A Word About Typesetting
January 24th, 2010
On Sunday afternoons my thoughts often turn to type. And when one thinks of type, it’s natural to consider the typefaces of one’s own blog. (How’s that for a polite-yet-heavy-handed introductory paragraph?)
The advances in typography on the web were one of the major influences on my decision to come back to blogging. Nobody reads my site, so the content part is easy. Choosing fonts, however, proved much more difficult.
In the end I chose to keep it pretty conventional—FF Meta for the body and FF Meta Serif for the headers. Though I feel a little like I’m cheating on my new favorite serif Skolar, it’s hard to argue with how balanced FF Meta and FF Meta Serif look together. I’m particularly happy with the FF Meta body copy. Its readability is a huge plus and its humanist touches and x-height add a lot of personality to what is otherwise a pretty boring layout.
The blue headers—another dash of personality in a minimalist setting—came from eating Berry Blue Jelly Bellies. I’m making the rest of the design up as I need it.
With less time to play music than I’ve had in the past and with all of my old bandmates in Arizona or hungover and facedown in a gutter somewhere (or, in your case Gentry, both), type has become one of my few passions. Typography is like your cell phone: it rubs up against your life in so many ways that you take it for granted until it goes bad. And though I’m not a master (or even a competent) typesetter, I take dark pleasure in knowing the names and histories of the fonts I see throughout the day and sharing that information very loudly with those around me.
Does this type-arrogance make me better than you? Probably not, unless you set “type-arrogance” in something confident and strong like Tungsten. And then? Well in that case I ask only this: did you look at this page and say, “Wow, Zach! Great use of FF Meta!”
I didn’t think so.