Constantia, Corbel, Calibri, Cambria, Candara and Consolas, the new system fonts for Vista that are optimised for sub-pixel antialiasing, have shown up on the Microsoft site as downloadable samples. They're available in XPS format, which means that hardly anyone will be able to view them. Clever!

I asked if anyone knew of alternatives for the majority who can't read XPS, and Tim Brown emailed in to the rescue - he's put up PDF and TIFF versions. Bless him... If you're a Mac user on a LCD screen, open the PDF in Preview and view it at Actual Size - the sub-pixel antialiasing should work, bar for any minor differences between Mac and Windows gamma.

Interestingly, this is the first time I've ever seen sub-pixel antialiasing that didn't give me colour flashes around the type when reading it (then again, no-one I have spoken to about this phenomenon sees it), a problem I first encountered all the way back in the days of Microsoft Reader on Windows CE. I am very impressed by the quality, especially if it translates that well into the real world (and my mac isn't magically altering it). The fonts themselves look superb on screen, which I would imagine is as much to do with being designed by such talents as Jeremy Tankard and Lucas de Groot as it is to do with the technology.

There is great controversy surrounding the collection, as I'm sure Yves will pick up if and when he peers over it for a future Bald Condensed column, but that aside, I have to say, well done Microsoft.
Source: MS Typo News
Updated and extended: Thursday, February 01, 2007