Operator
Save $178.00 when you buy the complete Operator collection!
How to use
Operator
Exploring the voice and functionality of typewriter faces, Operator includes two families: one with the rhythm and character of an editorial typeface, the other designed to improve the look of code.
Operator features both natural width and fixed width families.
Operator is a natural width family, its characters differing in proportion according to their weight and underlying design. Its companion Operator Mono is a fixed-width or monospace family, in which all the characters share a common horizontal measurement.
Operator contains nine weights from Thin to Black, each provided in roman, italic, and both roman and italic small caps. Operator maintains visually consistent intervals between its weights, to ensure that every style has a heavier counterpart that provides the same degree of emphasis.
For every weight of Operator, the style that’s two steps heavier has sufficient visual contrast to serve as a boldface:
Operator ScreenSmart is designed for on-screen text. To emphasize any of its styles, use the weight that’s two steps heavier:
Use Operator’s italics to distinguish text without changing its weight:
For more contrast, use the small caps:
Operator Mono contains five weights, each in roman and italic, also designed with consistent weight intervals between its styles.
For every weight of Operator Mono, the style that’s two steps heavier has sufficient visual contrast to serve as a boldface. Operator Mono maintains equal character widths among all ten of its styles.
Operator Mono ScreenSmart is designed for on-screen text. To emphasize any of its styles, use the weight that’s two steps heavier:
Use Operator Mono’s italics to distinguish text without changing its weight, or its fit:
Operator is suited to use at sizes both large and small. Owing to its large lowercase and short descenders, Operator sits ‘large on the body,’ appearing bigger than expected at text sizes, and inviting tight leading.
The following table offers some conservative guidelines for the smallest sizes at which the fonts can comfortably be reproduced and read, assuming typical reading conditions, and conventional contrast between type and background colors. The recommendations for sizes on screen are based on the coarser resolutions of older, entry-level monitors: at the higher resolutions available on modern phones, tablets, and laptops, type is viable at even smaller sizes.
The Operator 1 package contains the core styles, and Operator 2 the peripherally lightest and darkest weights that are best used at slightly larger sizes. For digital applications, Operator ScreenSmart and Operator Mono ScreenSmart are adaptations specifically designed for use on screen at text sizes, and engineered to deliver superior rendering in web browsers.
Text/Headlines
Smallest Sizes
Text/Headlines
Text/Headlines
Text
ScreenSmart® (SSm) fonts, designed for web and mobile applications, are engineered to work on screen at text sizes.
Text
Operator has three types of numbers: tabular figures throughout the family, two kinds of fractions, and superscripts and subscripts.
Operator has features that make it easier to use tabular figures when designing data-heavy applications such as charts, tables, menus, and reports, as well as digital experiences that show dynamic data such as prices, statistics, product numbers, timetables, account numbers, points, or scores.
Many of Operator’s special characters and alternates are grouped into Stylistic Sets, an OpenType feature available in many applications that makes it easier to apply related substitutions together.
7.1Stylistic Sets
7.2Stylistic Sets Operator Mono
7.3Additional Charcters
Operator automatically adjusts spacing and character choices to improve typography.
8.1Kerning
Operator is spaced and kerned to perform in most circumstances without the need for manual intervention. In applications that offer multiple options for kerning type, always use the default kerning that’s native to the typefaces (labeled auto in Illustrator, and metrics in InDesign) — never use the setting for optical kerning.
So-called ‘optical kerning’ was originally developed as an automated assist for fonts that lack kerning. But applied to a professional typeface, it overrides the visual decisions made by the font’s designers, and instead spaces characters using a mathematical model. It routinely misjudges common pairs, ignores important context, and misaligns tabular figures, creating erratic and disruptive rhythms. Because its algorithms are subject to change with each software update, ‘optical kerning’ can cause text to be reflowed without notice.
8.2Contextual Substitutions
Operator’s italics contain alternate designs for the lowercase f and l, which are automatically substituted in contexts where they can improve spacing.
8.3Capital Punctuation
Some design applications include an all caps option that not only capitalizes lowercase letters, but invokes the feature in Operator that substitutes capital-aligned numbers and punctuation. This raises characters such as dashes and enclosures so that they center on the caps, and substitutes the forms of symbols designed to accompany Operator’s lining figures.
The natural-width Operator family package comes in two different editions: a Basic edition containing the core character set, and a Pro edition that features the comprehensive character set designed for professional typographers.
Letters
Numbers
Punctuation
Operator features H&Co’s Expanded Latin character set.
Operator supports 503 languages including Afrikaans, Albanian, Alsatian, Basque, Bosnian, Breton, Catalan, Cebuano, Corsican, Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Estonian, Faroese, Fijian, Filipino, Finnish, French, Frisian, Friulian, Galician, German, Hungarian, Icelandic, Indonesian, Irish, Italian, Kurdish, Latvian, Lithuanian, Luxembourgeois, Malagasy, Malay, Maltese, Norwegian, Oromo, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Sardinian, Scots Gaelic, Slovak, Slovene, Spanish, Swahili, Swedish, Tagalog, Turkish, Welsh, and Zulu.
