Category talk:Digital typefaces

I don't understand the purpose of this page. Is it to list typefaces that are *only* available in "virtual" (digital) form? If so, many of the entries are incorrect. If it is to list typefaces that have *some version* available in "virtual" (digital) form, then it is laughably incomplete, and probably >99% of typefaces that have Wikipedia articles would qualify. A much more interesting category would be typefaces that have been deemed noteworthy enough to be worthy of a Wikipedia article, but have *not* seen a digital rendition. But I'm not at all sure there are any.... Which leads me to question the relevance of this classification. Thomas Phinney (talk) 04:33, 22 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, this category is "laughably incomplete," and perhaps someone who actually cares about something so ephemeral as digital type will add to it. As for myself, I am mostly concerned with making the "Category:Letterpress typefaces" as complete as possible. The fonts that I have been categorizing are listed in each form in which they are availible (Hot, Cold, and Virtual), but as I am only working on actual foundry type, the Cold and Virtual categories are bound to be only parital lists. The purpose of such categories is, as I see it, to aid someone in tracking down those obscure fonts that are actually unworthy of a full article. Supposing someone were to see a font identified as Cursiva Rusinol, by checking such a list they could track down that it was actually the Nacional Foundry's re-issue of Carlos Winkow's "Reporter." Dutchman Schultz (talk) 05:33, 22 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

You didn't directly answer my question, but from your response I infer that you intended the second of the two options I propose? In that case I continue to object to the category existing. Your argument that it would have information that would serve as a cross-reference to matching metal typeface doesn't hold up for me; that same information could just as easily go in the entry for the metal typeface, no? Or wherever else. I also object to the name, which is bizarre and does not match general or industry usage. If the category needs to exist, it should be called "Digital Typefaces" rather than "Virtual Typefaces." But as the number of digital typefaces is in the tens of thousands (typeface = family, not individual font, else the number would be much larger), it seems pretty crazy to attempt a list. Thomas Phinney (talk) 06:07, 26 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I have created three categories: Letterpress, Photocomposition, and Virtual and have been listing all types in all categories where they are availible. Take Highland (typeface) for example. Not only was it only availible in cold type, but it is actually just a knock off of Caledonia (typeface) and my link will lead you there. This is usefull information. "Digital" is a bad name to use because its opposite is analog and that is not the situation with type. The opposite of virtual is actual. Digital and analog clocks are, for instance, both actual clocks, both are real things that you can hold in your hand and actually exist in the real world. "Digital type" howver is not actual type. You cannot hold it in your hand (like foundry type), nor does it exist on a photographic strip (like cold type), is is the mere idea of type, simply an alphabet with no actual existance. As for these lists, I hope to make a farily complete list of metal faces and, so far as there is overlap, will be contributing to the Cold and Virtual lists. And if the virtual list is incomplete, who cares? The vast bulk of them are knock-offs like Gotham (typeface), pastiches like Verdana, or simply eye-sores like Comic Sans or Papyrus (typeface) and none of them have proven worthy of casting in metal. Dutchman Schultz (talk) 09:43, 26 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I am going to go to the category section and move for the renaming of this category. You don't get to invent category names for an encyclopedia just because you have a preference and want to use a pejorative term that nobody else is using. See also the discussion on Typophile: http://typophile.com/node/102722 Thomas Phinney (talk) 21:01, 6 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Dutchman Schultz said: “The opposite of virtual is actual. Digital and analog clocks are, for instance, both actual clocks, both are real things that you can hold in your hand and actually exist in the real world. "Digital type" howver is not actual type. You cannot hold it in your hand (like foundry type), nor does it exist on a photographic strip (like cold type), is is the mere idea of type, simply an alphabet with no actual existance.”

Dear Dutchman Schulz, I think that you have started a purely academic issue here. Digital type started as such way back in the last century. It does not make sense to rename ‘digital type’ into ‘virtual type’ after more than 60 years. Terms always tend to be inaccurate. Letterpress can be metal type, hot metal type and wood type, but keep in mind that ‘letterpress’ stands for a reproduction technique, not necessarily for the technology by which the font has been created or made available to the market. Nylon prints made from digital type is letterpress too … Same with photocomposition. The word ‘composition’ is connected with typesetting technology, not the way the typefaces were available in the machines. There were film strips, discs and glass grids. In some cases the widths were stored on such media, in other cases the font was analog, but the widths were stored digitally. And yes, there were phototypesetting machines in which the typefaces were stored digitally, but the characters were displayed on a CRT monitor before they were projected on photo-sensitive paper or film. Also I think that virtual / digital should not be seen (or judged?) as an opposite to the previous (analog) technology. They are merely different stages of handling typography. Which brings us to the next issue. The real trouble I have with these terms is that all three terms (letterpress, photocomposition and virtual) seem to exclude lettering templates and writing models. When we really want to understand what has been happening in typography and typeface design we will have to think of a way to integrate these in our way of describing them. When it comes to stone carving or sign painting, ‘having proven worthy of casting in metal’ never was an argument because letterpress or even wood type was not the technology used for this kind of lettering. Shure, letterpress has brought us many superb typefaces, but keep in mind that this technology also had its ‘dark sides’. The old specimen books are full of (illegal) copies, designs of inferior quality and designs that landed on the graveyard of typeface history because they did not ‘survive’. In some cases for reasons that nobody would even question today. Tracking down typefaces to their origins such as inspirational sources, predecessors, previous stages and originals (in the case of copies) shure is useful and needed, but I am afraid that a pre-defined categorization by a small number of roughly defined stages of font technology is probably not of great help here.AlbertJanPool (talk) 09:53, 7 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]