For Beginners
FAQ: About Fonts
By Shelleyrae Cusbert 2005
Jul 10, 2005, 03:50

Fonts can accompany software packages such as MS Word. Computers often come preinstalled with basic fonts such as Times New Roman. Fonts can be purchased in collections such as those by Creating Keepsakes or Lettering Delights, but are also incredibly easy to find online.

Finding Fonts Online

There are a huge number of sites that provide fonts for download online. Fonts may be offered free for personal use, require purchase or  may have a condition attached such as shareware - essentially a trial of a font that may be missing other characters until you pay the fee, postcardware – where the creator asks you to send them a postcard in return for the use of the font, guiltware where the creator of the font asks you to send him or her money if you like it, charityware is when the font creator asks that you donate money to a cause in exchange for the use of the font. Most fonts you will find are only available for personal use. This means that if you plan to use the font in a commercial project you may need to pay for a commercial use licence as fonts are subject to copyright.

Commercial Use of Fonts:

There are a couple of ways for you to find out if a font can be used for commercial use or not.
* check to see if a ReadMe file came with the font when you downloaded it. Terms should be listed.
* go into the fonts folder and double click on the font in question. A window will open and will give you any copyright info, including the creators name etc
*  type the name of the font or the creators name into a search engine like google and see what comes up.
*  type in Font copyright into a search engine and have a look at some of the articles regarding copyright.
* contact the creator of the font directly.

You should check any information yourself as sometimes the fonts are offered for download with the Terms of Use removed or the site may be erroneous in describing the terms of the font. Failing to ascertain the terms of the font may leave you open for legal action.

You can browse through a font collection site like dafont.com or 1001fonts.com to find fonts you like the look of or you can use a search engine such as google.com to find specific fonts by using the search terms of the font name and the word “font”. This is a great way to find fonts that you may have seen in a scrapbook magazine. Below is a list of font sites as a starting point for finding fonts for your collection.

http://www.scrapnfonts.com/

http://www.1001fonts.com/index.html

http://www.scrapvillage.com/fonts123.htm

http://www.geocities.com/scrapbookfonts/themes.htm

http://www.momscorner4kids.com/fonts/index.htm

http://www.fonts.com/

http://simplythebest.net/fonts/free_fonts.html

http://www.fortunecity.com/skyscraper/dos/1232/fontindex.html

http://www.letteringdelights.com/

http://www.scraplink.com/fonts.htm

http://www.pccrafter.com

http://www.liquidfonts.com/listfont/a.htm

http://www.chank.com/freefonts.php

http://www.twopeasinabucket.com/shop.asp?contents=1561&category_id=2144

http://www.cropperscottage.com/cottage_font_basket.htm

http://fonts.tom7.com/fonts98.html

http://www.disneyexperience.com/fonts.htm

http://www.fontgarden.com/