone is SO great I can't even begin to praise it enough. I'm dragging and dropping all of these elements around and moving my layout around as if they were pieces on a Scrabble board. And there are so many cool Wordpress plugins available. For instance, the last time I coded a form in HTML it was a pretty basic affair. I just did a form for my new site with Gravity Forms, it allows you to program all of these conditional rules into the fields so that the form starts off with a single drop down menu, and further fields and options and checkboxes slide into view according to what you select as you progress. It's so slick and dynamic. I would have had to have been a Javascript whizz to do something like that before. Oh I have a video header with great looking headline text on it that I programmed in Revolution Slider to rearrange itself dynamically according to what kind of screen you're viewing on. With Cornerstone you can even choose which kinds of devices certain sections of your page will be visible in. Building a web page has never been so much fun as it is now.
JamesWindows 10, Sonar SPlat (64-bit), Intel i7-4930K, 32GB RAM, RME Babyface, AKAI MPK Mini, Roland A-800 Pro, Focusrite VRM Box, Komplete 10 Ultimate, 2012 American Telecaster!
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Kamikaze
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Re: 99.5% of fonts are pointless and shouldn't exist
2016/09/11 03:18:06
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Jesse Screed
The font's a person chooses
Say much about them
I say a font for every man, woman, and child!
I would hate to eat the same font day after confounded day!
The fonts I choose says I teach. Colouring in fonts for little'uns, trace fonts when they are a bit bigger, clean handwriting fonts for reading exercises. I always want an 'a' not to llook like that, but as you'd write it, same for g not g etc. Free fonts sites are great for my work. My older kids were doing 24 hours time and I had them taken digital time and drawingi the hands on clocks. Being able to grab a digital font made making the activity a breeze.
Working on my control bar. had me looking at fonts that suit size 8,9,10 px, Droid Sans, Roboto etc.
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