Font Forum

I have a font that appears to be stuck in faux-bold, that is nothing happens when I press the [B} button
on a word processor. The font is of weight Thin but looks the same as Light yet in Font Creator
the stroke width is OK. Any ideas?

Mike

The behavior is similar on the iMac with osX 10.6.8. In FontBook the Thin is shown correctly but in TextEdit
it is always Bold. Command-B has no effect.

On the PC (VISTA), the font is shown correctly in FontCreator 9 and in MainType 3.0
In the Open Office it is always displayed Bold.
but in Word the font behaves correctly.

This behavior is not shown for any other of my fonts.
Mike

The WOFF file for this font works correctly.

This note hidden deep inside the manual might explain it:

Note: Windows automatically adds fake bold to any font with weight set to either Thin or Extra-light (Ultra-light), so better avoid these weights.

Erwin Denissen wrote:This note hidden deep inside the manual might explain it:

Note: Windows automatically adds fake bold to any font with weight set to either Thin or Extra-light (Ultra-light), so better avoid these weights.

Not certain Windows does that, Erwin. At least not anymore. But I don't remember the issue with properly made fonts in the past.

This screen shot from Word 2010 has a series of Gotham set. The styles are indicated at the start of the text string. It is true that it is difficult to see the weight differences for both Thin and Extra Light at the zoom magnification I have for the screen shot. However, zooming in a bit more the differences is apparent. The same differences in appearance in LibreOffice Writer is also true. Likely other word processors as well. In other applications (ID, QXP, and all vector drawing applications, any differences are apparent at most zoom levels one would work at.
@Mike,

Sorry I am of no help here. I would think it comes down to naming in the font and or the OS in use. I have families of 20 and more fonts that work as expected in Windows.

Mike

I have changed the Weight pull down menu item from 100 - Thin to 400 - Normal and this problem goes away.
Maybe I have created another problem elsewhere ...
Mike