Univers, Linotype Univers and Univers Next

[Jens Kutilek]

There is a scanned version of the Selectric Univers: http://ospublish.constantvzw.org/foundry/univers-else/

I wouldn’t call it a proper revival though.

[Nick Shinn]

Some form of pseudo-randomization would be good, to translate the yaw and bounce of the original “strike-0n” technology.

[quadibloc]

Univers Else is interesting; I remember being given here a link to an IBM Executive font; looking for it, I found:

http://site.xavier.edu/polt/typewriters/testimonial.html

but I don't think it's the same one. (I think "P45" was in the font name.)

Ah: F25 Executive, by Volcker Busse.

[Iain Farnsworth]

Thought this thread had died, only to find it resurrected!

Otmar, thanks so much for your inside knowledge on Univers. It certainly does help clear up some of the mysteries of the 'old' digital Univers, such as the ampersand. How could anybody complain about Frutiger's lovely 'Et'? It's one of my favourite features of Univers, and a reasons why I regret having purchased a few weights of the old version.

As an employee of Linotype, I'm not sure you'll feel inclined to answer the following, but I'll ask it in case you do (indeed, if anyone has any insights on this)...

What was the deal with Berthold Univers' disappearance from the marketplace? I believe it was a favourite of some Univers officianados (such I Willi Kunz, I think). I know there was some kind of legal dispute, but I wondered why Bitstream still sell Univers (albeit by another name - Zurich), yet Berthold has withdrawn it's offering. Anyway, thought I'd put that out there.

[Chris Dean]

Did you know that Univers would have been todays Helvetica?

I had a few conversations with Mike Parker about his time with Linotype, and of course, Times & Starling, and he wanted Univers to be their typeface of choice, but the italics were to italic to work on their machines properly.

Cool eh?

[quadibloc]

Incidentally, the Selectric Composer provides an illustrative example of how a variety of typeface designs fare when subjected to a similar (but more severe) set of constraints than those to which Sabon was subject.

1) Type elements contained only 88 characters, and so the same unit system applied to Roman, Italic, and Bold weights of every typeface.

2) The device employed a 9-unit system. However, this was not twice as coarse as the Monotype 18-unit system; instead, most letters were assigned widths comparable to those used for Times Roman, scaled down from 18 units to the em to 11 units to the em.

3) Hence, the letters m, M, and W were narrower than they should have been to be in the correct proportion, being 9 units wide rather than 11, in order to fit on the type element (it being desired to support type sizes up to 11 points, and to use the same basic type element as used in normal Selectric typewriters).

I just thought it would be worth citing this example in this thread, as comparing Press Roman to Times Roman, and so on, might give a benchmark for the potential impact of technical constraints on Sabon, and how well Jan Tschichold did in overcoming them.

EDIT: Oh, yes - here's the link

http://ibmcomposer.org/joomla/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=54&Itemid=56