Good fonts
I've been thrashing around Form & Function and the DTP magazines/books now that
I have a Deskwriter and expect to be using ATM, looking for good fonts, and
come across many conflicts. Caslon is either wonderful or a collection of
mistakes. Optima, is a great favorite of some Laserwriter users (I like it
too), or "too delicate for use at 300dpi." Helvetica and Times either look
good or are an incredibly overused cliche. There's the choice between
Helvetica and Neue Helvetica Roman. There's the conflict between the
attractiveness of Helvetica (I used to work for Atlantic Richfield, which
seemed to use it for everything), and the view that one "shouldn't" use sans
serif type for extensive text in letters and reports because it's "harder to
read." I find the Stone fonts unattractive (or maybe I'm just not used to
them), though some recommend them highly.
I should add that I'm an unsophisticated user in the sense that I have a notion
of the attractiveness of some typefaces on inspection, but little experience
with extensive use and the issues that arise over time.
I'd appreciate people's observations and recommendations with repect to Adobe
fonts suitable for 300dpi use for the following:
1.Serious business letters–i.e. business consulting, economics and finance,
where a compact type face is important to "get it all on one page" yet one
wants a clean, professional-looking letter;
2.Friendly business letters–i.e. enrolling people in projects, etc.;
3.Proposals, particularly for management consulting and similar assignments;
4.Professional papers for publication;
5.Professional reports of significant length to clients;
6.Letters to mothers, brothers, girl friends, wives, etc.
Assume I want to end up with 6-8 fonts, including any built-in ones that are
fonts of choice for the above.
Thanks;
Confused