Font change?

j-bo · January 24, 2008

Did Smugmug change fonts? :dunno For some reason, the font has changed on my page and whatever it is, it is hard to read, especially the bolded font.

http://motoximages.com

Andy · January 24, 2008

No, we did not. Do you have font tags anywhere in your own coding? Perhaps you missed a /font closing font tag.

j-bo · January 24, 2008

Andy wrote:

No, we did not. Do you have font tags anywhere in your own coding? Perhaps you missed a /font closing font tag.

I don't believe. I haven't done anything to my page since: October 4, 2007

The gallery names in bold are hard to read too. I'll take a look see though. Just font size and bold tags. All closed.

IE Page text size hasn't changed either, nor encoding.

Andy · January 24, 2008

Give us some specific examples please, gallery links, screenshots, etc. Then we can know what you're seeing

j-bo · January 24, 2008

Andy wrote:

Give us some specific examples please, gallery links, screenshots, etc. Then we can know what you're seeing

Main page: http://motoximages.com

Andy · January 24, 2008

j-bo wrote:

Main page: http://motoximages.com

Yes, we can see your page. But we don't know what YOU are seeing. And we don't know what browser you are using. Screenshot, and specific direction to parts of text please...

j-bo · January 24, 2008

Ohh...

IE latest.

The font has changed from whatever the standard smug font was (which matched the actually smug "news", "add photo's", etc.)

Where "new feature, hide photo" is blurry, etc. etc. Font is just totally different than yesterday.

http://motoximages.smugmug.com/photos/246875145-X3.jpg

Any help or another screen shot needed?

Here's another: white bolded lettering looks to not have enough spacing between the letters, fuzzy look. "updated" part also doesn't look spaced correctly or because it's a different font from before?

Don't know really. The font itself has changed.

http://motoximages.smugmug.com/photos/246877174-X3.jpg

raebrown · January 24, 2008

Hi j-bo,

Your pages look good here. Is it possible you've somehow removed some fonts from your computer system and it can no longer render them on your screen?

j-bo · January 24, 2008

raebrown wrote:

Hi j-bo,

Your pages look good here. Is it possible you've somehow removed some fonts from your computer system and it can no longer render them on your screen?

Nope.. nothing has changed on my end. I'm home now and it still looks like the font got changed. I guess I'll have to do some more snooping around. So..the screen shot I posted looks fine to you to? Do you see a difference between that and from going straight to my site?

Thanks for the help.

richW · January 24, 2008

j-bo wrote:

Did Smugmug change fonts? For some reason, the font has changed on my page and whatever it is, it is hard to read, especially the bolded font.

http://motoximages.com

On the screen grabs the letters do look a little too close, but viewing the site they didn't look that bad. It's the css in the theme styling the font.
You can change if you like.

This might help:

.albumTitle .nav,
.foreground {font-weight: normal !important;}

Give it a try, we can go another direction if this doesn't work for you.

j-bo · January 24, 2008

I put that code in the css part and it actually looked worse.

Okay.......I've gone through previews of other themes. Most look highly improved! I guess I'll just change the theme up. Thanks for the help!

I dunno what has changed. It looked super until today.

jfriend · January 25, 2008

j-bo wrote:

Ohh...

IE latest.

The font has changed from whatever the standard smug font was (which matched the actually smug "news", "add photo's", etc.)

Where "new feature, hide photo" is blurry, etc. etc. Font is just totally different than yesterday.

http://motoximages.smugmug.com/photos/246875145-X3.jpg

Any help or another screen shot needed?

Here's another: white bolded lettering looks to not have enough spacing between the letters, fuzzy look. "updated" part also doesn't look spaced correctly or because it's a different font from before?

Don't know really. The font itself has changed.

http://motoximages.smugmug.com/photos/246877174-X3.jpg

I wonder if it's possible if you got a slight zoom setting in your browser. This causes the browser to scale all the fonts to slightly different values. In IE, check the Text size menu item in the View menu.

Ahhh, now when I look at the text you have in your Bio, I see some very weird font tags. You have followed by . That isn't correct. The closing tag should be just . It also looks like you have a lot of extra tags.

If I were you, I'd start by fixing the HTML in your Bio and then see if that helps the home page.

jfriend · January 25, 2008

jfriend wrote:

I wonder if it's possible if you got a slight zoom setting in your browser. This causes the browser to scale all the fonts to slightly different values. In IE, check the Text size menu item in the View menu.

Ahhh, now when I look at the text you have in your Bio, I see some very weird font tags. You have followed by . That isn't correct. The closing tag should be just . It also looks like you have a lot of extra tags.

If I were you, I'd start by fixing the HTML in your Bio and then see if that helps the home page.

I also can see that if I remove all the CSS from the carbonite theme, your page starts displaying normally. I don't know why that theme makes it display strangely and whether it's a Smugmug issue or something I can't see in your page. You don't have any meaningful customizations so it's hard to see how it could be something you did.

When I apply the Carbonite theme to my home page, my home page looks lousy too (in Firefox). Text is so crunched together, it's very cramped to read. I think there's something wrong with the Carbonite theme. Andy or whomever from Smugmug is reading this, all you have to do is apply the Carbonite theme to any non-customized home page and you can see what's going on.

Here's what my home page looks like with the carbonite theme applied: http://jfriend.smugmug.com/gallery/224603#247063499-O-LB.

The "enable more features" text is cramped. The gallery titles are cramped. There's some sort of display problem in front of the "Most popular" title and the "gallery categories" title.

j-bo · January 25, 2008

You have followed by . That isn't correct. The closing tag should be just . It also looks like you have a lot of extra tags.

Actually that way is also correct, at least in very old school html. Also, the number of /b tags is because I have only certain words that are bolded, and yes, you need to end each b with an end tag. Thanks though.

jfriend.... THANKS! I'm glad to know it isn't on my end. I looked at your carbonite and that's exactly what mine does. It's okay though, it was time for a change for me anyway. Hopefully, smug can fix it for those others that are using carbonite theme though.

Andy · January 25, 2008

j-bo wrote:

Hopefully, smug can fix it for those others that are using carbonite theme though.

But we haven't changed the carbonite theme font

j-bo · January 25, 2008

Andy wrote:

But we haven't changed the carbonite theme font

Understand. But something has changed, no? Another user, using a different browser gets the same results as I did. Not arguing... just weird.

I've changed to black arts and everything looks normal.

Andy · January 25, 2008

jfriend wrote:

Andy or whomever from Smugmug

The font has always been this:

body {
font-family: "Myriad Pro", arial, sans-serif;
background-color: #373735;
background-image: url(http://cdn.smugmug.com/img/themes/Carbonite/body.gif);
background-repeat: repeat-y;
background-position: center;
}

Myriad Pro for those that have it (Typically Mac users) and Arial for everyone else.

http://img.skitch.com/20080125-d3mhee75wwne8pmcxd9eip8463.jpg

what am I supposed to be seeing here?

Andy · January 25, 2008

jfriend wrote:

I think there's something wrong with the Carbonite theme. Andy or whomever from Smugmug is reading this, all you have to do is apply the Carbonite theme to any non-customized home page and you can see what's going on.

I don't see anything wrong or different

jfriend · January 25, 2008

Andy wrote:

I don't see anything wrong or different

There is definitely a difference between your screen shot here and my screen shot. If you look at the text under the gallery names as an example, yours looks OK, mine does not - it's too squished (in my opinion). There's definitely a difference. Here's an example. The top gallery is from your screen shot, the bottom from mine. Mine was Firefox on Windows Vista. I don't know about yours.

Can you see how the text "6 galleries with 169 photos" is smaller than the text "10 galleries with 891 photos" and the letters are more crowded together in the second one? It's legible, but not what someone would choose for an ideal text display and definitely different than yours? Similar differences in the gallery title.

I wonder if there's any chance that a YUI library change sometime influenced this?

j-bo · January 25, 2008

I'll let jfriend take over as he seems to have a better grasp of the technical stuff.

I see exactly what jfriend does. How it got this way, I don't know as I haven't changed anything on any of the PC's that I've always used to see my page. I wouldn't have asked if I didn't notice a change. I totally understand this is one of those frustrating things on both ends to see what each is trying to convey.

Andy · January 25, 2008

Do you guys have cleartype turned off maybe? Or something else going on with your fonts? Here's what I see on John's site ..John, I never changed your theme permanently, I used my admin powers to preview Carbonite

Focus on the "portfolio thumb, with 169 photos.

jfriend's screenshot, lower part there is FF on Win Vista:

my screenshot, FF3B2 on WinXP:

my screenshot, IE6 on WinXP:

my screenshot, FF2 on Windows Vista:

my screenshot, IE7 on Windows Vista:

j-bo · January 25, 2008

My cleartype is still on. My text size is set to medium. Zoom is at 100%. I don't know what else to look at or what could have changed.

Thanks for taking the time Andy. Your screen shots are fine to me. I tried going back to carbonite, restarting, re-looking at my settings and it still looks out of whack. Oh well.. black arts looks better anyway.

jfriend · January 25, 2008

Andy wrote:

Do you guys have cleartype turned off maybe? Or something else going on with your fonts?

I'm running a four month old new Vista installation with the Aero interface turned on. I've never knowingly done anything with my fonts.

I don't know how to see if ClearType is on, but I certainly have scalable fonts elsewhere in my user interface.

j-bo · January 25, 2008

I'd assume it's the same on Vista.

Right click on desktop, properties, appearance, and effects. Make sure cleartype is chosen for what type of smoothing for fonts.

Then also check in IE, under tools, internet options, advanced tab, multimedia and the box checked always use cleartype for html.

Andy · January 25, 2008

jfriend wrote:

I'm running a four month old new Vista installation with the Aero interface turned on. I've never knowingly done anything with my fonts.

I don't know how to see if ClearType is on, but I certainly have scalable fonts elsewhere in my user interface.

I don't know either. But it sure seems like a local varaition, no?

jfriend · January 25, 2008

Andy wrote:

I don't know either. But it sure seems like a local varaition, no?

Yeah, it is apparently a local variation.

If it was only me and this was my old XP machine, I'd say who knows where it's been and what has happened to it over time, but this is pretty new Vista machine that I haven't done much to and it's happening to someone else too so I'm more suspicious that this might affect more people.

I suppose we could try to isolate the variables and see if just the font style code in a blank web page shows the issue or not or if it's an interaction with the rest of Smugmug. I have to run now, maybe later I can check that.

jfriend · January 25, 2008

Andy wrote:

I don't know either. But it sure seems like a local variation, no?

After a little detective work, the problem is caused by:

body {
background: #000000;
color: #ffffff;
margin: 0 0 20px 0;
font-family: verdana, tahoma, helvetica, arial, sans-serif;
font-size: 12px;
height: 100%;
~cursor: default;
}

in the SmugmugBlack style sheet. If I set my home page to Carbonite and disable this piece of style code in web developer, then I get normal fonts for the text we're looking at. If I let it be enabled, I get the weird fonts. Within this style block, it's the font-size item that is causing it. These style commands look normal so I have no idea why this is.

jfriend · January 25, 2008

Narrowed down even more, the problem is caused by forcing this font-family: "Myriad Pro", arial, sans-serif; to be font-size:12px. Take out either line and the problem goes away.

I can see the issue on my computer in a 20 line HTML page that only had these styles:

body {
font-family: verdana, tahoma, helvetica, arial, sans-serif;
font-size: 12px;
}

body {
font-family: "Myriad Pro", arial, sans-serif;
}

If I remove the font-size line, the problem goes away. If I remove the second font-family line, the problem goes away. If I change it to

font-size: 12pt; (note this is specified in points)
or
font-size: 14px; (large number of pixels)

the font looks good.

I can email you the test HTML page which you can load from your own computer if you want, but I suspect that the behavior of the fonts are somehow environmental or it depends upon your screen resolution or something like that.

Troy Raymond · February 25, 2008

I'm having the same problem, After working on my website getting it just right I posted it on an Aerial Photography forum for critique tonight. 3 out of 3 replies said the font was to bold and blurred together. Same here. I have a laptop on XP, One of my friends has a 22" monitor on a desktop running XP and I have no idea what the others are using or what browsers they are using.

I designed the website around carbonite. Is there a cure or start over?
Where would I change the font size?

Troy

Font change?

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