ManchuRegular font in The Dictator website parody.

[Vladimir Tamari]

This topic was imported from the Typophile platform

The website below has text in English and Wadiyan - an imaginary faux Arabic language used to promote the movie The Dictator. Click on the top right icon "Wadiyan" to see the script and top left for the English. I will not comment on the movie or website as such, but have some technical questions about the font and how was it implemented. I saw "ManchuRegular used as a font family in the html code. Is this a web font? I understand that Manchu is one of those languages faced with extinction - who made this font? Thanks Tom Milo for this reference.
The Republic of Wadiya

[Riccardo Sartori]

Dont let be tricked by the chosen name of the font. If you copy some text and change font, you will see that they’re just english words rendered with a faux arabic font.

[Vladimir Tamari]

ah, I see - I wonder what is the actual font name. It is used as a web font isn't it, but how?

[Michel Boyer]

The actual font name is Manchu Regular. Switching to Manchu is simply a change of font; the English text is left unchanged. "ManchuRegular" is defined in http://www.republicofwadiya.com/css/stylesheet.css with @font-face. The font files manch-webfont.woff, manch-webfont.ttf etc were generated with the Squirrel Font-Face Generator. (Note: the font is left to right, one glyph per latin letter).

[Vladimir Tamari]

Thank you Michel for the full explanation - it is a chance for me to learn about webfonts. Interestingly the Manchu language (which is threatened with extinction) uses theManchu scriptwritten vertically.

[hrant]

I don't understand why they couldn't have at least
renamed the font to avoid an allusion to Manchu.

> I will not comment on the movie

There could never be an exact antidote to something
like this (people don't bite the hand that feeds them)
but you might enjoy "Tropic Thunder" as much as I did.

hhp

[Vladimir Tamari]

> renamed the font to avoid an allusion to Manchu
Yes that would have been considerate... but that is hardly a virtue of the guy who gave us Borat and the others farces!

I did see Tropic Thunder :)

[Té Rowan]

So much for Fu Manchu…

[Vladimir Tamari]

Or Fu Manchu Font !

[hrant]

Actually I liked Borat. Even though the fat guy is Armenian,
and he was actually speaking Armenian in the movie! I liked
it because it exposes uncomfortable truths. This one seems
to distract from them.

hhp

[Vladimir Tamari]

Yes Borat was hilarious - but I suppose not if you are from Kazakhstan!