Okay! I've fixed up the blackletter issues, and I'm happy once more -- at least, I'm happy for the next 24 hours, until I start "seeing things" again.
I also revised the accompanying PDF of the character set, along with that sample image I threw together -- and so all those files have been swapped out in my first/original post here. It's still not "perfect," but then, it's not meant to be, of course. Indeed, take a look at this sample of three pages from John Aldo's original 16th-century texts, from which I made this font (note that I slapped an "old paper" background underneath the text -- I originally threw this image together for use in another context).
- Alde Fonts (Originals).jpg (535.51 KiB) Viewed 26815 times
(If you right-click on the image here and select "view image" -- or just download the attachment to this reply -- then you'll see the details of the original font much more clearly, of course.)
Think my characters, kerning, etc. are a bit out-of-whack? Well, I'm sure that Mr. Alde, if he was around now, would be very pleased with the improvements I've made on his fonts, don't ya think?
And one of the problems I've had with so many blackletter fonts that are currently available out there (along with other "historical" fonts) is that far too often they do look TOO "perfect" -- sure, blackletter fonts (in particular) might look "old-style" no matter how they're done, but they generally look like modern versions of "old-style" fonts, they're missing out on that "distressed" look, the wonkiness, the weird anomalies, and that's been my goal here all along in the creation of these fonts. I wanted documents made with them to actually LOOK "old," not just be merely modernized versions of "old" -- there's a huge difference between an old person (human), and one who has has a facelift and other cosmetic surgery done all over the place, after all.
There's nothing wrong with growing old, it's what's in your heart, your spirit, that counts -- I guess that's what I've been striving for, a set of fonts with heart, with spirit (evil spirits or otherwise).
PS... In the above image, on the right-hand page shown, to the left of the name William Clowes you see some weird little symbol -- I have no idea what that was supposed to represent in Aldo's original publication, but that's where my funky dollar ($) symbol came from.