Webfonts

Oct 30, 2011 16:49


It's a bit late for this year, but while building blurbs and such for the Arcanacon website, I discovered Fontsquirrel. It has a large repository of fonts that can be safely used on the web (by a webmaster who knows the correct techniques for embedding fonts in a web page). Arcanacon uses a one-blurb-to-a-page style so that writers can make awesomely-pretty individualised blurbs if they care to, and we don't mind people using specific fonts, except so many fonts we can't embed legally (due to licensing restrictions) so they only wind up working when the prospective player happens to have that font installed on his or her computer. Having a broad selection of fonts opens up so many more possibilities for picking a good font for the feel of a particular game.

The site also has a utility for generating the necessary files to embed any other TrueType font you want to (and legally may) embed.

Embedding techniques aren't 100% still, but the big-5 non-mobile browsers all support some form of font embedding in their current versions (though Firefox still won't use an embedded webfont for printing - grrr).

I doubt I'll get terribly much use out of this myself. I managed to annoy the Pheno webmaster a few years back when I requested the use of their site's secondary font for a piece of text in a blurb - not a specific font, just whichever one they use when that want a contrast - and it hadn't even occurred to me that they wouldn't have a secondary font. I'm not sure that the Conquest webmaster knows the necessary techniques. Random will give me custom CSS for Unicon if I hammer him with very precise instructions, though that's tricky. And then I really run short of venues that might be interested in a blurb I write. Still, good to know what can be done these days.

Edit: I submitted my newly-completed blurb for Conquest last night, with web font files for web embedding. I also updated the blurb I already had in with font files. Let's see whether the Conquest webmaster chokes on them. I predict that the fonts won't be used in the end, but the process should be amusing, and if I'm wrong, I get a pleasant surprise.
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