Font First-Aid: Our Mission
Hi and welcome to Font First-Aid™, a TalkGraphics.com supported community service.
What we do: We're always on the look-our for freeware and shareware typefaces floating out on the Web that have busted characters, the entire font is messed up, or there's something else wrong with the characters or the runtime code of the font that stops it from being usable. you've been there, and that certain font you really, really like call the Blue Screen of Death or something, right?
We look at the typeface, decide what will set it right, polish out a few dents, and then put it back on the street as a font people can download and use with the confidence that it's ready for prime time, A-OK.
What we need: We need the typeface, and we need the permission of the person or people who created the typeface. That means the creator must agree to let us have at their font with our members' font creation editors and that they agree that we re-release the font for free general public use, and that a copy goes into our currently empty TalkGraphics Font Repository.
Can we be more specific about this "Font First-Aid?"
Sure, and glad we asked :). There are two general things that can stop a font from being usable: 1.) The characters were created incorrectly. 2.) The runtime code of the font has a bad "page" reference, it's been tagged as a foreign language font, it's incorrectly tagged as an italic font when it's really a bold font, and so on. Recoding the font is not difficult when you have a good font editor, but it the characters (the glyphs) themselves where drawn incorrectly, well, then, we ask volunteers in this Fonts and Typography area to take a few of the characters and redraw them as faithfully to the original as possible. No artwork added to the font, but rather art restoration.
The characters are then reinserted into the font, and the font is recompiled with the original creator's name intact and all that good stuff. Here's an example of a font that is beautiful, but all the characters are made up of straight vector segments instead of curves. We'll get to this one as soon as we contact the author.
Got a typeface you've found that needs resurrecting?
Welcome to Font First-Aid, then!
—Gary Bouton,
Associate Font Surgeon, ABC, DeF., SuperScript, Ligature
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