Font Management

Dan Seese · Post by **Dan Seese** » Wed Apr 30, 2008 12:23 am

Since this is the Handlettering Forum and all any of us do is handlettering, I probably won't get any answers here, but I thought it'd be worth asking:
What is a good Font Management program?
I've honestly never used one and am sure that my system is overloaded because of the number of fonts I have installed. I know I need to reduce the ones I don't use but also thought a good program to manage them would be important. (I don't even know how to use such a program - I just hear it's a good thing.)
I think I've heard that Suitcase is a good one, but thought I'd check with some of the other signmakers and see what you suggest.
Thanks, gents.

Post by **Mike Jackson** » Wed Apr 30, 2008 8:11 am

Dan,
You didn't mention whether you were on a Mac or PC?
I think Suitcase is a Mac program. I used it on my Mac and it worked fine. As with many utilities, a lot of its success depends on how well you organize them. They don't often like it when the same font is stored or loaded in two different suitcases.

On my PC, I am now doing it basically manually within my operating system. I try to only keep around 500 in my fonts folder. I have a big master folder of fonts outside my Windows/Fonts folder and load needed ones from there. The external folder has thousands of fonts in it.

I will be watching this thread to see what others are doing, too. I am using Omega and it loads around 1000 fonts without a problem. So, really, I only need to add fonts into the Windows system if I need to use Small Fonts, or need them in a secondary program like Illustrator, Word, or Corel Draw.

Good luck,
Mike Jackson

Dan Seese · Post by **Dan Seese** » Wed Apr 30, 2008 9:10 am

Thanks Mike.

I figured you would have some helpful input.

I'm on a PC. I belive there is now a "Suitcase for Windows" version. I don't think it's been available for more than about a year or so. Maybe they're still working out the bugs if it's that new.

You mention that on your PC you do it manually. That seems kind of cumbersome, but maybe a font management utlility is cumbsome too. I don't know since I've never used one. I'd like to be certain that my system is running at optimal capacity and having as many fonts as I do, I'm sure that isn't the case. Also, it would be nice to organize them according to script, display, deco, nouveau, serif, sans serif, text, etc. Maybe there are simple ways to do this apart from font management software but I'm not conversant enough with things to have tried.

When using Word, of course, I don't have need for more than a few of the basic fonts. I use FlexiSign for almost everything I design. I have Adobe Illustrator (CS) which I use sometimes and an ancient version of CorelDRAW, but I find that Flexi works well for almost all my purposes. Took a class from Dave Butler a few years ago on Photoshop which was really good but I don't do much in that program so I've forgotten most of what I learned there and use Photoshop mainly for photo manipulation as opposed to design. So Flexi is, I guess, the main program where I need to limit my active fonts but would still like to have a ton of them available. Got a lot of cleaning up to do.

Thanks again for your input. I'm trying to get my mind wrapped around this so I can make a good decision.

Dan

Post by **Mike Jackson** » Wed Apr 30, 2008 7:02 pm

Dan,
With Suitcase, you can have a basic font set loaded at all times. Then you can go make additional suitcases with fonts divided however you want....Display, Serif, Old English, Scripts, Casuals, etc.....or by A, B, C, D, E and so forth. You get to label each suitcase and organize fonts into them however you prefer. Then, when needed, you go to the Suitcase utility and load or unload a suitcase, or suitcases. Overall, it is an easy concept.

You just have to be diligent and a bit careful when adding fonts to your suitcases, as the program didn't like to have the same font get loaded by two different suitcases at the same time. For example, it wouldn't be out of reason to add Goudy Handtooled into the Display suitcase and also the Serif suitcase. You might have a Display suitcase loaded 90% of the time, then need some sort of Caslon and load the Serif suitcase alongside it. Maybe they have worked through that kind of issue by now and maybe it isn't a problem. It didn't crash the system, but it did cause me some problems when I booted up. It would take a while to find the overlap.

Since I do most of my sign designing inside Omega, I have all those fonts loaded at all times. I just checked and that folder has 1062 fonts loaded. I also checked my Windows Fonts folder. It has 779 loaded currently and seems to be working fine. I have the other folder of fonts outside my Windows directory and I go there when I need to add one that is not currently installed. I just go to the Windows Fonts utility and ADD FONT, then point to my external font folder. It proceeds to list all my fonts and I pick the one or two I need to add for the current job. I add them and get back to work.

So, it is pretty darned clean and simple for me and I haven't felt the need to add an additional utility.

Chuck Davis at Letterhead Fonts might have a solution or page dedicated to it on his web site. Worth looking.
http://www.letterheadfonts.com

Hope that helps,
Mike Jackson