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How to Fix Jagged Fonts
by Tim Donnelly, guest writer —
S
ay you're working with a friend on their computer system and you realize that their fonts look different than yours. They're the same typefaces but theirs have nice even edges while yours seem to be straight from the pyramids in Egypt; built with little steps of stone. What's the deal? If you're using PostScript fonts, there are some possibilities that come to mind.

1. Missing screen fonts
You may not have your screen fonts installed properly. PostScript fonts come in pairs; each member of a font family has a screen font and a printer font. If you only have the printer font installed then the computer system will draw upon the printer font for information on how to display a font on-screen. Your fonts will look very jagged, much like a vector graphic. TrueType fonts, though generally not as high quality as PostScript fonts, won't give you this problem because there's only one file for each font.

2. Adobe® Type Manager®
The second possibility is that you're not using the Adobe Type Manager (ATM) software. Because screen fonts contain bitmapped information and come in a few representative sizes (most screen fonts come with a few font sizes like 10, 12, and 14 point), they don't look very smooth when you use sizes larger than the representative sizes. ATM is a piece of software that can be set to smooth the jagged edges of your fonts.

Where can I get it?
A free, "light" version of Adobe Type Manager (Macintosh or Windows) often comes packaged with Adobe software like Illustrator or Photoshop and can be downloaded here.

Adobe Type Manager Deluxe, which can also help you organize and manage your fonts, is available for Macintosh or Windows from Amazon.com.

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