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Comparing fonts

Posted: Fri Nov 07, 2014 4:13 pm
by MikeW
I find the present compare feature of little to no value. I really don't care about comparing the internal information of fonts. So I suggest having a window that I can add/subtract fonts to that display the chosen fonts. Perhaps also being able to change to preview string in that window.

I would be happy to find out I am overlooking how to do this.

Mike

Re: Comparing fonts

Posted: Fri Nov 07, 2014 5:25 pm
by Bhikkhu Pesala
This is where Tagging is really useful. Just create yourself a tag for comparing fonts, and apply the tag to as many fonts as you want to compare. Then select the tag in the Tag Search panel.
Times.png
Times.png (27.06 KiB) Viewed 20374 times

Re: Comparing fonts

Posted: Sat Oct 01, 2016 5:16 pm
by BraetonRaye
I agree with Mike an editable preview would be great! Sometimes I just need to see how a word or a name will look and it would be easier to choose if I had specific preview with the right caps and lower cases.

Re: Comparing fonts

Posted: Sat Oct 01, 2016 6:39 pm
by Bhikkhu Pesala
BraetonRaye wrote:I agree with Mike an editable preview would be great! Sometimes I just need to see how a word or a name will look and it would be easier to choose if I had specific preview with the right caps and lower cases.
Did you try my method? If you want to preview with specific text, just type it in the preview field in the search results.
Font Comparison.png
Font Comparison.png (16.68 KiB) Viewed 19847 times

Re: Comparing fonts

Posted: Sat Oct 01, 2016 8:32 pm
by BraetonRaye
Ok that works thanks! I also found that I could make a new sample file with more than one word so that is actually really useful too! This is a great program once you get used to it a bit.

Re: Comparing fonts

Posted: Sat Oct 01, 2016 10:07 pm
by Dave Crosby
Bhikkhu Pesala's solution is what I used when trying to decide on which stencil font to use.

By typing in the exact message I would make, it was easy to discard fonts with no numbers, only caps, difficult to hand cut, etc.

Re: Comparing fonts

Posted: Sun Oct 02, 2016 9:24 am
by Alfred
Dave Crosby wrote:Bhikkhu Pesala's solution is what I used when trying to decide on which stencil font to use.
By typing in the exact message I would make, it was easy to discard fonts with no numbers, only caps, difficult to hand cut, etc.
Ooh, yes! Can you imagine trying to hand cut MidDot, JapanKnees or Headhunter? :o

If you have some preview text that you might want to use again but would prefer not to have to type each time (such as "Trân trọng báo tin Lễ Thành Hôn của con chúng tôi" for Vietnamese) you can go to 'Tools > Options...' and add it to the Preview Texts tab.

Re: Comparing fonts

Posted: Sat Dec 17, 2016 8:44 pm
by hlff
Thanks for some great software!

I agree with the request to facilitate *easy* direct visual comparison between fonts.

I do not like the workaround that requires tagging. It should be an immediate feature that, as a user selects fonts in the fonts list, a comparison can be seen.

My favorite implementation of font comparisons so far can be seen in Linotype FontExplorer X. As the user selects fonts in the font list, a comparison pane simply appends the rendering in realtime, no tag selection required:
unspecified.png
unspecified.png (24.77 KiB) Viewed 19698 times
I note this feature has been requested in:

Display Several Samples at Once

Posted: Fri Jan 20, 2017 4:06 pm
by thibaud
Being able to have several samples displayed at once with their own setting for: size, margins, line-height, colors,... would be better.

That way we would be able to evaluate the quality of a font for several usages (body text, titles,...) at once.

Re: Comparing fonts

Posted: Wed Nov 01, 2017 5:16 am
by hlff
Just following up on this request. Does the development team have any further thoughts on this topic?

Re: Comparing fonts

Posted: Fri Nov 24, 2017 4:40 pm
by Erwin Denissen
We're still not sure if this is the way to go. It would help if other users of our font manager would post here as well.

Re: Comparing fonts

Posted: Fri Nov 24, 2017 8:27 pm
by hlff
Thanks, Erwin. I also hope more users join this discussion.

Even if the precise way I suggested is not implemented, my question to you would be: Can you devise a quicker, easier way of instant font comparisons rather than having to tag/untag fonts?

Re: Comparing fonts

Posted: Thu Jul 05, 2018 8:45 pm
by nabsltd
Some other font managers have a mode where the preview text is basically the only thing displayed in the list of fonts, and you can then have multiple columns displayed:
FontDisplayExample.jpg
FontDisplayExample.jpg (235.81 KiB) Viewed 17976 times

If you did that to the preview window, you could have something like the following (with just one column):
MainTypeCompareMockUp.jpg
MainTypeCompareMockUp.jpg (497.48 KiB) Viewed 17976 times

An option for the preview window to show just the last selected font (like now), or multiple fonts (like the mock-up) would allow users their choice in what to do. Configuring multiple columns would be something for later, if there is demand.

Re: Comparing fonts

Posted: Fri Jul 06, 2018 8:54 am
by Alfred
nabsltd wrote: Thu Jul 05, 2018 8:45 pm Some other font managers have a mode where the preview text is basically the only thing displayed in the list of fonts, and you can then have multiple columns displayed:
FontDisplayExample.jpg
MainType’s Print Preview does this.

Re: Comparing fonts

Posted: Sun Oct 28, 2018 2:01 pm
by hlff
From my viewpoint, I appreciate the Print Preview feature, but I would strongly prefer an in-line, main interface solution as discussed above.

I am interested in upgrading to version 8, but this is one of those features I'd really like to see implemented.