TYPE DESIGN INFORMATION PAGE last updated on Wed Nov 20 11:40:21 EST 2024

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LUC DEVROYE

ABOUT

Castcraft Software Inc (or: OptiFont)

Castcraft [3649 W Chase Ave Skokie, IL 60026], showed off a comprehensive library of fonts, all with extended character sets for multi-language typography. OptiFont is a trademark filed in 1990 by Fredric J. Kreiter of Castcraft. Castcraft sold a CD-ROM Type Library Volume 1 at 200 USD. Its entire font collection was sold for 1000 USD. It also made some custom fonts. Most post-1990 fonts have the prefix OPTI. For example, OPTI-Peking is an oriental simulation font. OPTI-Favrile is a copy of Tom Carnase's Favrile (WTC).

A visitor warned me that there is absolutely zero security when you order from this outfit, so you are warned--this is a dangerous site! It seems that Manny Kreiter (d. 2005) was the last President&CEO, and that his family (Abe, Harry and Ned Kreiter) have been at it since the days of metal type (1936) starting as Type Founders of Chicago. I found this on their pages: Castcraft has licensing [sic] the entire 20,000 TypeFaces from "Type Films of Chicago" and the entire "Solotype Alphabets" collection. Mike Yanega claims that most of their fonts are clearly not original any more than most of Bitstream's are original, and like them they re-name many of their fonts to avoid copyright issues. Their fonts all appear to be a "dead collection" of copies of relatively old designs that have already appeared in many other collections from the likes of WSI and SSi.

In 2010, John Brandt reports: Castcraft, aka Type Founders of Chicago, moved decades ago from Hubbard St in Chicago to a close-in suburb (Skokie? Niles?) and was still operating within the past few years when I happened to drive by. I failed to find any current incarnation, but they used several names even years ago as a prominent pirate. Besides pirated fonts (Typositor to later, generally poor digital), they were a big metal vendor (I have a partial metal set of Helvetica gifted as they left downtown in the 1970s), and also had a guy (whose name escapes me) who did fabulous high-end signage, from sand-blasted glass to the created-on-building inscribed metal logo for a well-known Michigan Ave mall. Longtime owner Manny Kreiter died in 2005, but whether Boomie or any of the others who may still be around kept it going is unknown. Aside from simply having ANY version of their many offerings, most would consider their collection worthless. Anyone who has a digital "OPTIfont" and a font editor can readily view the problems, including usually several times too many Bezier points within any character. I counted 78 control points on a minimal character, for instance, that should have had less than a dozen.

Mark Simonson: Castcraft was notorious in the sixties and seventies for pirating film fonts for headline setting machines, such as the Typositor. They would acquire a film fonts from franchisees of VGC (who also made the Typositor) or Filmotype or Alphabet Innovations, and then make duplicates and sell them to typesetting houses, usually changing the font names. Companies like Alphabet Innovations even put deliberate mistakes into individual fonts sent to franchisees just to try to see where Castcraft was getting them.

Florian Hardwig: OPTI is a label used by Castcraft (also/previously known as Typefounders of Chicago and Type Films of Chicago) for digital fonts they produced around the early 1990s. My understanding is that virtually all of them are based on designs by others, made and distributed without authorization and without compensating the original designers or IP holders. Technically, many were likely based on the copies Castcraft previously made for phototype. They typically have names different from the original to avoid trademark issues. The company is long defunct and, ethical issues aside, the fonts are of subpar quality.

Listing of Castcraft fonts (compiled by myself). The 802 fonts listed here are all dated between 1990 and 1994. I know there are at least 1,000 digital fonts made by them, so my list is incomplete.

This link maintained by alt.binaries.fonts regulars contains most OPTI fonts for free download. It contains in particular some scans of one-line listings (i, ii, iii), and lists of name equivalences (i, ii).

Mediafire link.

Picture of Ned, Abe, Harry and Manny Kreiter.

Defunct Castcraft Software link. Typophile discussion.

Font name equivalences (by Philippededa, 2012). List of equivalences of Castcraft names. List of Castcraft typefaces as of July 2014.

EXTERNAL LINKS
Castcraft Software Inc (or: OptiFont)
MyFonts search
Monotype search
Fontspring search
Google search

INTERNAL LINKS
Commercial fonts (small outfits) ⦿ Font vendors ⦿ Oriental simulation fonts ⦿ Type scene in Illinois ⦿ Dan X. Solo ⦿ Sites with only a few free fonts ⦿ Frederic William Goudy ⦿ Clarendon ⦿ Baskerville ⦿ Eric Gill and his typefaces ⦿ Bookman ⦿