From: hedrick@geneva.rutgers.edu (Charles Hedrick)
Newsgroups: comp.fonts
Subject: Chapparal
Date: 10 Sep 1997 00:04:01 -0400
Organization: Rutgers University LCSR

I'd like to draw your attention to the recent Adobe release of Chapparal MM, by Carol Twombly. It has two axes: weight and optical size. This is an odd though not unprecedented combination: a "slab serif" based on early Renaissance forms. There is very little "modulation" of stroke width, but it's not truly monotone. The bottom serifs of the Roman are completely rectangular, as implied by the term slab serif, but those on the heads of letters are not, and the Italic lowercase aren't either. Thus its "slabness" is greater than Charter but less than PMN Caecelia.

I like low-contrast fonts like this for correspondence and reports. However so far I hadn't found any I was completely happy with. While I won't know for sure until I've played with it a bit more, I think I am happy with this one.

Some comparisons:

The most obvious comparisons are PMN Caecelia and Scala, both of which are neo-humanist slab serifs. The letter shapes are very similar indeed for the Roman. (Caecelia's Italic is much further from Renaissance models.) However Chapparal has more modulation of the stroke, and is generally less "geometrical". Unless you're looking for it, Chapparal at text sizes wouldn't initially strike you as a slab serif. With PMN Caecelia there's no doubt.

In some ways it is closest to Scala. The serif shapes are similar. Scala is slightly sharper, particular in the upper case. However I don't entirely like Scala. The letters somehow don't seem to me to flow nicely, and some of the rectangularity seems distracting (particularly the "g"). It just doesn't have the nice evenness and ease of reading that Chapparal does.

Charter is classified as slab serif, but really isn't. It's just a very low contrast font. (It's also based on a Baroque font, rather than Renaissance.) Compared with Charter, Chapparal is "crisper", and has a smaller x height. It's a relief to see a recent font with real ascenders, as Chapparal has. While I like Charter in many ways, it seems to have a slightly "soft" feeling that bothers me, particularly in the capitals. It also doesn't have OSF and small caps, except if you have a Mac. Chapparal does.

Another possible comparison is Linoletter. Linoletter is another slab serif with some neohumanist influences. It is even sharper than Chapparal, with slabs even for the head serifs. (Actually, the serifs are slightly concave, but you wouldn't see that at text sizes.) Linoletter however has a very extreme x height. It looks squashed and possibly overly sharp. As with Scala, it doesn't "flow" as well as Chapparal.

On another design axis the obvious comparison is with revivals of early Renaissance fonts such as Jenson. (The one I have is ITC Legacy, but I'm also looking at samples of Adobe Jenson.) Letter shapes are similar, but not identical. Chapparal is somewhat modernized: the W doesn't have the complete double V shape, the terminals at the top ends of the T go down only, the e has a flat crossbar, and the b and p aren't as flat at the top of the arch. However it's still obviously inspired by Renaissance letters. The Italic is very good, and also follows Renaissance models, though the serifs are somewhat more horizontal than in the original. (However they are not perfectly horizontal.)

The samples I've seen of Jenson's original work is somewhat blurred. Based on descriptions I've seen of how revivals are done, it seems that one can only guess what the shape of the original type was. It seems to me that the photos have a somewhat darker and more even texture than the revivals. Of the types I've seen, Mendoza is the only one that captures that (though Mendoza isn't claimed to be an actual revival of Jenson's type, as far as I know). Chapparal has some of that same texture. Thus Mendoza seems close to Chapparal in overall appearance, though Mendoza is rougher, more condensed, and has a larger X height. For all of those reasons it's not something I'd use for departmental memos, though it's an interesting font with some similarity to Chapparal.

In my tests, Chaparral is a wonderful text font. It is crisp, readable, with a nice, even color (but not so monotone as to be a problem). When using caps for titles, I found that it was critical to use the appropriate optical size. If you use the default 11 point optical for a title even at 13 points, it looks a bit flabby. With the larger optical sizes I prefer somewhat more letter-spacing than I'm accustomed to use: 1.5 points rather than 1 point.

It seems that every font has a couple of odd characters. To my mind, the oddest in Chapparal is the C. The head terminal looks somewhat unusual to me. I don't find it a problem (particularly when titles are set with the appropriate optical size), but I do find it slightly noticable.

Chapparal is very well hinted. Thus it looks good on the screen. It doesn't quite convince me to move from Georgia as my browser font, but it's close.

There is some suggestion that the font is intended to have a "Western" flavor. This is reflected in the name of the font, Adobe's initial PR (with pictures and examples that are mostly connected to the old West), and the ornaments. It's not clear that this is reflected very much in the font itself, except the ornaments. I'd hate to see people overlook the font because they're not writing books about cowboys.