Agmena, a new book type from Jovica Veljovic

Jovica Veljovic was living in the former Yugoslavia when Aaron Burns, the president of ITC, met him in the mid 1980s. Upon seeing the young calligrapher's work, Burns immediately realized that he was in the presence of exceptional talent and encouraged Veljovic to take up typeface design. The ITC Veljovic typeface family was first of many he drew for ITC.

In his storied career, Veljovic has gone on to develop typefaces for Adobe and Linotype – as well as ITC. Although he spends much of his time today teaching typography and type design near his home in Hamburg, Veljovic has continued to draw new typeface designs. All started out as brush and pencil sketches.

None of Veljovic's designs were first imagined as constructed outline drawings. It was only after the basic shapes and proportions were finalized in brush form, that Veljovic would construct letters as digital outlines.

"For me, it is important to begin a new typeface by drawing with a brush or pen," says Veljovic. "This is especially true when I am making a new text typeface. The first text faces grew out of calligraphic writing and I think it is important to maintain this tradition."

The Agmena family, announced this week, is no exception. The first sketches for the design were roughed-out by Veljovic with a broad-edged brush. These became the basis for more refined drawings, which were then transferred to the computer for yet further development. The end result is a distinctive family of four weights – each with complementary italics – based on calligraphic, Renaissance "old style," design traits and proportions.

The complete Agmena family is available as desktop fonts from Fonts.com, as well for Web use through the Fonts.com Web Fonts Service.

Allan Haley is Director of Words & Letters at Monotype Imaging. Here he is responsible for strategic planning and creative implementation of just about everything related to typeface designs.