Lucida
 | |
| Category | Sans-serif,serif,and more |
|---|---|
| Designer(s) | Charles BigelowandKris Holmes |
| Date released | 1984 |
| License | Commercial[1] |
Lucida(pronunciation:/ˈluːsɪdə/[2]) is an extended family of relatedtypefacesdesigned byCharles BigelowandKris Holmesand released from 1984 onwards.[3][4]The family is intended to be extremely legible when printed at small size or displayed on a low-resolution display – hence the name, from 'lucid' (clear or easy to understand).[5]
There are many variants of Lucida, includingserif(Fax, Bright),sans-serif(Sans,Sans Unicode,Grande,Sans Typewriter) and scripts (Blackletter, Calligraphy, Handwriting). Many are released with other software, most notablyMicrosoft Office.
Bigelow and Holmes, together with the (now defunct)TeXvendor Y&Y, extended the Lucida family with a full set of TeX mathematical symbols, making it one of the few typefaces that provide full-featured text and mathematicaltypesettingwithin TeX. Lucida is still licensed commercially through theTUG store[6]as well through their own web store.[7]The fonts are occasionally updated.
Key features
[edit]The Lucida fonts have a largex-height(tall lower-case letters), open apertures and quite widely spaced letters, classic features of fonts designed for legibility in body text.[4]Capital letters were designed to be somewhat narrow and short in order to make all-caps acronyms blend in. Bigelow has said in interview that the characters were designed based on hand-drawn bitmaps to see what parts of letters needed to be clear in bitmap, before creating outlines that would render as clear bitmaps. The fonts include ligatures, but these are not needed for text, allowing use on simplistic typesetting systems. x-heights are consistent between the fonts. Hinting was used to allow onscreen display.
Lucida Arrows
[edit]A family of fonts containing arrows.
Lucida Blackletter
[edit]
A family of cursiveblackletterfonts released in 1992.
Lucida Bright
[edit]
Based on Lucida Serif, it features more contrasted strokes and serifs.
The font was first used as the text face forScientific Americanmagazine, and its letter-spacing was tightened to give it a slightly closer fit for use in two and three column formats.
Lucida Calligraphy
[edit]
A script font developed fromChancery cursive,released in 1991.[8]
Lucida Casual
[edit]A casual font, released in 1994. Similar to Lucida Handwriting, but without connecting strokes. In 2014, Bigelow & Holmes released additional weights in normal and narrow widths.
Lucida Console
[edit]
Amonospaced fontthat is a variant of Lucida Sans Typewriter, with smaller line spacing and the addition of theWGL4character set. In 2014, Bigelow & Holmes released bold weights and italics in normal and narrow widths.[citation needed]Lucida Console was the default font inMicrosoft NotepadfromWindows 2000throughWindows 7,its replacement beingConsolas.[9]This was also the font for theblue screen of deathfromWindows XPtoWindows 7.
Lucida Fax
[edit]
Aslab seriffont family released in 1992. Derived from Lucida, and specifically designed fortelefaxing.
Lucida Handwriting
[edit]
A font, released in 1992, designed to resemble informal cursive handwriting with modern plastic-tipped or felt-tipped pens or markers. In 2014, Bigelow & Holmes added additional weights and widths to the family.
Lucida Icons
[edit]A family of fonts for ornament and decoration uses. It contains ampersands,interrobangs,asterisms,circled Lucida Sans numerals, etc.[10]
Lucida Math
[edit]A family of fonts for mathematical expressions. Lucida Math Extension contains only mathematical symbols. Lucida Math Italic contains Latin characters from Lucida Serif Italic, but with smaller line spacing, and added Greek letters. Lucida Math contains mathematical symbols, and blackletter (from Lucida Blackletter) and script letters in (from Lucida Calligraphy Italic) Letterlike Symbols region.
Lucida OpenType
[edit]First released in March 2012, this collection includes OpenType math fonts in regular and bold weights, and Lucida Bright, Lucida Sans Typewriter, and Lucida Sans text fonts in the usual four variants (regular, italic, bold, bold italic). The regular math font includes an entirely new math script alphabet inRoundhandstyle, among other new characters. The Lucida Bright text fonts includeUnicode Latincharacter blocks including Basic Latin, Latin-1, and Latin Extended-A characters for American, Western European, Central European, Turkish, and other Latin-based orthographies.
Lucida Sans
[edit]
A family ofhumanist sans-seriffonts complementing Lucida Serif. The italic is a "true italic"rather than a"sloped roman",inspired by chancery cursive handwriting of the Italian renaissance, which Bigelow and Holmes studied while atReed Collegein the 1960s.[4]
Lucida Grande
[edit]
A version of Lucida Sans with expanded character sets, released around 2000. It supports Latin, Greek, Cyrillic, Arabic, Hebrew, Thai scripts. It is most notable for having been used as the system font formacOSuntilversion 10.10.
Lucida Sans Typewriter
[edit]
Also called Lucida Typewriter Sans, this is a sans-serif monospaced font family, designed for typewriters. Its styling is reminiscent ofLetter GothicandAndalé Mono;a variant, Lucida Console,replaced those two fonts onMicrosoft Windowssystems.
Lucida Sans Unicode
[edit]
Based on Lucida Sans Regular, this version added characters in Arrows, Block Elements, Box Drawing, Combining Diacritical Marks, Control Pictures, Currency Symbols, Cyrillic, General Punctuation, Geometric Shapes, Greek and Coptic, Hebrew, IPA Extensions, Latin Extended-A, Latin Extended-B, Letterlike Symbols, Mathematical Operators, Miscellaneous Symbols, Miscellaneous Technical, Spacing Modifier Letters, Superscripts and Subscripts regions.
Lucida Serif
[edit]The original Lucida font designed in 1985, featuring a thickened serif. It was simply called Lucida when it was first released.
Lucida Typewriter Serif
[edit]
Also called Lucida Typewriter, this font is a slab serif monospaced version of Lucida Fax, but with wider serifs. The letters are wider than Lucida Sans Typewriter.
Usages
[edit]Lucida Console is used in various parts ofMicrosoft Windows.FromWindows 2000untilWindows 7,Lucida Console is used as the default typeface ofNotepad.[9]InWindows 2000untilWindows 7,and inWindows CE,Lucida Console is used as the typeface of theBlue Screen of Death.Lucida Grande, as well as Lucida Sans Demibold (identical outlines to Lucida Grande Bold but with tighter spacing of numerals), were used as the primary user interface font inApple Inc.'sMac OS Xoperating system untilOS X Yosemite,as well as many programs includingFront Row.[citation needed]Lucida is also used in the logo forAir Canada.A collection of Lucida variants are included in the Oracle JRE 9.[11]Lucida Calligraphy was used in the logo forGladden Entertainment.
In April 2012, Lucida Sans was selected by GfK Blue Moon as the font for a package design as part of a proposed law inAustraliabanning logos on cigarette packaging. The proposed law requires cigarettes to be sold in dark olive-brown packages that depict graphic images of the effects of smoking and the cigarette's brand printed in Lucida Sans. According to Tom Delaney, a senior designer with New York design consultant Muts & Joy, "Lucida Sans is one of the least graceful sans-serif typefaces designed. It’s clumsy in its line construction."[12]On August 15, 2012, the Australian government approved the ban on cigarette logos, effectively replacing them with the unattractive packaging.[13]
See also
[edit]References
[edit]- ^"EULA - Lucida Fonts".lucidafonts.com.
- ^Wells, John (2008-05-02)."World atlas of language structures".John Wells’s phonetic blog.Retrieved2008-09-19.
- ^Bigelow; Holmes (11 July 2018)."How and Why We Designed Lucida".Lucida Fonts.Retrieved20 July2018.
- ^abcWang, Yue (2013)."Interview with Charles Bigelow"(PDF).TUGboat.34(2): 136–167.Retrieved20 July2018.
- ^Bigelow, Charles; Holmes, Kris (2009) [1986]. "The design of Lucida: an integrated family of types for electronic literacy". In van Vliet, J.C. (ed.).Text Processing and Document Manipulation: Proceedings of the International Conference, University of Nottingham, 14-16 April 1986(reprint). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. pp. 1–17.ISBN9780521110310.
- ^"Lucida fonts - TeX Users Group".tug.org.
- ^"Lucida Font Store - Home".lucidafonts.com.
- ^"Lucida Calligraphy font family".Microsoft Learn.30 March 2022.
- ^ab"Restore Windows Notepad to the Default Font or Settings • Raymond.CC".2 January 2012.Retrieved2018-08-22.
- ^Lucida Sans descriptions
- ^"Supported Fonts".Oracle.Retrieved2018-08-22.
- ^Boyle, Matthew (2012-04-22)."Consumers Buy Death in Australia's Cigarette Packaging Law".BusinessWeek. Archived fromthe originalon April 25, 2012.Retrieved2012-04-23.
- ^McGuirk, Rod (2012-08-15)."AP News: Australian Court OKs Ban on Cigarette Packs".Associated Press.Archived fromthe originalon 2013-01-17.Retrieved2012-08-15.
External links
[edit]
- Lucidaand TeX(TeX Users Group)
- LucidaFont Family Group - by Kris Holmes, Charles Bigelow(Linotype corporation)
- Notes onLucida,byCharles Bigelow
- LucidaFamily OverviewbyCharles Bigelowand Kris Holmes
- Lucida Calligraphy Text Samples - Thin, Lite, Normal, Bold, UltraBlack
- Lucida Handwriting Text Samples - Thin, Lite, Normal, Bold, UltraBlack
- Lucida Casual Text Samples - Thin, Lite, Normal, Bold, UltraBlack
- Lucida Grande Text Samples - Light, Normal, Bold, Black
- Lucida OpenType font set
- Lucida Bright Math OT
- Ulrik Vieth and Mojca Miklavec,Another incarnation of Lucida: Towards Lucida OpenType,TUGboat, Volume 32 (2011), No. 2
- All Lucida fontsbyCharles BigelowandKris Holmes
- Interview with Charles Bigelow(Yue Wang)
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