It is considered as the most abstract form of the letter-alphabet. These fonts impress with their simplicity and large usability.
The main feature of the sans serif is the lack of any serif (in French “sans” means without). This font was created at the beginning of the nineteen century, but it took almost a hundred years to gain the popularity it deserved. Some examples of slab serif are: Rockwell, Memphis, Figaro & Excelsior. There are five different subcategories: Egyptienne, Clarendon, Italienne, Latin & Tuscan. The serifs are square and larger the same line weight and the serifs are usually perpendicular on rectangular ends. The influence of the Modern style is powerful, but these fonts have other features that make them stand out. Some of the most important exponents of this kind of types are: Century, Bodoni, Didot & Bookman. The Modern fonts have appeared in the eighteen century, the creators being the Didone group which was based in France and the Italian printer Giambattista Bodoni. These fonts have very strong features: thin horizontal strokes but thick vertical ones, extreme contrast between strokes, serifs aren’t rounded and joined vertically. Rounded serifs are more formal than Old Style, but less formal than Modern.īy far the most used font from this family is Times New Roman. This type of fonts can be recognized by its characteristics: the majuscules and the ascenders of the lower case are on the same line, breaks are oblique or horizontal, and the axis is slightly oblique or horizontal. Some of the most used fonts in this category are: Garamond, Minion Pro, Palatino, Centaur & Bembo.Īs the name states it is a transition element between Old style and Modern fonts.
It is characterized by the low/moderate contrast between thick and thin strokes and the serifs are usually rounded. Some specialists consider Old style to be a synonym of Garalde, other consider Garalde as being a category of Old style (together with Venetian). This type of font was designed by the printers of the Renaissance and it takes up many Roman elements. This might seem kind of unimportant at first glance, but it is used in CSS as a measuring unit (mostly because the lowercase letter “x” has no ascenders or descenders). “x” height … is the height of lowercase letter “x”.
Sans serif, as you must have figured out, is the lack of those strokes the characters have a prominent cut.ħ. Serif … is the extra stroke of the letters. Unfortunately, not many know what the true distinctions are:Ħ. We may all discuss the classification of serif fonts and sans serif. It is determined by the top of “b”, “d”, “f”, “h”, “k”, “l”, “t” lowercase. Descender … is the part of the “g”, “j”, “p”, “q”, “y” letters that is situated bellow the baseline.ĥ. Meanline … is the horizontal line determined by the top extremities of the majority of lowercase letters as “a”,”c”, “e”, “x”.Ĥ. It can have the same height with the ascender but it can also be different, depending on the font.ģ. Cap height … is the imaginary line that is determined by the top edge of uppercase letters. Baseline … is the imaginary line that is the base of all letters, they “sit” on it.Ģ. Let’s start by having a look at the structure of a letter:ġ. The classification is not what is the most important aspect, the way designers work with each individual and unique font should be. I honestly believe that this debate will go on forever. Some may consider categorizing fonts separately, others may think of it is a common division… The classification of fonts is still unclear, even with the various classes and categories that have been created by some of great type lovers of the years.