Hi mgbgt—

Although I understand, can relate to, and usually support the Purist approach to design work, these monthly tutorials play to an entire spectrum of users, some who have pro sets of typefaces, some who are dealing with a Windows default set, and a few free ones from online and software installs.

I believe I did mention, if not stress, that it's a good idea to own different members of a font family, so I'm left with a choice when I teach something like this:

• Focus on typography, preach the wisdom of spending $100 or more on a font family, make teaching good design a secondary topic, and finger wag at anyone who uses Xara to disproportionately scale text.

-or-

• Do exactly what I did in the tutorial.

I'm not trying to get anyone to the point where they'd consider themselves a professional sign designer, mgbgt.

The April tutorial is about how to design that is well-organized, well conceived, conveys a message effectively, and sells something, as commercial art is supposed to do.

In other words, teaching people to choose an elongated, condensed, wide, or other font family member appropriate for a design—would be lesson #5 or 6 if I had that many lessons to spare on the subject of sign-making.

I don't, I deal with materials the member is likely to have, to work through a tutorial.

My Best,

Gary