High-clarity fonts.

[Nik]

I usually work in 12 pt Arial, but even that's less legible than it was, especially when battling punctuation...
;-(
While looking for a high-clarity alternative, I came across these two free fonts:

APHont from...
APH Products: APHont A Font for Low Vision
To download, you must declare user's vision is impaired.

Though not 'elegant', this sans-serif, proportional, TT font is very, very clear at 12 point. IMHO, double-spaced lines look a bit gappy at first...


Proggy family from 'downloads' on...
Proggy Programming Fonts
Care: TT versions do not play well with ClearType, whatever that is.

This is a sans-serif, fixed-width font, so looks typed. It is NOT pretty.

The Proggy Clean sub-family includes a 'slashed-zero, bold function' variant that automatically highlights punctuation. I had to take it up to 14 or 16 pt to match 12 pt Arial and APH text size but, IMHO, smaller sizes are still remarkably legible and punctuation is very clear. Characters such as 1, i, I and l are very easily distinguished, as you'd expect from a 'utility' font, and typos almost jump off the page. The sizing seems to suit double-spaced dialogue...

Disclaimer: Your mileage may differ...

 

[Sapheron]

Times New Roman?

 

[Commonmind]

Courier New is my poison. Not only are Courier fonts -- save the bold variants -- a standard where submissions are concerned, they're also clear and easy to read (seems obvious this is the motivation behind the former).

 

[Nik]

I've just switched some plain-text to Windows' 'Courier', found the beautiful 'serif' degraded legibility during editing compared to eg Arial.

But, where-as I'd laser-print either of those, I would not inflict 'Proggy' on an unsuspecting reader. I'd certainly offer a test-page before giving an APHont ms. to a beta-reader...

 

[Rinman]

So nobody here would submit anything in Wingdings or MT Extra?

Wingdings: Wingdings
MT Extra: MT Extra

 

[Nik]

At risk of drifting off topic...

Oddly enough, a fistful of wingdings formed the punch-line to one of my MMORPG 'Lands' stories, 'The Mage With No Name.'
---

"Ha!" He sneered, "You'll never hold me- 'Ere? What's that?"

"Voder, Sir Mage."

"¿§§ª¢¢¤µ¶ÿ?" It spluttered correctly, "Also known as 'The Mage With No Name That Human Voice Can Utter', you are under arrest for fraud, deception, conspiracy, intimidation, and attempted virtual murder. You have the right..."

 

[Rinman]

Re: At risk of drifting off topic...

(Niceness)

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

You can't use a sans serif font for submissions, though. As Commonmind said, publishers want Courier (or in some cases Times). They are likely to bounce anything in Ariel.

 

[KESpires]

Courier grows on you after a while. I can't write in anything else. I can judge my word counts without having to use the tool, gauge whether I've made real progress that morning or evening, spot typos, punctuation errors, and just generally can produce better work when I know that I'm working in the format that I'll submit in.

 

[Kissmequick]

You can't use a sans serif font for submissions, though. As Commonmind said, publishers want Courier (or in some cases Times). They are likely to bounce anything in Ariel.

Indeed, but you don't have to sub in the same font you write in. Couple of clicks and save it out as courier ( or TNR, many take that too) and Bob is the mollusc of your choice

 

[Xelebes]

Sans serif fonts are good for on screen applications but bad for paper.

The opposite is true for serif fonts.

Serifed fonts were created for the explicit purpose of making things easier to read on paper as the serifs make lines for people to follow. Editors demand it because they know the work will be printed to be read. On the computer screen, it makes it less easier to read because of the raster on the computer screen. Thus sans serif fonts were created en masse to deal with this.

The more you know.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

I'll change fonts when I'm editing my own work, just to give my brain a chance to switch gears. It's doesn't make any difference if they're high-clarity or not, though, just that they're different.

But I'm old-fashioned, and I like my fonts with serifs.