Re: Barline scans

[Jan Nieuwenhuizen]

Marnen Laibow-Koser <address@hidden> writes:

> Then that was the luck of the draw.  I basically chose a few books
> more or less at random, and added some editions whose aesthetics I
> like (such as Henle).  I will be trying to enlarge my sample and
> seeing if the numbers change.
>
> Or should I say: Congratulations, you found some heavily printed
> editions. :)

Thanks :-), but I knew where to look of course.  When designing bar
lines, we were looking for a practice that was backed by big houses,
but also something interesting or exceptional(ly beautiful), rather
than something too common and `looking also ok'.

> Then this may be current practice.  In that case, shouldn't Lilypond
> keep up with the times?

I'm not sure, can you tell me?  We should not close our eyes to new
practices, but look why things change rather than blindly following.
LilyPond was started because we felt that current practice was going
down, quality-wise.

> Not at all.  I love Henle's engraving, which is quite dark.
> Lilypond's dark look is OK with me in general.  I object to that one
> point of barlines that are so much thicker than the staff lines.

> I wonder.  However, I'll bet that most people who think that Lilypond
> output is ugly just don't bother to use the program or say anything.
> I am trying to offer constructive suggestions so that Lilypond can
> come closer to its stated goals.

Okay, I'm very glad to hear that.  Also, I apologise if I was a bit
harsh.  You put quite some effort in something that I haven't looked
at for years, which is a very good thing.

> I'm biased because I have a preference?  That's ridiculous.  I didn't

(No offence intended, but it is a quite masterful mind that is not
biased when it has made strong judgments.)

> even *know* I thought thick barlines were ugly until I saw Lilypond's
> use of them.  And obviously, that's not the only factor: I don't think
> Bärenreiter or Peters are ugly editions.

That is interesting.  When printed on my printer, LilyPond's staff and
bar lines give the same impression as the two samples that I scanned
(when scanned and measured, Lily's bar lines are thinner even, but
that's why looking is so important).  So what you find ugly *cannot*
be the bar lines in itself: it must be that you see something else.
It could be artifacts of you printer, it could be a font or spacing
issue.  Can you try to find what that is?

>> Compromising into making our bar lines a bit thinner is not going
>> to make him happy anyway.
>
> What makes you say that?  That's also ridiculous.

Good question.  It must have been from what I read between the lines.
Sorry, I'll take that back.

> As I recall, Feta looks very little like Bärenreiter notation.  If you
> want to mimic Bärenreiter, perhaps an overhaul of the font is in order
> -- after all, all the graphic details are interdependent to some
> degree.

No, I'm afraid that we cannot do that even if we would like to.  I'm
not even sure if we can say that we mimick Bärenreiter's bar lines
(copyright-wise) but it is probably OK to be inspired editions of a
select group of publishers.

Greetings,
Jan.

-- 
Jan Nieuwenhuizen <address@hidden> | GNU LilyPond - The music typesetter
http://www.xs4all.nl/~jantien       | http://www.lilypond.org