Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

So you think you can tell Arial from Helvetica?

ironicsans.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–70 of 184 posts

Re: So you think you can tell Arial from Helvetica?

#61

Post by killahpriest »

Aardwolf wrote: post #50
ef4 wrote: post #4

I really don't consider myself a typography expert or designer, but I found that easy and got a perfect score. There are obvious tells in almost all of them -- mostly lowercase "s", "c", etc, in which Helvetica is has perfectly level edges and arial is angled. The only harder ones are some of the all caps examples like TOYOTA.

Same here, I had only MATTEL and TOYOTA wrong for that reason. All the rest I had immediately, on the very first image there was 50% chance I had it right and I did a lucky guess, from then on I knew Helvitica was horizontal, Arial slanted.

The way to spot MATTEL is to look at the letter widths. Arial tends towards fixed widths, whereas Helvetica's letters have varying widths.

Re: So you think you can tell Arial from Helvetica?

#62

Post by callum85 »

visarga wrote: post #48
jongold wrote: post #2

Ruining the game for everyone; two things I love about Helvetica — Terminals at right angles to the stroke. http://c.jon.gd/image/3Q0y2u323j3C . Arial looks particularly sloppy with jaunty terminals. It is possible to have a similar grotesque sans-serif feel with offset terminals (see Univers & Akzidenz Grotesk) but they're a crucial part of what give Helvetica its character. - The uppercase R. Has a really strong le…

I immediately got 17/20, missing only the ones where there were no lower case characters. How do you distinguish between in these 3 cases? http://imgur.com/a/NOLoI

A thing that helps me distinguish them is that Helvetica is a bit more decorative with some of the capitals, like G and R. I think the Arial designers were probably trying to make it "even more Helvetica than Helvetica", by simplifying the flourishey/decorative bits, like the bottom thing on a G and the curvy bit at the top of the slanty line of the R. (These are the proper typographical terms, btw.)

Re: So you think you can tell Arial from Helvetica?

#63

Post by calinet6 »

dsr_ wrote: post #52
calinet6 wrote: post #19

Yes, the differences are easy to see, as everyone has said. But the important part is that there's a difference in feel and theme that's not really measurable and identifiable in direct comparison. The subtle difference is far more important than trying to identify the tiny details that don't really matter. And in that sense, this game (while fun and interesting) misses the point.

It's entirely measurable. Helvetica has slightly heavier strokes, which are finished at right angles or closer to that than Arial, and prefers verticals and horizontals in general compared to Arial.

Yes, but why would you use one over the other?

Re: So you think you can tell Arial from Helvetica?

#64

Post by [deleted] »

dsr_ wrote: post #52
calinet6 wrote: post #19

Yes, the differences are easy to see, as everyone has said. But the important part is that there's a difference in feel and theme that's not really measurable and identifiable in direct comparison. The subtle difference is far more important than trying to identify the tiny details that don't really matter. And in that sense, this game (while fun and interesting) misses the point.

It's entirely measurable. Helvetica has slightly heavier strokes, which are finished at right angles or closer to that than Arial, and prefers verticals and horizontals in general compared to Arial.

[deleted]

Re: So you think you can tell Arial from Helvetica?

#65

Post by rexreed »

ef4 wrote: post #4

I really don't consider myself a typography expert or designer, but I found that easy and got a perfect score. There are obvious tells in almost all of them -- mostly lowercase "s", "c", etc, in which Helvetica is has perfectly level edges and arial is angled. The only harder ones are some of the all caps examples like TOYOTA.

Agree that lower case is trivial due to the level terminal edges in Helvetica.

For uppercase, the tip offs are the following:

* The capital A in Helvetica is narrower (more isoceles and less equilateral)

* The capital G has an extra hatch on the right side (looks like an arrow and not an L)

* The capital R does not have a straight leg in Helvetica

* Conversely, arial chooses a non-straight hatch mark for the Q whereas Helvetica's Q hatch is straight.

This image provides a good overview on the capital (and numeric) differences: http://cdn.ilovetypography.com/img/gqr.gif

In the case of TOYOTA where it seems that kerning might different in two images, the heavier strokes in Helvetica should tip that off.

Re: So you think you can tell Arial from Helvetica?

#66

Post by callum85 »

etfb wrote: post #20
reidmain wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is almost the exact experience I had. I got 17/20 and the ones I screwed up all had capital letters. I couldn't see any difference between Mattel and Toyota.

The perfectly round "O" was the giveaway for me. Helvetica just feels more "literal" to me, if that makes any sense, with its perfectly horizontal endings on "C" and "S" and "t", so the round "O" seemed more likely. Mattel nearly tripped me up too, but I noticed that Helvetica was bolder throughout than the Arial equivalent, so it wasn't hard.

O isn't perfectly round in Helvetica. The Toyota logo is modified to use perfect circles for the Os. The real O is a bit rounder than in Arial maybe, but still not a circle. Futura is the one with the perfect circles (for both O and o).

Re: So you think you can tell Arial from Helvetica?

#67

Post by markokocic »

ef4 wrote: post #4

I really don't consider myself a typography expert or designer, but I found that easy and got a perfect score. There are obvious tells in almost all of them -- mostly lowercase "s", "c", etc, in which Helvetica is has perfectly level edges and arial is angled. The only harder ones are some of the all caps examples like TOYOTA.

You don't even have to know anything about typography. Without knowing anything about any typeface, after guessing and comparing the results of first few, I was able to nail 13 of 14.

I guess that anyone who knows anything about typography would answer correctly to all questions.

Clue: I went for bolder font. Also, Helvetica is a bit wider in these logos. After that, I also noticed the clue in C.

Re: So you think you can tell Arial from Helvetica?

#69

Post by jongold »

calinet6 wrote: post #63
dsr_ wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's entirely measurable. Helvetica has slightly heavier strokes, which are finished at right angles or closer to that than Arial, and prefers verticals and horizontals in general compared to Arial.

Yes, but why would you use one over the other?

Because it gives the text a different character on a macro level.

Re: So you think you can tell Arial from Helvetica?

#70

Post by threedaymonk »

callum85 wrote: post #66
etfb wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The perfectly round "O" was the giveaway for me. Helvetica just feels more "literal" to me, if that makes any sense, with its perfectly horizontal endings on "C" and "S" and "t", so the round "O" seemed more likely. Mattel nearly tripped me up too, but I noticed that Helvetica was bolder throughout than the Arial equivalent, so it wasn't hard.

O isn't perfectly round in Helvetica. The Toyota logo is modified to use perfect circles for the Os. The real O is a bit rounder than in Arial maybe, but still not a circle. Futura is the one with the perfect circles (for both O and o).

Toyota was the only one I got wrong: it was the round Os that threw me off. I thought Helvetica didn't look like that, and, well, it doesn't.
Post reply on HN