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For all its hate and overuse, Neue Haas is used for one reason and one reason only: simplicity. When you read a block of Garamond in a classic book from the ea
by kunai 13y ago
For all its hate and overuse, Neue Haas is used for one reason and one reason only: simplicity.
When you read a block of Garamond in a classic book from the early 19th century, you feel the serifs. They guide you from word to word, but they're there and you see them and feel them structuring the text into lines and establishing the x-height easily for readability. Easier to read, but you're still conscious of the typeface.
The beauty of Neue Haas Grotesk compared to, say, Futura or Avenir is that it disappears. You cannot tell that you're reading a typeface, you're only seeing words. It's a highly readable font but with a very simplistic design. This is also evident with Lucida, but its letterforms are slightly more ornamental and wouldn't fit well on a mobile device.
There's a reason Neue was chosen for iOS 7. It's simple and clean, just like its design leader likes it to be.
- arrrg 13y agoIt’s grey and boring and too self-similar to really be super readable. It’s ok enough, I guess, but if Apple wanted to they could actually improve on it. The church of Helvetica is annoying.
- melloclello 13y agoWho exactly are you trying to impress by calling Helvetica "Neue Haas"?
- radicaldreamer 13y agoI had to look up what 'Neue Haas' was. For all the extolling of simplicity and clarity in the original post, it wasn't very clear.
- achalv 13y agoFor all the extolling of simplicity and clarity in the original post, it wasn't very clear. You get +1 internet points for that.
- nsxwolf 13y agoI'm looking forward to hearing his thoughts on the upcoming NeXTSTEP 10.9.
- klapinat0r 13y agoWhile Neue Haas was the original name for Helvetica, it does seem to be two different font's in Chrome (OSX): http://i.imgur.com/ufxsfKh.png http://i.imgur.com/ufxsfKh.png
- benaiah 13y agoLooks like it's not two different fonts, just that Neue Haas isn't recognized as a font name by OSX, so it falls back to the default font - a serif, in this case.
- stewf 13y agoNeue Haas Grotesk and Neue Helvetica (known as Helvetica Neue in iOS) are not the same typefaces. Neue Haas Grotesk is the original name for the typeface but it underwent many changes over the last 60 years before it became what we most commonly see today in digital form as Helvetica and Neue Helvetica. NHG would probably be a better choice for iOS due to its looser spacing and optimizations for text. See Font Bureau’s NHG site for more info: http://www.fontbureau.com/nhg/history/ http://www.fontbureau.com/nhg/history/