"When trying to make a point, I have noticed that many folks state they are experts when, in actuality, they are not. I am not one of those people. I spent most of my college years taking design and graphics classes in Colorado, I do freelance commercial artwork, and I work as a font operator at a television station in Florida, so I am informed in what I am about to say.
Before reading “Scale Mail” in issue #277 of Dragon Magazine, I was appreciating the bizarre fonts used in some areas of both Dungeon #82 and Dragon #277. I have even gone so far as to approximate them on our computer at work (not for any newscasts I assure you – they would not be appropriate). Then after reading the reports made in Dragon #277, I must say I became worried. Would they stop using those font styles because of one letter? So I am writing a “pro-font” letter to cancel the “con” one out.
Fonts are crazy and bizarre things in that they have to be appropriate for whatever medium they are used for. One cannot use a font just because it looks cool. For television, the obscure fonts you have used (Wrongfont and Replicant are cases in point) would not work. The audience we produce for would not be able to comprehend the quirky letters as fast as we would have them up (for about 2-3 seconds). For television, plain blocky letters are best.
However, your usage of these typestyles in your magazines not only gives flavor to the areas in which they are used but also they give the magazine character apart from other magazines like it (although there are none like it, in my book). Mr. Loya made it seem that the aforementioned fonts were used throughout the magazine, making it very hard to read. They were, in fact, not used throughout the magazine. The areas in which the fonts were placed were thought out, planned for, and the letters were easy to understand.
Keep the good work, and may I say after five years of playing D&D, and occasionally buying the few good issues of Dragon over the past several years, that I have subscribed. Thank you for finally putting out a magazine we can all be proud of.
Your quality of content has improved greatly, and your new features are well worth the money.
Justin Carmical . Tallahassee, FL"
