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be5invis / Iosevka

Versatile typeface for code, from code.
http://be5invis.github.io/Iosevka
SIL Open Font License 1.1
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Iosevka Fixed/Term: Letter m is too dense, causes heavy contrast to other characters #2581

Closed lf94 closed 1 week ago

lf94 commented 2 weeks ago

Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe. I find the letter m is particularly squished. Visually I find it sticks out from every other english glyph in text. It kind of ruins visual contrast.

Describe the solution you'd like I'd like to see the letter m be less contrasting in words and sentences. How font designers do this is up to them. Maybe it's as simple as giving more space between the stems of the m.

Describe alternatives you've considered I've looked at the variants with the middle stem cut. It kind of helps, but something is off about it meshing with the rest of the font when making the variant change.

Additional context

lf94 commented 2 weeks ago

Here's a screenshot to demonstrate this:

out

AndydeCleyre commented 2 weeks ago

Regarding the short stem variants, can you elaborate on

. . . something is off about it meshing with the rest of the font when making the variant change.

?

Logo121 commented 2 weeks ago

How font designers do this is up to them.

This is really vague too. While Iosevka already thins the stroke of more crowded glyphs like m (more visible on higher weights), over doing it risks making them stick out in a different way.

Do you have examples of this problem being handled well in other fonts?

And while also not a perfect solution either, have you tried the "texture healing" feature in #2081?

lf94 commented 2 weeks ago

I'm not a font designer so I'm unable to suggest anything useful.

Regarding the short stem variants, can you elaborate on

Simply put the m feels like it loses its relationship with n. Additionally opting for the short stem feels like normal/default m is being left as too dense and will never be adjusted.

over doing it risks making them stick out in a different way.

Yes super fair. I was hoping the font designers would come together and solve this hard problem.

Do you have examples of this problem being handled well in other fonts?

I don't. Quickly looking at various fonts I've used in the past, Source Code Pro seems to render m pretty nicely ( https://fonts.google.com/specimen/Source+Code+Pro look at the 400 16px example).

And while also not a perfect solution either, have you tried the "texture healing" feature in https://github.com/be5invis/Iosevka/issues/2081?

This is a feature I've really wanted to use but the terminal I used does not support it and in general it seems like an advanced font rendering feature I'd rather not rely on and instead have the font itself be designed as perfect :) (Which by the way Iosevka pretty much is!)

Thank you both very, very much for the responses. I really appreciate your time and efforts. Let me know if I can get back to you with anything else.