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In the video here...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F691weEVpwc&feature=related

....Erik Spiekermann says his favorite letter is the "small a"...I totally agree....It is the most complex and has the most potential for variation as he says....That is one of the reasons I have always been fascinated with the "Galliard" typeface, it is revolutionary since it dares to "throw away" much of the potential variation of the small letter a and replace that with just a uniform width straight line!!!....INGENIOUS I say.....

PS...I know, that straight line in Galliard's small a is not exactly uniform width, it is slightly narrower at the upper right part etc, but at 12 or 14 point that detail is hard to tell and few notice it.

The Armenian lowercase հ. It has so many stories to tell, not least about the future.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/istype/7605119742

hhp

Some S's that I have made throughout my career. The S is my favorite letter. Some are fonts and others are lettering jobs. :)

Have you ever made the so called "archaic long s"?

When I was practicing Spencerian years ago I made the long s. Not sure if that is the same thing you are talking about.

I am referring to the long s that looks like an f without the right side part of the f cross bar.

Sounds like a normal long s to me.

The ones I did years ago just looked like an f without the crossbar.

My favourite glyph to make is the asterisk, and it's got to be five-pointed.

And upside-down, or in certain styles slightly rotated.

hhp

Charles, wow, I'm surprised anyone likes the S! For me I spend about ten times the amount of time on the s then I have to on any other glyph.

I would definitely pick capital R (apparently Erik Spiekermann's second favorite ^_^), I love when it isn't connected in the middle. It also has some sort of dynamism (maybe due to straight, curved and diagonal lines all in one letterform) and crispness to it that I like much.

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Ryan,
That is why I like the S so much. Once you have mastered the S the other letters are easy :)

@Ryan Maelhorn:
For me I spend about ten times the amount of time on the s then I have to on any other glyph.

Then Donald Knuth's experience in the design of Computer Modern is not atypical.

That's at least half a coincidence, since he was only doing about half type design...

hhp

Then Donald Knuth's experience in the design of Computer Modern is not atypical.

Seems there would be no better place to find that out than here.

What does everyone else say? Is the S the hardest latin glyph?

To me it's the binocular "g", by a long shot. And I'm not speaking only from my own experience - it's quite common to see a font that works fine... except for the "g"; or a font where the "g" is lifted/modified from an accomplished typeface because the designer couldn't get it right.

hhp

I also love drawing the "S" because it has more gain than pain. For the opposite reason, I hate drawing "W."

My favorite roman is the lower case "g"--here is one I am soon going to release (as a glyph) as part of my typeface Dez Petranian.

Gazimough, from the zingauloonian carbon script. Impossible to render with technology available in this sector.

5ive.

n.

S, yes. As for favorites, I like the i no dot the most. Vertical bar next. Then the back slash... Period and comma next... Then the stuff you can combine from that. Then the stuff you get to flip, so its two for one. Then then stuff you can just cut and paste from other stuff, all the way the down to... the S, no... the s is harder, less room. But the S is more filling, so it could be a toss up.;)

@5star:
5ive.

Hmm. Inspired by this famous painting, were you?

http://www.wisdomportal.com/Christmas/Figure5InGold.html

@quadibloc , Demuth's for sure, and J.J.'s too (amongst others)!

www.graphicdeclaration.com/images/JasperJohns_5.jpg

n.