NYTYpography

[rhu]

OK, toonhead_npl, here's what I've noticed :-)

The byline is leaded a little lower.

The answer grid uses a narrower set, and the letters are lower in their boxes. Maybe it'll just take some getting used to, but I think the old answer grid looked nicer.

While there used to be "more than 2,000 past puzzles" in the online subscription, now there are "more than 4,000 past puzzles."

Other than that, looks identical -- great job!

As to your comment yesterday, that one of the original problems apparently has been caught and fixed in post-production for a while now, I wonder if you mean the problem I posted on last August, in which the puzzle looked like it had been halftoned?

Comments

[530nm330hz.livejournal.com]

InDesign properly centers these letters on the cap X-height vertically.

Except that I don't think it does in this case. Look at a square in today's paper containing cap E and carefully measure the whitespace above the top crossbar and the whitespace below the bottom crossbar. The letter is now sitting a hair south of center.

And given the choice between too high and too low, my eye is happier with too high (since in most text boxes, if there's extra whitespace, it's at the bottom). Or it may just be that it's what I'm used to, and after a few weeks I won't even care. (As often as I look at the answers anyway :-)

There was an issue where it was using someone else's Helvetica rather than Adobe's so it may be what you're seeing (even though Helvetica is pretty darn standard).

If only. I can't tell you how many support cases we get at work that come down to someone installing two different versions of Helvetica. (Or assuming that Helvetica-Neue is the same as Helv. Or forgetting to remove the Windows registry entry that says "When the user asks for Helvetica, use Arial, even if Helvetica has been installed.") And I still remember the "wart" on the Helvetica "8" in the original Apple LaserWriter.

[toonhead-npl.livejournal.com]

Oh yeah it does look a smidgen on the low side. Still, a lot closer to dead center than before. If it's only the result of ID's automatic vertical centering I'll leave it but if it's a specific value I set I'll probably give it a little tweak.

I meant Helvetica should be pretty much the same as long as it's from a major vendor and only appearance-wise. I've had to deal with my share of headaches much as you describe.

Tangent: Do you remember Bitstream Analogue? You'd type in a typeface and it would tell you what the Bitstream equivalent is. It would always come up with Swiss 721 for Helvetica -- is that font really pretty much the same thing?

[530nm330hz.livejournal.com]

It would always come up with Swiss 721 for Helvetica -- is that font really pretty much the same thing?

Yes. In the early days, Bits started by selling lookalike fonts to printer manufacturers, but couldn't afford to pay the trademark licensing fees. Swiss 721 is Bitstream's "version" of Helvetica; Dutch 801 is Bitstream's "version" of Times New Roman.

Have you played at all with "WhatTheFont" on our myfonts.com site? It's pretty cool.

[toonhead-npl.livejournal.com]

Yup and Identifont as well. The first shareware program I ever wanted to write was one to help people identify fonts. I don't think I realized just how much work it would have entailed if I ever tried going through with it.