This is especially impressive given that Google’s service competes directly with Extensis’ own WebINK product. Adding support for these fonts was a terrific idea and gives a nice productivity boost to anyone using them in InDesign, Photoshop or Illustrator. And Google is constantly adding to the list. These free, open source fonts from Google are marketed toward web designers and developers but they’re equally suitable for print or epublishing. The Extensis panel also supports Google web fonts. ![]() Select the font and it’s instantly activated.īut there’s more. Using the new Extensis panel (found under Window > Extensions in all supported Creative Suite applications) you can either scroll to the font you need or search for it. But with version 4, activation is a snap. With Suitcase Fusion’s auto-activation, if the font is present on your system it will be found and activated when opening the file.įor Creative Suite and QuarkXPress users, activating fonts in earlier versions of Suitcase Fusion required leaving (and in some cases closing) your application along with any files you were working on. There’s no bigger frustration than opening a file to work on and being greeted with a missing font alert. This is a real time saver when looking to freshen up a design without going too far. A slider is available to narrow the relevance, and the matches can be made based on style or classification. The color picker is very intuitive and allows you set the font color and the background.Īnother very useful feature, Quick Match allows the user to select a font and find similar fonts by right clicking and choosing Quick Match. This is especially handy in the initial phase of design and can really speed things up for those among us who take a more visual approach to choosing fonts. One of the new features added to the interface is the ability to choose a color for the font preview. When you restart, the fonts are no longer active and won’t hog any system resources. Using temporary activation is especially nice when you’re starting a project and experimenting with different typefaces. All libraries and sets are retained.įonts can be activated on a permanent or temporary basis for a set, a font family, or an individual font. For example, you can create a set with all of the fonts with “Adobe” in their name:įor upgraders from Suitcase Fusion 3, the installation is seamless. These are sets that you can create based on search criteria. Smart sets take that idea that one step further. Adding new fonts is a simple drag and drop procedure. ![]() From there you can create individual sets that can be activated or deactivated with a click. ![]() Once installed, Suitcase Fusion takes an inventory of all your installed fonts and puts them in a library. This of course was somewhat like herding cats, only a bit more frustrating since cats do tend to be much cuter than fonts. Prior to that, I just figured that managing fonts meant installing and uninstalling them as needed. I’ve been using Suitcase Fusion since version 3 was released in 2010 and have grown completely dependent upon it to activate fonts when opening up InDesign and Illustrator files. It’s available for Windows and Mac for $99. Suitcase Fusion 4 is the latest upgrade to Extensis’ flagship font manager that began its life as a merger of two programs, Suitcase and Font Reserve. Font Doctor included for free.Ĭons: Inconsistent support throughout Creative Suite applications. Auto-activation support for InDesign CS3–CS6, Illustrator CS3–CS6, InCopy CS4–CS6, Photoshop CS4–CS6, and QuarkXPress 7–9. Pros: Easily manage thousands of fonts, including Google Web Fonts and WebINK fonts.
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