Oliver Ker Design

Typeface or Font

I am currently in the middle of putting together my own font that I created back in college. I’ve always wanted to be able to actually have this as a proper ttf(True Type Font) or similar that I or anyone could use, putting that aside as i’ll write about this and the process later when it is finished.

I’ve always had an interest in typography and that using a certain typeface/font will effect the reaction of the person looking at it, but the keywords in the last sentence are typeface and font and I have always referred to them when talking to clients but never realised that there are specific meanings to each word and that they do not mean the same thing.

Cue search on google! I found a few articles on the topic and the history of typography (which I will leave for another day) but the best was an article by Jon Tan which best describes the differences.

Typeface = a type family’s design

If we take Helvetica as an example, Helvetica used in this term is defined as Typeface.

Font = one member of a type family

Think of a font as a variant of that type face, so, Helvetica Bold is classed as a Font. When fonts were created for the letterpress the difference in each size was also a font. Each Helvetica Bold 9pt and Helvetica Bold 12pt are two different fonts, but this is not thought of as much as we can change sizes very easily today.