View source for Ray Larabie

{{BLP sources|date=February 2012}}
{{Infobox person
| name               = Ray Larabie
| image              = 
| caption            = 
| birth_date         = {{birth year and age|1970}}
| birth_place        = [[Ottawa, Ontario]], [[Canada]]
| death_date         = 
| death_place        = 
| death_cause        = 
| resting_place      = 
| nationality        = 
| known_for          = Designing novelty computer fonts
| alma_mater         = 
| occupation         = [[Typographer]], [[Type designer]]
| years_active       = 1996&ndash;present
}}

'''Raymond Larabie''' (born 1970) is a Canadian [[designer]] of [[TrueType]] and [[OpenType]] [[computer fonts]]. He owns ''Typodermic Fonts'' [[type foundry]], which distributes both commercially licensed and [[shareware]]/[[freeware]] fonts.

==Biography and career==

{{Infobox font
| name = Snasm
| sample = [[File: Typeface specimen Snasm.svg|220px]]
}}

Larabie was born in [[Ottawa, Ontario]], Canada. In his self-published autobiography, he states that he spent much of his childhood in the [[cottage country]] of the [[Ottawa Valley]], an isolated environment that did not allow him to have traditional friendships or social activites, and thus spent much of his time learning computers and typography; he graduated from [[Sheridan College]] with a degree in [[classical animation]], a field that was largely obsolete by the time he received his degree.<ref name=autobiography>Larabie, Raymond (August 10, 2020). ''[https://typodermicfonts.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/between-the-lines-v1.pdf Between the Lines: The Hidden Stories of Typodermic Fonts]''. Retrieved August 21, 2024.</ref> Larabie was employed at [[Rockstar Canada]] and had contributed his designs to multiple [[video game]] titles, including the hit series' ''[[Grand Theft Auto]]'' and ''[[Max Payne (video game)|Max Payne]]'', before he quit the company in 2002 to focus full-time on [[type design]], after having released a series of [[freeware]] fonts over the Internet under the brand LarabieFonts since 1996.<ref>Cabarga, Leslie. ''Logo, Font, & Lettering Bible: A Comprehensive Guide to the Design, Construction, and Usage of Alphabets and Symbols.'' Cincinnati, OH: HOW Design, 2004. 237.</ref> Larabie recalled an incident in which Rockstar had used his Pricedown font for the ''Grand Theft Auto'' logo, completely unaware that its designer was their own employee.<ref name=autobiography/> He moved to [[Nagoya, Japan]] in 2008, maintaining his Canadian citizenship<ref name=autobiography/> and returning to the country briefly in 2017 to celebrate its sesquicentennial.<ref name=designersfume/>

Larabie primarily specializes in novelty [[Typeface|typefaces]] that are intended for use in [[desktop publishing]] and [[graphic design]]. The [[logo]] for ''Grand Theft Auto'', for instance, uses Larabie's Pricedown font, which is based on the logo for the international game show ''[[The Price Is Right]]'', as well as for the [[Disney]] animated series ''[[Fillmore!]]''. In addition to game shows, Larabie has also used 1960s and 1970s graphic logos, computer emulation, and other inspirations to design his fonts; most of his designs are display faces not meant for [[body text]], with Larabie acknowledging that he had difficulties with [[italic type]] and, especially in his early career, had difficulties adapting [[katakana]] and [[hiragana]] to his designs.<ref name=autobiography/><!-- section: Injekuta --> He is particularly known for his “ubiquitous futuristic and sci-fi fonts”; Larabie specialized in that style early in his [[career]] because he felt that, other than a few examples such as [[Bank Gothic]], [[Microgramma (typeface)|Microgramma]] and [[Eurostile]], the market for that style was underserved.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.howdesign.com/design-creativity/typodermic-fonts-raymond-larabie-type-technology-sci-fi-fonts/|title=Typodermic's Raymond Larabie Talks Type, Technology & Science Fiction|first=Jason|last=Tselentis|date=August 28, 2017|work=How|access-date=October 29, 2017|archive-date=April 18, 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180418150848/http://www.howdesign.com/design-creativity/typodermic-fonts-raymond-larabie-type-technology-sci-fi-fonts/|url-status=dead}}</ref>

Two of his typeface families, Marion and [[Clarendon (typeface)|Superclarendon]], are released with [[macOS]].<ref>{{cite web|title=Fonts included with Mavericks|url=https://support.apple.com/en-gb/HT201375|publisher=Apple|access-date=8 July 2015}}</ref><ref name="Marion MyFonts">{{cite web|last1=Larabie|first1=Ray|title=Marion|url=https://www.myfonts.com/fonts/typodermic/marion/|website=MyFonts|publisher=Monotype|access-date=8 July 2015}}</ref> Larabie's "Canada 150" is an extended version of his previous font Mesmerize (in turn based on 1920s calligraphic German sans-serifs such as [[Semplicità]], [[Nobel (typeface)|Nobel]] and [[Kabel (typeface)|Kabel]]) with [[Cyrillic alphabet|Cyrillic]] and First Nations alphabets included; it was commissioned by the [[Government of Canada]] to be the official typeface for the country's [[150th anniversary of Canada|sesquicentennial]]. The government paid him nothing for the custom work,<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://qz.com/574312/canadas-official-new-united-font-was-designed-to-include-aboriginal-languages/|title = Canada's new national font was designed to include aboriginal languages| date=16 December 2015 }}</ref> which he subsequently placed into the [[public domain]]. He would proceed to release large portions of his Larabie Fonts library (inasmuch as he could, since some of the designs were derived from freeware that turned out to be copyrighted and thus could not be re-released), along with less successful designs for Typodermic, into the public domain in 2020, 2022 and 2024.<ref name=pdfonts>[https://typodermicfonts.com/public-domain/ 142 Early Typodermic Fonts Released Into the Public Domain]. Retrieved December 25, 2020.</ref><ref name=autobiography/>

Larabie has drawn controversy for releasing fonts freely; other professional designers (among them Graphics Designers of Canada president Adrian Jean and competing type designer Rod McDonald) took particular umbrage at Canada 150, arguing that the government should have paid for a professionally drawn type because it had the money to do so, because not doing so would be a vote of no confidence in up-and-coming Canadian designers, and that professional designers would publish a superior product.<ref name=designersfume/> Larabie responded to the criticism by noting that he appreciated that Canada had chosen a work by a Canadian artist (contrasting it with the use of [[Helvetica]], of Swiss origin, on Canadian money) and said "You can’t just throw a couple hundred grand at a problem and that’s the solution for every problem."<ref name=designersfume>{{cite news| url = https://www.thestar.com/news/insight/2016/01/12/designers-fume-over-free-font-for-canadas-150th-birthday.html| title = Designers fume over free font for Canada's 150th birthday {{!}} The Star| newspaper = The Toronto Star| date = 12 January 2016| last1 = Daubs| first1 = Katie}} </ref> He noted that when he had previously attended typography conferences, he had received the cold shoulder from attendees who felt he was threatening their business.<ref name=designersfume/> In another case, attorneys for [[Metallica]] sent Larabie a [[cease and desist order]] over one of his freeware fonts, Pastor of Muppets, for having taken letter designs from Metallica's [[wordmark]]; though Larabie maintained that, as Americans, they could not claim copyright over character designs as they did not meet a [[threshold of originality]], he complied with the order (also noting that the use of the [[Muppets]] name could have drawn further trademark challenges), but found that the font had been too widely distributed to withdraw it from all the sites that had begun distributing it. Metallica never pressed any further action and Larabie, in his autobiography, stated that he wanted nothing further to do with the font and would never release it again.<ref name=autobiography/>

==Typefaces==
*Coolvetica—an eccentric neo-grotesque sans-serif based on Chalet and 1970s [[Helvetica]], Larabie's most popular font
*Foo—used for ''[[Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars]]''  ({{abbr|PD|public domain}})<ref name=pdfonts/>
*Neuropol—a modified version of which was used in the wordmark for the [[2006 Winter Olympics]]<ref name=neuropol-olympics>{{cite web|url=https://www.behance.net/gallery/6451631/Corporate-Identity-XX-Olympic-Winter-Games-Torino-2006|title=Corporate Identity XX Olympic Winter Games Torino 2006|first=Antonino|last=Benincasa|work=behance.net|date=March 4, 2014|access-date=December 28, 2020}}</ref> ({{abbr|PD|public domain}})<ref name=pdfonts/>
*Pricedown—used for the logo of ''[[Grand Theft Auto]].'' Based upon Pinto Flare.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Pinto Flare in use |url=https://fontsinuse.com/typefaces/38256/pinto-flare |access-date=2024-06-29 |website=Fonts in Use |language=en}}</ref>
*[[Stereofidelic]] ({{abbr|PD|public domain}})<ref name=pdfonts/>
*Mesmerize, inspired from [[Nobel (typeface)|Nobel]] ({{abbr|PD|public domain}})<ref name=pdfonts/>
*Kawashiro Gothic, Japanese gothic typeface based on the Mesmerize typeface
*Canada 1500, based on the Mesmerize typeface; supports Greek, Cyrillic, Vietnamese, and [[Canadian Aboriginal syllabics]]<ref>{{cite web|title=Canada 1500|url=https://typodermicfonts.com/canada1500/|publisher=Typodermic Fonts|access-date=18 September 2020}}</ref> ({{abbr|PD|public domain}})<ref name=pdfonts/>
*Blue Highway, based upon the [[Highway Gothic|American highway sign typeface]] ({{abbr|PD|public domain}})<ref name=pdfonts/> and its commercial counterpart Expressway
*Ethnocentric

==Samples==
{{gallery|title=Fonts by Ray Larabie
|File:Grand Theft Auto logo series.svg|Pricedown, as seen in the ''Grand Theft Auto'' wordmark
|File:Coolvetica.png|Coolvetica (top, compared to its inspiration [[Helvetica]] below) is, according to Larabie, his most downloaded font by far.
|File:Logo Mass Effect.svg|Korataki, Larabie's most purchased commercial font, is used in the wordmark for video game ''[[Mass Effect]]''.
|File:Stereofidelic.png|[[Stereofidelic]]
|File:Torino 2006 logo at Palavela.jpg|Neuropol (modified) in use in the [[2006 Winter Olympics|Torino 2006]] wordmark
|File:Canada 150 Street Banner on the Alexandra Bridge in Ottawa, Canada.jpg|Canada1500 (Mesmerize) in use for its original purpose on the [[150th anniversary of Canada|Canada 150]] wordmark
|File:WVTT25.png|Anklepants, a font based on [[Westinghouse Broadcasting]] wordmarks, in use in a former logo for [[WVTT-CD|WVTT]] in [[Olean, New York]]
}}

==See also==
*[[Open-source Unicode typefaces]]
*[[List of type designers]]
*[[Cartier (typeface)]]

==References==
{{reflist}}

==External links==
*[http://www.mobygames.com/developer/sheet/view/developerId,377/ Ray Larabie] at [[MobyGames]]
*[http://typodermicfonts.com/ Typodermic Fonts]
*[https://www.myfonts.com/foundry/Typodermic/ Typodermic on MyFonts]
*[http://www.fontspring.com/foundry/typodermic Typodermic on Fontspring]
*{{IMDB name|nm2391669}}

{{Authority control}}

{{Free and open-source typography}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Larabie, Ray}}
[[Category:1970 births]]
[[Category:Living people]]
[[Category:Artists from Ottawa]]
[[Category:Canadian typographers and type designers]]
[[Category:Independent type foundries]]
[[Category:Canadian expatriates in Japan]]
[[Category:Sheridan College animation program alumni]]