Install Font with missing families?

[Number9]

Sorry for disturbing you, but I have to ask. I loaded Literata in to my H2O, but it doesn't look anything like those screenshots above! When I use "document default" the book looks just fine, but when I choose Literata, it's just ugly! I'm new to this stuff so I might have done something wrong. But I have the fonts in a folder called "fonts" in the root of the Kobo. Please help!

[hvas]

You might not like unhinted Literata but it's objectively closer to the glyphs of the actual font. The hinted version is weirdly squished to align to a different kind of screen than e-ink.

Originally Posted by GERGE

Again though it all comes down to personal preference. Also it's a lovely new font that I hope ends up replacing Georgia on e-readers.

[GERGE]

That is a serious problem, everyone who is learning about typography first learns this: a typeface is a beautiful collection of letters, not a collection of beautiful letters. Using hints meant for computers disrupt the glyphs on the eink screens. And, worse yet, it changes every glyph differently. This is why you should not use them. It destroys uniformity of the type.

[GERGE]

Originally Posted by Jellby

But then, if the problem is that hinting algorithms developed for LCD or CRT screens are not good for e-ink screens, you can't show that with a screenshot like that.

I thought so too, at first. But screenshots taken by Kobo devices are almost completely have the same letterforms as what I see on the device itself. I don't know what kind of system they are using but letter forms are almost the same. (strangely, i letter is distorted on the unhinted screenshot.)

So, screenshots are not useless.

[howyoudoin]

Originally Posted by hvas

Again though it all comes down to personal preference. Also it's a lovely new font that I hope ends up replacing Georgia on e-readers.

There's no reason why the two fonts can't co-exist!

[Jellby]

Originally Posted by hvas

You might not like unhinted Literata but it's objectively closer to the glyphs of the actual font.

There I agree. The unhinted version seems to be rendered closer to the "real" version. But that's something half-expected. Hints are intended to make all vertical stems the same with, for instance, while with no hints the system will simply try to approach the "true" shape.

Originally Posted by GERGE

I thought so too, at first. But screenshots taken by Kobo devices are almost completely have the same letterforms as what I see on the device itself. I don't know what kind of system they are using but letter forms are almost the same. (strangely, i letter is distorted on the unhinted screenshot.)

Then the problem, if there is any, is with the hinting algorithm itself, and not with the nature of the screen. Maybe they changed the renderer to better fit the eink screen, or maybe that's just the way it is. How do the two versions render in a computer, at similar pixel size?

So, screenshots are not useless.

They are useless to show the difference between screens. Initially it was said (or that's what I interpreted) that the hinting methods used for LCDs are not valid for eink, because they are physically different. A screenshot cannot show that, a photo can.

Of course, subpixel rendering techniques that rely on the display structure are useles in eink, unless there's some method especifically tuned for that.