Recommendations on fonts for chip design (1 Viewer)

[Max D]

I have found a few threads on fonts but not exactly what I wanted. For people that have done custom chips, do you have any recommendation on fonts to be used, types, rounded not rounded, etc... What makes them look more legible, are there font that should not be used...

Just wondering if people have any strong opinions on fonts.

 

[Ronoh]

There are a million of them out there, find one that fits your theme.

 

[72o]

There are a million of them out there, find one that fits your theme.

View attachment 115553

The exclamation and question marks are great.

 

[Max D]

There are a million of them out there, find one that fits your theme.

View attachment 115553

Working on that, but I am wondering if there is any no, nos in picking a font on something that is going to be relatively small.

 

[chipjoker]

I believe most fonts will work, IF, you design it correctly...

Here is what I mean, Sometimes with thinner fonts and long word/Name and/or multiple words they get lost, or muddied up. Split the words up with more space or split to be upper and lower..
Graphics play a roll also and I find that when you use a white border or red border it looks better.

Find a font YOU really Like and you can get it to work with some of the tweaks I mentioned.. .Good Luke.

 

[Max D]

I believe most fonts will work, IF, you design it correctly...

Here is what I mean, Sometimes with thinner fonts and long word/Name and/or multiple words they get lost, or muddied up. Split the words up with more space or split to be upper and lower..
Graphics play a roll also and I find that when you use a white border or red border it looks better.

Find a font YOU really Like and you can get it to work with some of the tweaks I mentioned.. .Good Luke.

Thanks you I did notice that some font don't do very well when they are curved... I am going to keep trying.

 

[Quicksilver-75]

Fonts can be tricky. Keep in mind that they may look great on a screen but become hard to see when printed to scale. If you're using photoshop or illustrator it is also easy to compress/decompress the font's characters as well as increase/decrease the height of them to get that special font to fit in any given space perfectly.
Another trick for the thinner fonts is to add a .05 - .1 stroke to it. It will strengthen the overall font much like bold will but with a little more control. If you "outline" the text when it's done and still want to strengthen it you can again add a stroke to it but as it isn't text but rather an object you can select where to add that stroke. Outside, center or inside. This is particularly useful for script text when you don't want to close out loops in "L's" and "a's" and such. A drop shadow can do the same thing but with a bit of depth added too.

A good rule is to setup to scale, work to scale, print to scale. A mediocre photo paper will give you a fairly decent idea what it will look like on vinyl.

Good luck!

 

[chipjoker]

I did these for shaggy and we found that some names do NOT work no matter what font you use..
Like the Two But Saloon, I tried more than what is on here and found that these were best, and i am not a fan of any of them..



Two Bit Saloon

Silver Shoe

Saddle Club

Moe's Tavern

 

[Max D]

Fonts can be tricky. Keep in mind that they may look great on a screen but become hard to see when printed to scale. If you're using photoshop or illustrator it is also easy to compress/decompress the font's characters as well as increase/decrease the height of them to get that special font to fit in any given space perfectly.
Another trick for the thinner fonts is to add a .05 - .1 stroke to it. It will strengthen the overall font much like bold will but with a little more control. If you "outline" the text when it's done and still want to strengthen it you can again add a stroke to it but as it isn't text but rather an object you can select where to add that stroke. Outside, center or inside. This is particularly useful for script text when you don't want to close out loops in "L's" and "a's" and such. A drop shadow can do the same thing but with a bit of depth added too.

A good rule is to setup to scale, work to scale, print to scale. A mediocre photo paper will give you a fairly decent idea what it will look like on vinyl.

Good luck!

I am using Photoshop, Ill play around with the stroke, and definitely will be printing it to scale.

Thanks

 

[Max D]

I did these for shaggy and we found that some names do NOT work no matter what font you use..
Like the Two But Saloon, I tried more than what is on here and found that these were best, and i am not a fan of any of them..



Two Bit Saloon

Silver Shoe

Saddle Club

Moe's Tavern

I see what you mean, I have started playing with the chip app to see what it will look like. I am going to play around for the next few weeks and figure out what seemed to work. It is not an easy process and have a lot of respect for all the designer/artist on this site.

 

[Poker Zombie]

The only no-no I can think of is, do not mix serif and sans-serif fonts. Most people won't notice the mix, but those that do notice will think you're an uneducated baboon.

 

[Quicksilver-75]

Just curious. Are you going to be submitting these to a vendor for label printing, for cpc or a ceramic? You may want to try using illustrator and working in vector right from the get go. You can save individual elements and Scale them later for stuff like dealer buttons, t-shirts ect..

 

[Max D]

Right now I am thinking labels with @Gear, and I only have Photoshop, so I am starting to design big so that it can scale down. I have never used illustrator, but it does sound like the official format... Is Photoshop still ok though?

 

[Quicksilver-75]

Yeah. When using ps my personal opinion is to still work at the exact scale you intend to print. The biggest reason is that you can run into issues with artifacts when scaling albeit at those scales >1" they are hard to notice.

 

[Max D]

Ok I see. I'll keep playing around and see what it does... and if I can't get the results then I ll probably hire one of the pro's on the site like you...

 

[WedgeRock]

Ill play around with the stroke

 

[Quicksilver-75]

Ok I see. I'll keep playing around and see what it does... and if I can't get the results then I ll probably hire one of the pro's on the site like you...

Lol. Well I appreciate the good word but I am no pro. It's just a hobby for me and I'm not able to help at the moment. There are a lot of great guys here though. P5 woody comes to immediate mind along with j5 and pokerchipsdesign. But if gear is printing for you he is also pretty awesome with the software.

Good luck!

 

[Max D]

Lol. Well I appreciate the good word but I am no pro. It's just a hobby for me and I'm not able to help at the moment. There are a lot of great guys here though. P5 woody comes to immediate mind along with j5 and pokerchipsdesign. But if gear is printing for you he is also pretty awesome with the software.

Good luck!

Thanks for the all info.

 

[Max D]

Yep...

 

[AWenger]

What makes them look more legible

Sounds like you've done this already, but look through the Custom chip threads and check out the different look to fonts, placement (curved, straight text) denom placement, denom color, etc. The look isn't just about the font itself, but also the spacing, sizing, theme, etc. Also in those threads, check out the progression of the look of the chips & fonts from start to finish. I'm always amazed how input from the community here improves on the initial chip mock-ups. I'd recommend posting a mock ups, showing different fonts/alternatives, etc, when you're at that stage. You may get some good input from others here.

The exclamation and question marks are great.

If you want to check out a very cool, unique example of a font, find and check out @72o's Knollwoods custom chips thread (seeing those chips in the avatar next to his reply above reminded me of this). IMO, those chips have one of the best looking unique fonts. IIRC, the main font for the "Knollwoods" started out as completely hand drawn, and I thought it even looked great that way.

 

[72o]

...
If you want to check out a very cool, unique example of a font, find and check out @72o's Knollwoods custom chips thread (seeing those chips in the avatar next to his reply above reminded me of this). IMO, those chips have one of the best looking unique fonts. IIRC, the main font for the "Knollwoods" started out as completely hand drawn, and I thought it even looked great that way.

Thank you very much for the compliment man!

Yeah I was struggling with finding a font that fit the space and slightly curved orientation that I needed. The only solution that I came across was to just draw the letters by hand and then have them digitized as is. Probably not the ideal solution for some, but it fit with my theme so it stuck.

 

[Nex]

You can't make many general recommendations on fonts, really. Apart from "never use comic sans or impact or you shall burn at the stake".
As to legibility, there sure is theoretical knowledge about it out there but that part really is something you can determine just by looking at your draft from the right distance.
As for professionalism/professional look, there's just too many rules and even more exceptions to those rules. Unfortunately the only easy alternative to that I have found so far is having an eye for good design and bad design, but you either have that or you don't

There's nothing wrong with making your own little font - or modifications to an existing one - if you can't find any you like, but there's a lot you can do wrong in the process. Crafting fonts is an art only few have mastered.

Go browse some font sites and use the custom text preview feature that pretty much every one of those sites has first!