typeface-anatomylisted

# Typeface anatomy The vocabulary that turns "this font looks modern" into a claim you can defend. Coles' method: read the letterforms, then say what you see. ## 1. When to invoke - Comparing typefaces that look similar and needing to articulate the difference. - Justifying a type choice from evidence. - Reading a specimen or type-foundry page critically. - Diagnosing why a face fails at small size or on screen. **Do not** invoke to make the final choice (`typeface-selection`) or to combine faces (`typeface-pairing`). This skill supplies the evidence those use. ## 2. Required context - The **actual specimen** at the size and medium of use — anatomy read at 200px tells you little about behavior at 14px. - The **characters that discriminate**: `a g e s t R Q 1 l I 0 O`. These carry most of a face's identity. - Whether you're judging **text** or **display** performance. ## 3. Invariant principles - **Anatomy is descriptive, not evaluative.** "Open aperture" is an observation; "better" requires a context. - **The main Latin alignments are cap height, x-height, and baseline.** Other writing systems have different points of focus — Indic scripts often hang from a headline, Chinese characters gravitate to the heart, Japanese occupy a square. Latin anatomy does not transfer. (Lupton) - **Overhang is intentional.** Round letters overshoot the baseline and x-height slightly; without it they'd look smaller than flat-sided letters. - **Nominal size ≠ apparent size.*