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comment by lil
lil  ·  4309 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Why I created comic sans

Why I Love Comic Sans

Comic sans is the clearest and easiest to read of all fonts available in the font kit. I create activity books for my courses. We work through the material, discussing concepts, fill blanks, and complete quizzes -- all in Comic Sans. No other font seems to have the warmth and approachability of Comic. I'm aware that as the song says, "Comic Sans is the best font in the world/if you want your designs to look like their done by little girls." Scroll down the bancomicsans link for the song.

From time to time, my students mock me and send me all the "hate Comic Sans" stuff out there. Yet I persist. I'd be happy if hubski had a Comic option. As the song goes "To ban it would be ever so drastic/How can you hate a font that's so fantastic?"





achughes  ·  4307 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Quite ironically the reason that designers hate comic sans isn't because it's an inherently bad font, in fact its a perfect font for a many situations, but its total misuse by the non-designer. People will use it on quizzes in business reports, websites or anytime they think that things need to look "more fun".

You never said what courses you teach so I'll hold my tongue, but the last thing that I want to see when I look down at a quiz is comic sans screaming at me THIS IS SUPPOSED TO BE FUN

lil  ·  4307 days ago  ·  link  ·  

absolutely Avoid comic sans on a handout at a memorial service for a dead friend Avoid comic sans on a technical report and so on.

Keep in mind that not everyone looks at comic as fun. I just see it as clear and readable. But, looking back at my course book now, it does seem to be monotonous. Maybe next iteration I'll change the font to something equally clear and readable. Any suggestions? As for my course, I actually confess to it on my hubski bio. btw, what is this font that Hubski uses? Any idea? It's not bad, but the Kern seems a little tight. Have you seen this?.

achughes  ·  4305 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Hubski uses Arial or Helvetica depending on your system (Windows default to Arial and Macs default to Helvetica). And the snobbier students will still give you a hard time for Arial (because its essentially an Helvetica knockoff). After a while every font starts to feel monotonous so don't feel to bad about it seeming that way when your looking back at things. Helvetica is as overused as they come (Helvetica Neue though; now thats catching up a bit).

I can sort of see where your coming from on the readability of comic, but I bet your using it your titles, and its not doing what you think it is. It looks good and in the right place in small speech bubbles but not really as a title (since its based off of comic books). What your really looking for is a display font which is specifically designed for titles and to be expressive (and more readable at larger sizes). Take a look around myfonts.com and I bet you'll find something. Comic was never really designed to be a display font and thats probably why it starts to look a bit monotonous after a while. Hope that helps you escape your students ire.