I choose the font for the project - PERIOD! . . er that's a > "." <



Maybe what you really are asking is what is the most effective font/size for a piece of work? Ho! How long have you got? How long have I got to answer?

Simply put - and REALLY simply put - fonts, size, colour do set the scene for a movie . . . do add drama and narrative . . . do focus a person attention . . . do demand as much finesse and thought as the series of cuts and edits you spend hours and hours on.

Good question . . tough answer!

Best regards,

Grazie

Grazie,
You speak like a designer. It's all true what you say, but as a writer I am first and most concerned about the readablility of fonts and their uses. As soon as that start to suffer I'll throw all the design stuff overboard. Which I why I so often end up using Courier New, white (or almost white) with black shadow. Impact is another frequent visitor. Lucida Handwriting too.
You did not say readability should suffer - probably because it should go without saying. But with so much flashyness and 3D-fixation going on in the world I'm afraid it needs to be said again and again:
Text is there to be read. If you can't read it, take it away. If you can't take it away, clean it up.
Tor

Torsie . . I don't understand?

Clarity IS everything - UNLESS you want to cast a narrative of non-clarity. Think of the openning titles sequence of "7" ? Yeah? . . I don't think I was arguing for complex stuff . . . I am saying that text/fonts/style are as important in what you wish to get across.

If clarity is needed, then as you say. If I am arguing for anything here, it is to widen an approach so that text becomes so important that it is more than just an after thought.

G

>>>Clarity IS everything

That's what I meant. I wanted it to be said clearly.

Tor

I aviod serif fonts for smaller text. Those little serifs can do wierd things sometimes. So I often end up using boring old Arial for things like sub-titles.

The funny thing is, serif fonts are supposed to be easier to read according to studies.

When working with larger fonts, I then look for style that fits.

Verdana is one of my favorites. I think that the drop shadow is pretty much a must for any font though.

John

I also find yellow text is easier to read than white.

BS! Excellent observation . . . Now we start:

1/- Do you know why? [ lets talk about the development and evolution of the retina for humans as hunter gatherers ]

2/- On what background? [ Good point - is yellow a higher contrast? ]

3/- What preceeded it? [ Ah, more thoughts about the retina here and retinal fatigue ]

4/- What density of yellow? [ Is yellow "yellow"? ]

5/- How close is the yellow text to lighter or darker shapes?

6/- How quickly do you see this yellow?

Intersting isn't it? Point being here is that the more we appreciate "what" is going on, we can make and use this information with an applied sense of direction using physics, biology and colour theory.

Grazie

I find the easiest readability being something that's all upper and lower case caps - don't know why - and I may just be a little odd compared to the rest of the world - but as for fonts I pick on a per project basis, everytime.

Dave

To answer the original question, in general for a light background I prefer Comic Sans MS , buff or pale yellow with .010 black outline no feather, no shadow. For a dark background, the same font, black, no outline, no shadow.

The only thing I have to say - is that I have seen FAR FAR TOO MANY people put text on commercials and billboards that have no real definition from the BG, no contrast from the BG - it just blends right in and is unable to be read. It seems like it's getting worse lately too - maybe they're just are too many people that are out there doing graphic design and video with no real training / experience - or maybe they just don't care. Either way - whatever you do - DON'T LET YOUR TEXT BLEND INTO YOUR BG!!!

Dave

"DON'T LET YOUR TEXT BLEND INTO YOUR BG!!!" . . well . . I disagree . . you know I would . . I just put pale pink on a pale torq background. It looked neat! Wanna see? I guess it is the amount of blend . .

email me . . .

Grazie

LOL! Grazie, you never fail to bring a smile to my face!
You sound like what goes on in my head whenever I shoot a documentary.

I try to do a piece about propaganda in the war in Iraq, and the next thing I know, I'm talking to an anthropologist about who were the real "cannibals:" the natives of Guyana, or the mummy-eating Catholic royalty of Western Europe?

But to answer your questions:
1/- Species that have evolved to eat fruit are likely to be very receptive to bright colors of flowering plants.

2/- Bright yellow is less likely to be found in the background of the average video. White shows up pretty frequently.

3/- See above. You're less likely to have been looking at a lot of bright yellow in the previous scene. Eyes like change.

4/- What density? Why you adjust it until it looks right, of course! (i.e., using the same instrument to measure the levels that the recipient will use: the eyes!)

5/- The right shade of yellow stands out pretty well against either light or dark backgrounds. (I'm sure there's a physical/chemical explanation here about light wavelengths, in addition to the biological explanation in 1/ above. However, electromagnetic physics is not my strong point.)

6/- Hmmmm... interesting. Do you mean how quickly it fades up or fades down, or how quickly the human eye will see colors like yellow? If the latter, it occurs to me that not only would 1/ apply, but many venomous or stinging animals use yellow (Yellowjackets, for example) as a warning device. It seems likely that evolution would favor a quick reaction to colors like yellow to avoid getting stung (or worse).

So how'd I do, Professor? Do I get an "A?"

[Now, we just have to hope this discussion hasn't offended any Creationists out there!]

>DON'T LET YOUR TEXT BLEND INTO YOUR BG!!!

Not to mention those blasted white-on-white subtitles in foreign movies!

Here's another vote for myself. San-serif to avoid all those "busy" lines which add noise on the screen. And "thicker" than Arial which also makes it easier to read. IMHO, Verdana is the easiest text to read in small fonts.

As for colors, you might be interested in a ColorWrite - free tool, which lets you play with color combinations, including auto-generation. Fast tool for finding "good" combinations for text and backgrounds.

I tend to AVOID any fonts that come as part of an operating system. Arial, Tahoma, Verdana, Times, etc. They're all so overused it makes me assume the user doesn't have a graphic design background, and just uses whatever is on the machine as a default. Yuck.

I tend to lean towards Trade Gothic quite a bit. Futura is nice. Rotis Sans and Semi-Serif was nice until TJMaxx and 1000 other places started using it. I dunno, once I see a font become "trendy," I avoid it. I do prefer sans-serif in almost all applications.