You may not realize it, but the way words appear in a mobile application can be just as important as what they are telling you. Funky fonts can enrich any number of mobile applications and lend style and individuality to the most mundane mobile offerings. With this belief firmly entrenched in their business model, Monotype Imaging announced it is making its text rendering technologies available to the entire BREW value chain—from developers to operators and everyone in between. The company will offer many of its font types as BREW extensions, which will provide developers a wider variety of scalable typefaces to enrich mobile applications. Monotype is also making it possible for its fonts and technologies to be delivered to consumers over-the-air through the BREW Delivery System, which enables network operators to distribute wireless data services to mobile subscribers.
“Because manufacturers are coming out with so many products, they’re looking to scalable fonts as a branding device,†says Monotype’s Director of Words and Letters Allan Haley. “We’re seen the industry grow very much like what happened with PCs 20 years ago—except this revolution is happening even faster. We can’t build fonts fast enough.†As more graphic designers create unique user interfaces which cater to a worldwide market across multiple handset designs, technology like Fonts in a Box, which helps scale characters without sacrificing readability, and Monotype’s WorldType Layout Engine, which enables the composition, positioning and rendering of multilingual text, ensures mobile application producers do not have to sacrifice individuality in a small-screen environment.
“We are continually advancing the technology on the platform as well as the fonts, to yield a high-quality user experience that over time will be a seamless event for the user,†says executive vice president John Seguin. “People want to personalize their phone, and with low real-estate on a screen, technologies like ours that can scale and facilitate the appropriate layout are essential.†Legibility and versatility top considerations when choosing appropriate fonts to brand or enhance the user experience for a mobile application: No doubt Monotype’s 9,000 registered font styles, of which a couple hundred they’ve considered suitable for mobile adaptation, could go a long way to providing the extra design edge mobile developers are looking for.
Monotype’s director of words and letters Allan Haley will present “Fontastic BREW Ingredients: How to Add Value Using Fonts†during the conference on June 22 at 1:45 p.m.