Tony Pritchard

Dear Oufti Thank you for your generous time and efforts and for kindly sharing this. I've had a brief look and will take a deeper dive later. In the past I would have created a flatplan in Adobe Illustrator and printed it out. Then scribble on paper the layouts. It often took a few goes to get the sequence right. I then used the digital file but the page numbers and content weren't linked so any update meant moving pages and renumbering individually. Fine for a small job but not 300-400 pages! A former colleague (no longer with us) created a linked file which updated automatically. They did this in InDesign. My skills are limited so I'll have to have a play to see if I can come up with something that makes sense and is usable. Again thanks for taking the time to investigate this. All the best Tony

Thank you for your reply especially as you are doing so not in your mother tongue. Merci beaucoup! Your reply is clear to me. This is not quite what I meant. A flatplan isn't an overview of the existing document. It is more a planning situation. MY book is 400 pages and is currently in separate chapters. I don't want to do a lot of work using that final document until I have a plan. Here is the video I saw on the InDesign version Here is an article https://medium.com/@kaibrach/how-to-plan-a-print-magazine-using-a-flatplan-dae139c82a4e It is far more basic. During the analogue era you would draw out double page spreads and write onto each page what would be on the page eg title page; contents; introduction; chapter opener; etc. I was wondering if Affinity Publisher had something like this to plan with, to get the overview. Tony

I see in InDesign there seems to be an automatic flat-plan feature. I am working on a 400 page book in Affinity Publisher and am at the stage whee I need to plan and re-jig pages and see this as a flat-plan. Does this exist in Affinity?

Thanks CK. I've been doing all the kerning manually. I've accepted this as in my situation the benefits of Affinity vs Adobe rent are outweighed. I have now committed to this large-scale project as a one off. If I was working commercially or within a university I'd opt for InDesign for the optical kerning aspect. It's all a balance.

Thanks MikeTO. I have Neue Helvetica which has .otf Figure Position appears but I can't see Figure Width

I am doing a 300pp book and kerning manually as I go. The 1s are pretty bad. Under different circumstances not having optical kerning would be a deal breaker.

Thanks for the information loukash. Auto / metrics on definitely looks better.

Are you doing this within Affinity Publisher? In terms of kerning the only option I see is Auto. I don't see metric – where is this? Your first two examples seem to have a better relationship between the W and o of World.

BTW I am writing and designing a book set in the mid 20th century. There is a great occurrence of dates starting 19. The kerning before the 1 and between the 1 and 9 is the most problematic of most kerning pairs. I kerned before and after the 1 and then copy and pasted the 19 throughout the chapter I was working on.

BTW I am writing and designing a book set in the mid 20th century. There is a great occurrence of dates starting 19. The kerning before the 1 and between the 1 and 9 is the most problematic of most kerning pairs. I kerned before and after the 1 and then copy and pasted the 19 throughout the chapter I was working on.

Thanks for these. I usually think of the optical alignment as to how the left edge looks eg the A and W might outdent more than the uprights for optical reasons. Oddly your fourth version using InDesign Optical Kerning doesn't stand out as the best. If you look at 'Way' the 'ay' seems to snuck under the 'W' better in the first three

I take your point. There would have been a time that Adobe didn't have optical kerning. It's a nice refinement. Typesetting during photo-setting and letterpress would have its flaws but would have been acceptable of its time. We possibly have become spoiled and we expect the best from our software producers. I still think Affinity should upgrade to better and what might now be seen as an industry standard for typesetting. There is the technical side of the argument and then the socio-economic political / ethical aspect. On principle I have decided not to continue with Adobe. I am a retired designer and design teacher. I supported Adobe as they grew. They are now THE dominant and monopolistic force within design education. My tutor has also rejected Adobe on principle. On balance I will accept a slightly less quality setting and go with Affinity as I would like to support them. The Modernist designers of post WW2 in the UK had to use what ever was available in terms of typesetting. It might not have been their desired font of choice but they accepted the constraints. I'm almost applying those constraints to myself now. They are the constraints of economics and what can be afforded by all the parties involved. When I create the colophon I will credit the software; typeface; paper; etc. people will be able to make their own judgments.

I agree with you HenrikF. I decided to move away from Adobe on principle when I retired as indeed so did my tutor. I think Affinity should get optical kerning back on their radar. There is an interesting thread with suggestions here (if you go to the end of the thread there is relevant discussion and tests to look at):

Thanks Thomaso and Lacerto for some suggestions and ingenious workaround solutions. I remember doing similar things in After Effects! But then I was dealing with small amounts of display. I also found that you could copy and paste between Adobe programmes and the attributes would often be kept. I'll get the text done and then give some thought as to whether certain workarounds are realistic. I am obsessive enough to go through that amount of text.

Agree optical kerning is the starting point for a good looking text

I agree. I don't think it is there. With regards to text, optical kerning within InDesign tightens the text up and makes it a good starting point. The 1s in particular look odd with too much space around them. It's not realistic to go through the text for a 300 page book and adjust all the numbers.

I agree with optical kerning. In InDesign it tightens up the text and makes it a really good starting point. The number 1 in text always has too much space around it as numbers were designed to sit one under the other and 1 is narrow so it has more space.

OK – It's worked. Everything clear in Font Book and Affinity. My gripe is now with MyFonts and Monotype. I was lured into the 10% off Monotype Foundry Fonts. I thought that it would apply to all Monotype Fonts. But no! Only Monotype 'Foundry' Fonts. I found that misleading. It doesn't apply to the other Foundries they own which are subsidiaries. So I go ahead and pay. The invoice informs me that the same 10% discount applied to Linotype Fonts ie the Monotype subsidiary that has Neue Helvetica. Really poor coordination from the parent company Monotype.

Thanks Lacerto I too hope it will help. I have sent the link to this thread to a colleague as they will be in the position of replacing their Type 1 Fonts. I have now deleted the 'rogue' font which immediately clears up the Apple Helvetica Neue. I'll buy the new version and hopefully my Font Book will look the same and when in use in Affinity I'll have the fonts separated out.

Thanks Lacerto Message from MyFonts / Monotype: "The Helvetica Neue that you will purchase from us will be shown as 'Helvetica Neue LT Pro' in fontbook and will not cause clashes with the default system font(Screenshot attached for reference)". I double checked that the attached screenshot was of Font Book and sent them my alert message of 'multiple copies', they replied: "Yes, that is a fontbook screenshot. I do not see the alert message after installing the the latest version available on the website with the preinstalled version of Neue Helvetica". Hopefully their screenshot will show below. If not I'll post it again.

Thanks all for the contributions. Really appreciate it. It's turning to be something of a complex tangle web with many implications. Originally I was concerned with the Apple list and the 'rogue' font that I had. Apple Font Book was alerting to the fact that there were multiple versions. So Font Book couldn't distinguish between the two. The muddle up was carried over into both InDesign and most noticeable Affinity Publisher, when looking at how the different sets appeared in the type display. Can't do anything about the Apple version of Neue Helvetica or Helvetica Neue. But the rogue set needs to go. I feel I should buy a new font of Neue Helvetica / Helvetica Neue and keep my fingers crossed that Font Book will be able to distinguish between the two and that I won't get the multiple versions alert. Then I hope within Affinity Publisher that the new typeface will be grouped together and be selectable with no naming confusion. This has been a very detailed discussion my concern is that there are many within academic and the profession that would know much about this. The Type 1 Font situation started to alert folks that there might be something they have to deal with this. I think Monday I should commit to buying the new version and see what happens. I hope I'm not wasting £200! Have a good weekend!

• Yes, I deactivated the rogue version and 14 came back for Apple. • Arun from customer support confirmed as above that "the fonts purchased from our website will appear as HelveticaNeueLT Pro-55 Roman" • Attached screenshot of MyFonts Tech Specs that seems to confirm this.

Hi Lacerto et al I have had another exchange with MyFonts / Monotype, this time Veronica. • The font is called Neue Helvetica. The reason for Helvetica Neue in the display of fonts in the software is this: "the name has historical reasons - customers who had installed Helvetica complained they didn't find the Neue Helvetica (because it was listed under N, not under H ...). So Linotype decided to make the change in the name so that Helvetica and Helvetica Neue would be listed one after the other". • There seems to be a lot of caution when talking license ie Monotype cannot comment on Apple. • I asked whether the intrinsic Apple fonts were the same as Monotype's. Veronica replied that Apple and Monotype are not the same fonts. • Veronica confirmed that the Monotype fonts would cover the needs for the traditional print book. I raised my concern that the answers didn't feel very straight. • I asked directly whether this font family would work and whether anything could go wrong https://www.myfonts.com/products/neue-helvetica-pro-basic-family-package-379965 Veronica replied "Affinity Publisher is a desktop application - so yes, you can use the desktop fonts in this application in order to create the documents for your book. Was that straight enough?" • I am not sure there is much further I can go with this. I think I should take the risk and buy.

Thanks Old Bruce

• I will ditch my original non Apple version • Monotype meant that the way they have named the fonts will be enough to distinguish them from Apple. I will not have to rename the fonts. • Maybe the sister sites have different company names but as they are the same company Monotype then the ultimate deal should be the same. • I hear that there are issues with the intrinsic Apple proprietary fonts. The Monotype version can be used for traditional print and isn't just a screen font. Monotype would provide fonts with original integrity (they own the company that designed the original) within one family from 25 to 95. • The intrinsic Apple versions are very limited. I could use Light, Regular and Bold, but I don't think there is enough of a distinction between regular and bold. Extra bold is 75 and Heavy which I intend to use is 85. Neither are intrinsic to Apple. Monotype would provide the full range plus the italics.