Hacker News new | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submit login

Funnily enough, many phone displays have much higher pixel densities than notebook, desktop, and TV displays, and thus would have little problems rendering the serifs, ligatures, and other fancy bits of digital serif typefaces compared to the old 72/96 DPI displays from the late '90s and early 2000s.

Semi-unrelated rant: why do many entirely digital web typefaces have ink traps? They look terrible. On paper, they were meant to be filled in by overflowing ink and thus render the glyphs as intended, but they just look weird and bad on a high-resolution digital display.




I’m aware. But when you’re trying to set a tiny brand mark over a photo in the corner of some social media thumbnail, a screen’s fidelity is not the limiting factor, it’s the human eye.


> why do many entirely digital web typefaces have ink traps?

Add it to the many things that made it from the necessary to the aesthetic.


The pixel density might have increased, but phone screens fit less information than desktop screens, so the logo can't take up as much space. The goal isn't good reproduction, but rather improving legibility and recognisability at small physical sizes.


I have written two blog posts that sort touch on this subject. The increase in screen pixel density has had a much larger impact on web design as a discipline than is commonly acknowledged.

https://daniel.do/article/making-noisy-svgs/ (I link to the second post in the first paragraph)


True about the definition, but portrait consumption remains a problem, the horizontal space on the header is much smaller, and many old school logos that worked on stores and websites would end up on two lines on mobiles.




Consider applying for YC's Spring batch! Applications are open till Feb 11.

Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: