> On Jun 29, 2015, at 3:19 PM, Toby Thain <t...@telegraphics.com.au> wrote:
>
> On 2015-06-29 1:26 PM, Paul Koning wrote:
>>
>>> On Jun 29, 2015, at 11:26 AM, Toby Thain <t...@telegraphics.com.au> wrote:
>>> ...
>>> There's reason to believe it's "Chalet". See my previous mail for a link to
>>> one revival of that family.
>>
>> I looked at that. There are plenty of variations, but none of them match at
>> all. Take a look at the 11/45 processor handbook, or the peripherals
>> handbook (for example the 1976 edition). The inside cover page is
>> particularly helpful because it shows the company name for an additional
>> bunch of characters.
>>
>> If you mix & match letters from all the different variants of Chalet
> (like the a from Paris 1980 but the k from Paris 1970) you can get
> closer. But that’s not plausible,
>
>
> I worked in graphic design for a long time. Modifications and substitutions
> of any kind are not unusual in a logo. So yes, it's plausible, but just
> annoying when reverse engineering it later, of course.
For a logo, absolutely. For a house style typeface used as display text in
manuals and for panel labels, not quite so likely.
> ...
> This *could* be due to differences betwen the House revival and the original
> Chalet font. The next research step could be to find specimens of the latter.
>
> Or perhaps it was indeed a "custom font" as you said earlier, "based on"
> Chalet or something like it, with variant letters cherry picked. That
> explanation might satisfy everyone. :) I think it's pretty unlikely that a
> font will be discovered that is a better match than Chalet out of the box,
> though.
Perhaps. I think the similarities are faint enough that I would not point to
Chalet any more than I would point to Avant Garde. Designed from scratch by a
guy with a set of drafting tools seems more likely to me. But unless someone
with first hand knowledge comes along, as was done for the 7-block digital
logo, all this will likely remain speculation.
Meanwhile, if you want a font file that’s a better match than Chalet, try the
“handbook” font I created some years ago from the DEC document samples I have
on hand.
paul
