Typography is an art form and designers spend their lives studying it. For those that don’t have a lifetime to spare or just like typography, we’ve compiled a list of extremely helpful, fun, and interesting typography sites that also happen to be free.


1. Typedia
Finally. An encyclopedia completely dedicated to typography. We know you’ve been waiting impatiently for one. On Typedia you can learn about the anatomy of type, explore type faces and type face families, read blog postings from typedia, and join in BadaBoom BBon the forum discussion. The best part, you can look up all things type – this includes typefaces, font foundries, and designers.


2. What the Font
Have you ever spent valuable time flipping through all of your fonts trying to figure out what font is used in a client logo? I have, and if you have, then you will understand the value of this tool. What the Font allows you to upload a file and it generates a list of possible font faces that are used. There is also a "What the Font" iPhone app.


3. I Love Typography
I Love Typography is my favorite typography blog, but it is actually much more than a blog. The posts are usually inspiring, and if they’re not inspiring, then they are educational. I have spent many uninspired days looking through I Love Typography for inspiration. As well as being a great blog, there are also free wall paper downloads and a store that sells products that only typography lovers would appreciate, like a t-shirt that reads “Helvetica de neue haas grotesk” are sold.


4. Typetester
Typetester is a really handy tool that allows you to compare what fonts are going to look like in a web browser. You can compare different font faces, sizes, leading, tracking, alignment, word space, decoration, color, background, color, and number of columns. It’s a handy tool when you are trying to make font decisions in the design phase of websites.


5. Designer Plaything
Designer Plaything is another tool that allows you to experiment with different typography and color options on the web. Unlike typetester, on Designer Plaything you can also change the page and article background colors. This site gives you a better idea of what a site containing long paragraphs of type will look like. Esthetically and functionally, I prefer Typetester, but Designer Plaything has its benefits.


6. Vertical Rhythm
This is a tool that helps the designer compute CSS that has consistent vertical rhythm. To learn more about what vertical rhythm is, take a look at this article about vertical measure.


7. Color Contrast Check
This is another tool that is helpful for designing typography for the web. Color Contrast Check does exactly what its name implies - it allows you to check the color contrast between type and background colors.


8. PHP + CSS Dynamic Text Replacement
This is something that I am really excited about, a JavaScript-free version of the Dynamic Test Replacement method. It allows you to take a standard web page and dynamically create images to replace the page headings using PHP and CSS.


9. Fawnt
Fawnt is plain and simple, a resource to browse, find, and buy fonts. They have about 10,000 to look through. Better get started.


10. Fontstruct
This is a fun site where you can not only buy fonts, but you can also create and sell your own. Use Fontstruct’s free font creator, upload it to their gallery, and try to sell it.

Portland, OR, August 18h, 2009 – Outlier Solutions, a technology driven marketing and advertising agency in Portland, Oregon, has recently launched a new E-commerce site in the life science arena. The web site, www.al-tar.com, exemplifies the industry knowledge acquired from servicing the laboratory equipment and life science industries since Outlier Solutions was founded in 2005.

Outlier Solution’s ability to apply this knowledge creatively to meet client’s needs has already established the company within the Life Sciences industry in the short time they have been around. For example, Al-tar Services Inc., a current partner and large resource in the laboratory technology field, has fully integrated their repair and calibration services and equipment sales into their new web site www.al-tar.com built by the Outlier Solutions web development team. “We are marketers and are passionate about technology and design,” says founder Ben Friedle, “and this is the reason we have been successful.”

Aside from the typical E-commerce store where all of Al-tar’s products can be purchased online, the web site was also created with a document center, complete with certificates of calibration, manuals, brochures, and service information. Outlier also fully integrated pre-existing business software and systems into the new web applications they developed. Outlier continues to provide ongoing marketing support including, print, PR, search engine optimization (SEO) and web marketing. Outlier services

About Outlier Solutions
Outlier Solutions Inc. is a full service Portland marketing firm with the tools and flexibility to customize marketing campaigns focused on your business goals. We are a unique advertising agency that focuses on leveraging technology to create stronger brand awareness, support lead generation, and aid in product training and promotion. Outlier portfolio

For more information visit www.outliersolutions.com