I'm not sold on the ascending 3 and 5, but digging up an old post of yours on French OS figs did inspire me to try an open, semi-descending and semi-ascending 4! (middle row)

Just noticed 'Millennial' is missing an 'n' ;)

Holy crap, how embarrassing! Thanks for the correction!

In 'logjam', your descenders are different lengths, is that from Century? I don't remember noticing that before.

No, Century Oldstyle has consistent descender depth... consistently very short!
I decided to deepen it, but my sense was that /j/ didn't look good at full depth (and, in italics, /f/ and /ß/).
But now looking at it again, those shorter descenders (top rows) look stunted, and full depth ones (bottom rows) look okay. What do you think?

You're the best, Ben, thanks for taking the time!

I think it's much more elegant with the full length descenders

Agreed.

sorry to harp on about the commas/quotes, but I'd make the tails darker still, and longer. I'm not sure exactly what target size you're aiming for, somewhere around 10-11pt?

Don't apologize, you're completely right! Yes, I have in mind right about that size. This turned out quite big on the em compared to other text faces on my system.

Spur of /G/ seems to need more prominence — to the baseline? — to make it stable

Like what the italic wound up with?

did you try an uppercase version of the /u/

Yes, upthread you can see some hideous attempts along those lines. Maybe I'll try again, as the present solution isn't entirely satisfactory.

I'll get to work on all those suggestions!

I really like the pointy terminals, I'd have those on the lining figs too I think. Also I'd make the roman os 4 the same shape as the italic one, though maybe with a square top or something. Italic os 3 could be a little wide.

Oh, those swoopy top terminals on the 2 and 3 didn't work for the italic lf?

Even in this form, it could be neat to shorten the descender of the roman osf 4.

Does the descender of osf 7 have enough weight?

I like the beaked 1, though the left serif seems a bit too long and/or dark (but maybe is just some screen artefact).
About the zero, my taste isn’t for the ones without contrast, even if I understand the rationale. But then, I think your italic OS zero should retain some of the lack of contrast of the corresponding roman one.

Yes, yes. Those amends are good.

I'm looking at pdf04.

• Italic cap K is almost working, but the arm and leg look like independent strokes even despite the join; not sure what to suggest but the movement needs to flow together more.
• Italic Xx need a bit more offset on the hairline stroke.
• Italic D may be too light and/or counter too large, it looks pale overall.
• I'm really loving the italic lc, in the same way I love Baskerville's italic. I wonder if b needs a spur?
• Italic caps may need more space?
• Check right sidebearings of roman Ww?
• This is really great work :)

This is going to be good. I want it! These are my thoughts on the italics (very much in italics mode myself at the moment, I'll criticise the romans later), based on 04.pdf.

A: Is the thin stroke a little too curved?
B: Are the bowls slightly too slanted-looking? I'd slide their extremas a little down.
G: Something is not comfortable about the right stem, should it be slightly less slanted? Or is the curve on one side-, straight on the other-approach problematic?
H: When I look at the word "Helen" I get the impression that the 'H' is more slanted than the 'l'. Is it just me, or does the upper case need to be one degree less slanted?
N: Looks less slanted than other members of upper case.
P & R: See B
S: Is the upper ball a little to low and/or prominent?
T: Cool! But should that loop be more prominent?
U: Some stiffness in the curve here too?
W: Not sure about the middle serif. Is the middle stroke a little thick/clumsy too?
X: Yes! But needs quite a bit of cross compensation.
Y: Make the thin arm more curved?
Z: Brilliant!
Er ... VWXYZ is quite similar to my solutions for Satyr. I swear I haven't copied you.

a: Great! Should the tail curve be a little more generous? Personally, I'd make a slight ink trap on the bottom join of 'a' & 'd'.
g: Is the beak a little sad?
k: Brilliant!
r: Ball a little small?
t: Not comfortable with the top. I'd make it shorter or less tapered.
u: Oh yes! But more of that loop?
x: Cross compensation again.

My thoughts on the roman:

A: I really dig the chopped off terminal of A, Y, V, but I wonder if it makes the 'A' fall a little leftward? I would consider letting it lean very slightly to the right as a compensation.
J: Heavier ball?
K: Arm serif cut off to straight? Leg not dark enough?
S: Too black spine? Slightly tall too, is it? Or perhaps that gives it character ... those serifs approximating arrows are cool!
VW: A little black, aren't they?

nmh: Something about their curves seem a little uncertain. Can't quite put my finger on it.
x: Serifs a little black, compare to 'z', for instance.

I apologise if I have repeated other's critique too much.

The thick lower-left serif on A (and many others) looks distracting to me.

The first t is fine to my eye.

Second W, defenitely!

Why don't you make the connection of the two 'bowls' in g a little smoother? To me it LOOKS as if you were having a hard time with the contour tools of Fontlab. I guess you like the quirkyness.

Keep going!

And maybe the 'G' stem needs to be a little straighter?

Do you mean more upright?

Why don't you make the connection of the two 'bowls' in g a little smoother?

That angularity was a quirk of the Century Oldstyle model that I liked, but perhaps I was a bit too unsubtle in adapting it.

Ha-ha, no vengefulness attempted. I just thought those curves were a little indecisive. Last try looks good to these eyes. Personally, I'd nudge the top point of the 'a's ceiling curve ten units to the left too.

Latest pdf (05) shows lots of tweaking. In addition to addressing some of the above comments, the more noticeable changes include:
- beefed up middle arms of E and F in both roman and italic
- lowered roman A crossbar
- narrowed italic y
- made bowl of P taller in both roman and italic
- reduced relative size of top bowl of roman g
- widened and rebalanced roman v and y
- closed aperture of roman c
- brought the straight part of the stem of italic b down lower (and adjusted the whole bowl) - I think this might help anchor the letter as an alternate solution to Ben's suggestion of a spur at lower left.

Excellent, thank you Sindre. Look at the even newer pdf #06 instead, as it includes subtle but far-reaching adjustments to the italic cap serifs.

Per Sindre's suggestions, for the roman:
S smoothed, Y arm thicker, r thin thicker, s spine lightened, v and w angles changed ever so slightly and w narrowed, ff ligs respaced.
Then, the more exciting stuff: as I'm discerning the emergent personality of this typeface, I think it's time to disembark from the model for those character-filled glyphs R, Q, and ampersand. Pairs show Century-like original left and my new take right.

Italic changes:
how does "abcde" look now? I raised the top of the counter of b and widened it slightly. Then, I think key was to make d's top bowl come into the stem at a downward angle (it was almost perpindicular before. I think this is more graceful and makes the counter rhyme a bit better with those of other letters.
lowered ascender of p, rejiggered curves of ae
narrowed N (I've gone back and forth widening and narrowing this glyph since I created it!)
lightened X and tried again at getting the optical correction right.
adjusted os8 to mesh with the other figs
Then the before and after of a dramatic rethinking of ampersand for the italic.

Sindre, your sharp eye is such a help and your compliments are good fuel for my project. Seriously, thanks!

you Really need to do something about that æ

Is it ugly? Does it not read well? Should I use a single story a in the italic ae?

Better?

If you feel the one-story solution is too humanistic, please do try a two-story version! Your sketch is good. I tried my hands at this, and it’s a hard shape.

Slightly rotated e and some cross compensation made the eye smaller. Also shortened the tail slightly. Sloppy interior, but you catch my drift?

œ middle is too heavy.

If you want to differentiate them even more, you could thin the southwest part of "e" in "œ".

Sure. "The æsthetic value of his œuvre is..."
But a better question is: are there single words where
the two could be confused? Here's one: æther vs œther.
And that's nothing - check this out: Færœ Islands. :-)

The æ is really not itself enough now. Classical, shmlassical.

hhp

Ah! :-)

BTW, you know what would be nice? Something I proposed years ago on
Typo-L (and apparently Gary Munch had already thought of): Ae and Oe
diphthongs! Why? Well, what about a book titled "Aesop's Oeuvre"? :-)

hhp

Ohh... can't help but think the second and especially the third of these ampersands might just do great without the arm (with some rebalancing). Dunno if that's your thing but you might give it a go.

I side question, isn't it considered affected/pretentious to use the æ and œ ligatures in standard English? I've certainly never had cause to use them in British English.