Exported pdf doesn't contain bold

[pavelchod]

Hi,

I exported pdf containing Work Sans font - pretty basic. When I exported it, everything that was bold in Affinity was regular in the pdf. I recently switched to Mac from Windows and it's the first time I had this issue. Can somebody help? I use this font a lot. 

Thanks

[walt.farrell]

Welcome to the Serif Affinity forums.

What application did you use to view the PDF file?

[walt.farrell]

9 minutes ago, Hens said:

It maybe a variable font version and affinity doesn't support variable fonts

In that case, though, the bold would not show in the original Affinity document, either.

(But also, even if it did show in Affinity, it would not show in the PDF because PDF doesn't support variable fonts, either.)

[Alfred]

16 minutes ago, Hens said:

And a free version

Work Sans is released under the SIL Open Font License (OFL), so all versions are free!

https://www.fontsquirrel.com/license/work-sans

[pavelchod]

55 minutes ago, walt.farrell said:

What application did you use to view the PDF file?

Just standart Mac Preview app.

[pavelchod]

53 minutes ago, Hens said:

Which work sans font?
Adobe has one here https://fonts.adobe.com/fonts/work-sans
So does google https://fonts.google.com/specimen/Work+Sans
And a free version https://www.1001freefonts.com/work-sans.font
It maybe a variable font version and affinity doesn't support variable fonts

I used the Google one. Is there a difference?

[Alfred]

38 minutes ago, Hens said:

Just pointing out that there are more versions around.

Understood. It would be helpful if they all displayed the version number prominently, so that we would see at a glance whether there’s a newer version than the one we have installed.

[pavelchod]

Is there a way to download it NOT as a variable font? 

[walt.farrell]

16 minutes ago, pavelchod said:

Is there a way to download it NOT as a variable font? 

Probably depends on where you download it from. From Google, for example, you usually get both in the downloaded file, which includes a folder named Static.

But if you can see bold in the Affinity application I don't think that's your problem.

Can you show us a screenshot of your Affinity document and off the font pulldown that shows the font names?

[pavelchod]

5 minutes ago, walt.farrell said:

Can you show us a screenshot of your Affinity document and off the font pulldown that shows the font names?

 

bold_test.pdf

[walt.farrell]

Thanks. That's not a Variable font.

[pavelchod]

3 minutes ago, walt.farrell said:

That's not a Variable font.

It probably is. I deleted the whole font family and installed the fonts from google's "static" folder and now it works. GOOD NEWS

[walt.farrell]

7 minutes ago, pavelchod said:

It probably is.

The one in your screenshot just above isn't, based on all my experience with the Affinity applications so far. If it were Variable then you would not see the different style names (all names would be the same) and you would not see the styles demonstrated as they are in that list.

Was that screenshot perhaps after the font replacement?

[pavelchod]

8 minutes ago, walt.farrell said:

Was that screenshot perhaps after the font replacement?

No, before. But here is the screenshot after. Notice the order of the types. In the first screenshot it was really random. But when I installed it one by one as static font types, it looks much more organized. 

[kenmcd]

On 3/16/2022 at 10:09 AM, pavelchod said:

No, before. But here is the screenshot after. Notice the order of the types. In the first screenshot it was really random. But when I installed it one by one as static font types, it looks much more organized. 

You may have had both the static fonts and the variable fonts installed - which is really going to confuse things and perhaps result in the odd font menu order you had.

Google Fonts requires that the instances in the variable fonts (Regular, Bold, etc.) be named exactly the same as the static fonts. That way if you are looking at a web page using Open Sans (which is going to be the variable font) and you have the static fonts installed locally, your browser will use the local fonts and there will be no web font download needed (so it is faster and less traffic).

The downside is that you cannot have both installed locally because of the name conflicts. Some designers make a separate VF font, such as Open Sans VF, and because the family name is different you can install both without conflicts.