Perfecting the characters

[larsenwork]

I'm revisiting many of the curved characters...any thoughts/feedback?

[larsenwork]

Some of the updated characters

[larsenwork]

new tilde and t

[larsenwork]

Some of the capital letters

[larsenwork]

Further tweaking

[larsenwork]

Less rounded D, new terminal on J and narrower S

[jdittrich]

do you have some images with comparisons or the like? I’d like to help with feedback, but without knowing the character styles by heart it it is difficult :)

[larsenwork]

Thanks for your interest:) I think most of them (if not all) are merged into the default font now but I'll add comparisons to new images I might upload

[inferno986return]

Would love comparisons. These glyphs do look lovely, but it's hard to tell if they are an improvement over the original.

[larsenwork]

yeah, sorry about that - they were improvements - I didn't take screenshot of the old ones.

hnm: top right part of curved looked a bit thin + not round
t: bottom left part of curve was too thin + lower point was to far to the right (=> looked like the t was falling to the left)
tilde: the curves flow more "effortlessly" now
BDPR: more perfectly rounded and maybe a bit more boxed look
U: the bottom left and right part of the curve was too thin
J: the curved opened up too much before
S: can't remember what I fixed here.... :)

I will post before:after comparisons on future adjustments ;)

[inferno986return]

A description is better than nothing. Thanks.

I look forward to seeing more comparisons as this typeface develops.

[larsenwork]

a more playful l with hook

OLD

NEW

Interrobang

V1

V2

[davelab6]

I compared this to other DIN designs, and I actually am not quite sure why you say this is a DIN :) Almost all the proportions are different, many of the terminals are very different... :)

[larsenwork]

@davelab6 Hehe...it started out a lot more "DIN'y" and trying to humanise it. What would you call it today?

[larsenwork]

I've thought about "humanist sans serif" but that's just dull...

[larsenwork]

note to self: update k and K...not happy with those

[davelab6]

I think I would call it a RATIONAL humanist sans :) In the first image you posted:

The a is really humantic sans (frutiger et al) except for that totally level/flat crossbar, and then with all the flat-y sided rounds, which are not totally flat, there's a similar thing going on... so its not 'flat geometric' (as opposed to a round geometric like Avenir/Futura/etc) or a 'flat grotesk' (like just published https://github.com/googlefonts/rubik)

cc @EbenSorkin as he might have fun trying to define this :)

[davelab6]

(and that 'rational' personality is core to DIN, so, there's some lineage here, but I don't think it is "a DIN")

[larsenwork]

@davelab6 I'm new to all this but the flat-y sided rounds, the (almost) symmetrical arcs in e.g. u, n and m, the wide apertures and smooth curves is what defines this font to me.
I looked at Roboto and SF and felt they were too grotesque and unfriendly and kinda took it from there
¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[davelab6]

Yeah, those are what I would call rational grotesks

[larsenwork]

@davelab6 yep...the good thing about calling it a "Something DIN" is the SEO/marketing aspect even if some other term might be technically more correct. I asked on Twitter the other day and Marcus' reply kinda confirmed my suspicion: https://twitter.com/larsenwork/status/620854141338931200

[larsenwork]

currently improving some letters, left = old, right = new

[davelab6]

k improved with a higher leg. The change in the s is subtle, probably good :) Great to see you active again :D

[larsenwork]

cheers, and happy new year! I've been crazy active - just not so much with spare time projects 😄