Download Free Fonts for the PC and Mac

Technically speaking, fonts are a collection of text characters of a single size and style. The characters on your screen or printed page can take on many different shapes and styles. A font is a set of characters that are designed to include all the letters of the alphabet, plus a wide range of special characters. They have the same basic style. They can be normal, italic, bold or bold italic.

If you’re creating a web page, book or slide presentation, here are some ideas to review about types and sizes of fonts before you start downloading all those free fonts.

Font Types
There are three basic types or categories of fonts:

Serif – A serif font has extra tails at the end of each letter. Times Roman is by far the most popular font. Other serif fonts include Bookman, Century and Lucida. Serif fonts are ideally used for titles. It takes the human eye a little longer to read a serif font, so it’s good to pause on the title or subject of your documentation.

Sans Serif – A sans serif font does not include the extra tails at the end of each letter. Arial is the most popular sans-serif font. Other sans serif fonts include Century Gothic, Helvetica, Lucida Sans and Verdana. The sans serif font is much easier to read and is ideal for text.

Script – A script font attempts to emulate handwriting. Script fonts include Brush Script, Edwardian Script, Freestyle Script and French Script. Because the script fonts are so hard to read, be careful how you use them. If you’re doing a slide presentation, avoid them.

Font Sizes
Font sizes can vary anywhere from 8 to 72 depending on the font. If you’re creating a slide presentation be sure to use a size 24 of larger for all print. This will allow the audience to more easily follow your presentation.

Use the 8 to 1 rule to determine how large a font to use. Simply stated, this rule tells you that the most comfortable viewing distance of an image is eight times the height of the image. For example, if your image is one foot tall, then those viewing the image should be no further than eight feet away.

There are many web sites that offer free fonts to download. Here are two you should check out:

Fonts for PC Users:
http://www.1001freefonts.com/ 

Fonts for Mac Users:
http://www.freemacfonts.com/  

About The Author:

Larry Andrew is an educational consultant, author and publisher of www.ez-software-review.com. Learn how to purchase cheap, reliable and quality software for your home, school and business.

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