Favourite Font for Writing

[St Andrews Lynx]

Let's say that you are writing a formal document (e.g., research proposal, coursework essay) where there is no proscribed font for the text.

 

What is your go-to font? I want something other than the default Calibri, and so usually stick with Times New Roman. But what else looks good?

[dr. t]

Garamond. End of discussion 

[TakeruK]

If it's in LaTeX, then it's usually in Computer Modern (default font) since I don't want to bother fiddling with that. 

 

For most fellowship research proposals (i.e. other formal writing), the agency often specifies a font so it's normally Times New Roman or Arial.

 

But for other things I type up (often not for classes though since almost all my work is handwritten, or it's a report so it is written in LaTeX), I often choose Helvetica Neue or Georgia. Sometimes Georgia for headings and Helvetica Neue for the text.

 

Currently, my CV uses Century Gothic (i.e. the main font used in the Ellen show) for headings and Georgia for the body text. 

 

For presentations, I really like Century Gothic and Helvetica Neue. Sometimes a very "compact" font (e.g. Impact) make good slide titles.

 

Finally, I sometimes like to use Bitstream Vera Sans (free to download) because it matches the default font of Python's matplotlib package.

[Between Fields]

We talked about this a little bit in another thread:

 

Basically, it depends on the medium your reader is going to be presented with. Digital texts work better with sans-serif fonts, but print texts work better with serif fonts. The serifs make it easier to tell the difference between letters like 'l' and 'I', and in general make a text easier to read when it's really long. Even a Retina display doesn't have sufficient DPI to make serifs worth-while for digital documents. (And one of the links talked about in the other thread says that they can be difficult for people with visual impairments to understand.)

 

I like Helvetica when I'm in a sans-serif mode and Palatino or Cambria when I'm in a serif mode.

 

http://www.abilitynet.org.uk/quality/documents/StandardofAccessibility.pdf

http://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2013/03/serif-vs-sans-the-final-battle/

Edited October 18, 2014 by Between Fields

[fuzzylogician]

My dissertation, CV, research statement, cover letters, etc. are all written in (an expanded) Palatino that contains the symbols for linguistic characters that I need for my work. I experimented with re-typesetting my entire dissertation in other fonts but liked that one the best.

[PartyupDMX]

Hoefler Text.

[maelia8]

Call me old-fashioned, but i always go with either Times New Roman or Helvetica for official documents. Everything else just seems to flamboyant somehow.

[Cookie]

I use XeLaTeX and make custom classes for everything, and my favorite fonts are Lato and Adobe Caslon Pro. Lato is big and clear (and free!), has many styles and weights, good for keynote presentations. Adobe Caslon Pro makes all written documents look like Shakespeare's.

Edited October 23, 2014 by Cookie

[TakeruK]

I also really like Adobe Caslon Pro, however it's not free

[rising_star]

I have a preference for Garamond or Georgia but I can't seem to convince my students to use it, unfortunately. For official things, I tend to use Times New Roman just because people are familiar with it but I may play around with other fonts on my CV this weekend.

[danieleWrites]

I like Book Antigua for stuff printed on paper. I go for serif fonts, so if it's getting sent electronically, and not a .pdf, I put it in Times New Roman. Boring, but there's rarely an occasion where TNR is inappropriate.

[volitans]

I've always had a thing for Verdana 10pt, but I only use it on emails these days.

 

For everything else, as allowed, I stick to the Twentieth Century font family - they're beautiful to me. And condensed versions work excellent for labeling purposes.

 

Most of my professors have a strong fondness for Georgia.

[1Q84]

 

I think "Calibri" or "Cambria" both are very nice font style of writing. I strongly recommend to use "Calibri" or "Cambria" font style of writing.

 

 

Calibri for me is the absolute worst. It makes me so rage-y that it's the new default font setting in Office 2010 and up, which means I often have to grade long papers set all in that font. 

[juilletmercredi]

I use Georgia.  I wrote my dissertation in Georgia.  If I'm not using Georgia, then I use Arial or Helvetica.  I only use Times New Roman if the agency specifies that's what they want.

 

I dislike both Calibri and Cambria, and when I teach, I require students use a specific font. In the past out of habit I used to require Times New Roman, but I think I will give them a choice (Georgia, Arial, Helvetica, or the standard Times New Roman).  I'm looking at a grant proposal I'm a consultant on right now, written in Calibri 11-point font, and I want to shoot myself.  It's at 125% and it's still too small!  I have to blow it up to at least 145% for it be decent enough for me to read.

 

I used to like Garamond, but it's too small and light at standard font sizes for my blind eyes to read.  Plus the apostrophes and commas are weird now.

[victorydance]

Times New Roman 12 pt. Pretty standard stuff. 

[Chiqui74]

Comic Sans!

 

No, seriously, Times New Roman 12 points.  For footnotes, I decrease the size to 10 points. I cannot stand foodnotes in bigger font!

[isilya]

I love Computer Modern, LaTeX's default font.

[kotov]

Times New Roman über Alles, über Alles in der Welt.