By Request.


Designer: Zuzana Licko
Date: 1986
Foundry: Emigre
Re-released: 2002

With the introduction of laser printers, the "smooth" printing option was provided as a shortcut
to increasing the resolution of bitmaps from screen to printer.

The smooth printing option provided by the early Macintosh processed 72 dpi bitmaps into
300 dpi bitmaps for laser printers;seemingly polishing stair step pixels into smooth
diagonals. This was the inspiration for Citizenâ„¢.

Licko used straight line segments to approximate the features of smooth printing, applied
to her earlier Lo-Res Twelve bitmap design. Later, this progression would develop into the
Triplex Sans family.


Left: Bitmap screen font derived from the logic of the computer grid.
Middle: Bitmap screen font printed with the "smooth printing" option.
Right: The resulting Citizen design. The features of the "smooth printing"
are approximated with the use of straight line segments.

Citizen Lightâ„¢

http://www.identifont.com/samples/emigre/CitizenLight.gif

Citizen Boldâ„¢

http://www.identifont.com/samples/emigre/CitizenBold.gif

http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/emigre/citizen/
http://www.emigre.com/EF.php?fid=85