Variable Fonts on the Web at TYPO Labs
I’m currently on my way home from a pretty spectacular few days in Berlin for TYPO Labs. There’s far too much to cover in just one post, but I had the distinct pleasure of being part of a trio of talks that focused very much on variable fonts on the web and I’d like to link those together here.
There were some other interesting tidbits about the concurrently-held W3C CSS Working Group meeting and the significant presence of all the major browser teams, but first the videos.
Responsive, dynamic, interactive, reactive, variable: How can type influence how we design written communication?
The first was from Bianca Berning (type designer, font engineer, and among many other things an active member of Alphabettes—more about Bianca here) and is an insightful look at how we communicate, and that has evolved (or perhaps hasn’t) as we have shifted from paper to screens. She raises some very important points, and calls on all of us to be more thoughtful and indeed experimental as we continue to evolve the practice and application of typography. While there is much we want to preserve from our printed past, Bianca encourages us to not let that be our only litmus test, but rather keep what’s successful while continuing to explore how we can take advantage of what screens and devices can offer to make reading, learning, and comprehension even better.
I was up later that afternoon on the first day, and thankfully had time to think more about Bianca’s and others’ excellent presentations and try to connect some of the threads.
Variable Fonts and the Future of Typography
In this new talk I try to look at not just how variable fonts work and what they can do, but rather try and put into context themes about how we have held up notions of ‘one ideal solution’ over the years. From Beatrice Warde’s Crystal Goblet putting forth the notion that the perfect typography presents its content without color or distortion; to our current ‘best practice’ of using design systems to represent any and all content on our sites; to thinking that news content itself maintains all of the authority, authenticity, and voice when stripped of the typographic style and presentation and presented equally with all other stories. Variable fonts can play an important role in taking our current best practices and pushing them considerably further, and could potentially help enable a future where that content can travel with its voice. (You can see more of my writing here on Medium or find out more about my past and upcoming speaking engagements on my website)
The next morning (bright and extremely early, especially by Berlin standards), Laurence Penney took the stage to remind everyone at this, a very type-centric event, that we have to continually engage with the wider web world in order to ensure that the true value and potential of variable fonts continue to develop and spread.
Beyond the bubble: Talking to web designers about variable fonts
Laurence talked about his experiences both speaking at web conferences and witnessing the reactions of web designers, and from feedback he gets from users of his eponymous variable font playground site Axis-Praxis.org.
In truth, there were many more talks worth mentioning and watching from this year’s event. More will be written I’m sure, and if you’d like to go explore them yourself you can find them all on the TYPO Labs site and collected in a channel with videos from past events on YouTube.
Observations: CSS Working Group and other noted sightings
Monotype made the decision to host the W3C’s CSS Working Group ‘Face to Face’ meeting during the same week, and I had the good fortune to be able to sit in for an afternoon of discussion about various text handling and variable font implementation issues. It was truly a great experience, and I’m certainly looking forward more opportunities to help and collaborate. It was also great to see Rich Rutter (author of Web Typography and organizer of the always-excellent Ampersand conference) there representing the voice of the type (and web typography) community. The members of the working group also gave an update on what was discussed to all the conference attendees.
Another observation that stood out to me as particularly significant was the presence of all the major browser vendors: Microsoft, Mozilla, Chrome, and Apple (Webkit). And this has been true at every type conference I’ve attended in the past 2 or 3 years. Coupled with comments from CSS WG members about their focus shifting more heavily to typography this year and it certainly bodes well for the web as a whole. Indeed Jürgen Siebert highlighted the extraordinary level of crossover and collaboration between the type community and the web design and development one, and announced that they will be expanding on that even more next year.
A huge thank-you to the organizers, speakers, and attendees for making this a truly memorable event.
