What's the Deal with Papyrus?

chest2tank

Why do so many people who claim to be creative use this font? It's so cliche and unbearable. Thoughts?

Pixoul

Because Papyrus is the new Impact?

http://www.papyruswatch.com/

Pixoul

Oh, and:

chest2tank

EXACTLY!!! Argh. I have an album on Facebook of all the signs and things I see when on the road with Papyrus. There are 10000's of beautiful fonts out there....

Andy

It's a hideous, awful font. It really is over-used.

Did I say it's horrible?

takeflightphoto

chest2tank wrote:

Why do so many people who claim to be creative use this font? It's so cliche and unbearable. Thoughts?

Why are so many people, including the three (so far) who criticized Papyrus in this thread, so unimaginative that they can't get past plain hideous, awful, and overused old Arial or a variant?

Why does anyone care what typestyle (yes, typestyle...a font is the variant, such as plain, bold, italic, etc. OF a typestyle) anyone else uses? If your personal choice is so superior, why would you knock down someone else's choice? You, after all, are better than the rest.

Why do so many people that claim to be creative use any typestyle that they didn't create themselves? Or use 6 different typestyles within one document or website? Why, oh why?

Now, back to your whining, grousing and belittling.

Pixoul

takeflightphoto wrote:

Now, back to your whining, grousing and belittling.

Using your own logic, why do you care?

Everyone has (and is entitled to) an opinion of what they like and don't like. You obviously like Papyrus. I personally don't. I sincerely and humbly apologize to you for being an unimaginative git with the gall to mention in public a font I don't like. I hope that one day I shall be worthy of your forgiveness.

Reeflections

I guess I don't understand how a font or type style can be bad or good in and of itself. Overused or improperly used, sure. Most every font must have a purpose somewhere or it wouldn't exist long enuf to discuss it. I always thought that Papyrus was useful for certain applications until it was over used. Fonts aren't always supposed to be beautiful are they? Isn't the reason it was over used simply a reflection of the fact that lots of people liked it?

What is really interesting, is the emotion it seems to have brought to this thread in an otherwise pretty tame forum. With this reaction of love and hate coming from the same font, Papyrus surely must be art!

Pixoul

Reeflections wrote:

I guess I don't understand how a font or type style can be bad or good in and of itself.

• Kerning, spacing, etc. Characters in aesthetically-pleasing fonts will snap together like puzzle pieces and won't leave gaps or uneven spaces. This is sometimes intentional but usually just looks wrong. A good example would be to create a document with the word "WAR" in a huge font size and flip through all your fonts; you'll see that some fonts have a huge unsightly gap between the W and the A.
• Fonts that are not designed for a certain style sometimes look pixelated, rough, or just plain weird when that style is applied. For example, paste two paragraphs of Lorem Ipsum into a document. On the first paragraph choose Helvetica Bold Oblique (or any other font that has native bold/italic) and on the second paragraph choose plain Helvetica and then apply Bold and Italic. The plain Helvetica with Bold and Italic applied will look much rougher than the native Helvetica Bold Oblique.

With those two points illustrated most people don't notice, know about, or care about such things (be it photos, illustrations, fonts, etc.).

Reeflections wrote:

What is really interesting, is the emotion it seems to have brought to this thread in an otherwise pretty tame forum. With this reaction of love and hate coming from the same font, Papyrus surely must be art!

Hey, if Papyrus is good enough for Avatar (which gets the same love/hate reaction), then...

CWSkopec

Come on guys... don't blame Papyrus! The poor little guy is just a victim of his own popularity.

I have to disagree with Andy, it's not awful, hideous or horrible. It's actually a very nice typeface.... when used with corresponding material. And there in lies the issue. People are using it, just to use it.

The San Diego Museum of Natural History used it a couple years ago in their print collateral for a traveling exhibit of the Dead Sea Scrolls and it worked perfectly! Because the subject related to the typeface.

If it wasn't a good looking font, it wouldn't be used. We just need to give the poor guy a chance to get back to his niche and really work it there. Sooner or later, all the folks using it, trying to look be original will realize they aren't being original with it anymore (and they really haven't been since about 1990) and the next fad will start, allowing Papyrus to reclaim his (her?) place in relating to antiquity.




PS - According to Wikipedia, even the original designer of Papyrus thinks it's overused!

Reeflections

Pixoul wrote:

• Kerning, spacing, etc. Characters in aesthetically-pleasing fonts will snap together like puzzle pieces and won't leave gaps or uneven spaces. This is sometimes intentional but usually just looks wrong. A good example would be to create a document with the word "WAR" in a huge font size and flip through all your fonts; you'll see that some fonts have a huge unsightly gap between the W and the A.
• Fonts that are not designed for a certain style sometimes look pixelated, rough, or just plain weird when that style is applied. For example, paste two paragraphs of Lorem Ipsum into a document. On the first paragraph choose Helvetica Bold Oblique (or any other font that has native bold/italic) and on the second paragraph choose plain Helvetica and then apply Bold and Italic. The plain Helvetica with Bold and Italic applied will look much rougher than the native Helvetica Bold Oblique.

...

I guess that's my point. Not all fonts work for everything. So the fault lies in the user - not the font.

But then I haven't even seen Avitar so what do I know???

ian408

Reeflections wrote:

Not all fonts work for everything. So the fault lies in the user - not the font.

+1

chest2tank

CWSkopec wrote:

Come on guys... don't blame Papyrus! The poor little guy is just a victim of his own popularity.

Kind of like "Lips of an Angel" hahahaha! Well, the font itself does has some merit, but I mean EVERYONE uses it. There are 1000000's of free fonts out there that are equally as interesting. Papyrus is appropriate for middle eastern branding like a night club having a King Tut party or whatever. Are you a wedding photographer who is white as white can be shooting the typical American wedding? I hardly think that it belongs. As a former marketer myself, we spent a lot of time thinking about how our brands felt, tasted, and sounded. Papyrus is inherently unrefined, and thus inappropriate for most brands - especially wedding photogs!

You want help creating a living brand? Here's a tip. Start with who your brand would be if it were a person. Talk to it. Smell it. Write its story. Then you go to a logo and font set. The other way around just makes everything look disjointed. Your client sees that.

Andy

Pixoul wrote:

Oh, and:

Finally saw the movie (AWESOME) but the papyrus font used for the subtitles was a huge detraction. :puke