Photoshop Fonts for commercial use

[Amanda32021612ajd6]

I would like to start a business creating printables. Such as planners and homeschool curriculum. Are all fonts in my Photoshop application authorized for this use, without getting separate permission? Also, can I use the fonts to make curriculum for young children to trace for learning early penmanship? For example a page with the letter A repeated a few times or a page with the child's name where the font was modified for tracing. If I need to use my own handwriting for this I can, however, I prefer the cleaner lines of a font. Thanks for your help. 

[Abambo]

Check here the fonts licensing: https://helpx.adobe.com/fonts/using/font-licensing.html

You can use any creation you do commercially, even if it includes Adobe fonts. Check just this: 

Can I use the fonts to make stencils, stickers, jewelry, or anything else that features a single letter or glyph?

No. You may not create a product that is individual glyphs from the font files, e.g. an alphabet set of each letter to spell out your own phrase. Creating products from individual glyphs is not allowed in any format.

[Amanda32021612ajd6]

To make sure I understand this correctly, I can create the printables and sell them using the pre installed fonts. However, the tracing pages I want to create are NOT authorized? I would need to purchase a separate license or create the lettering by hand using my own handwriting?

[Amanda32021612ajd6]

For example these pages would show the letter "A" about 3 times and then blank lines after for handwriting practice. The child would trace over the typed letter and then try to write the letter on there own. Same concept with numbers, sight words and/or the child's name. 

[Abambo]

You are asking questions that probably a lawyer can answer you. It's difficult to assert use for any given application, if they touch on soecific needs. I would now if I could yose a certain use case. It may be cheaper (as an alternative to consulting a lawyer) to simply buy the single font file you need from the foundry, giving that the restriction is not in. 

But especially for education purposes, there are a) many exceptions to the general copyright law and b) different providers, creating free for use assets. You need to check the licensing that comes with those assets, to see how and when you can use them. 

Google also publishes a bunch of fonts with less restrictions. You can also check there. 

[Bobby Henderson]

Here is an important detail. Letters (or glyphs) on their own are not subject to copyright. No one can take ownership of a letter in an alphabet. This is one reason why there are "clone" fonts of Helvetica, such as Nimbus Sans, Swiss 721 BT, Triumvirate, etc. However, digital font data is proprietary. But if the type objects are converted to raw vector outlines they are no longer font objects, just vector shapes.

Still the safest approach for something like a retail product is creating unique letter forms, even if they look like a copycat of an existing typeface. Type companies who created "clone" fonts of a classic typeface like Helvetica took steps other than merely grabbing one company's font data and renaming it. They drew and digitized the letters from scratch. The copycat versions of Helvetica don't line up perfectly with the original. The differences give those companies additional legal cover.

[Abambo]

The issue here is not: can I design a new font that looks like Helvetica, but can I use a font from Adobe fonts to produce some assets? You are limited here to your contract (licensing agreement) with Adobe, which allows certain actions and disallows others.

And yes, you can't copyright a character like A, but you can probably copyright a typeface containing a whole alphabet and having some unique attributes. And a font file is copyrighted and distributed according to a license that limits its use (not exactly usability).

[Bobby Henderson]

Typeface names can be copyrighted or even turned into registered trademarks. The font data in a digital typeface can also be copyrighted. The letter shapes cannot be copyrighted. If someone creates a graphic design for commercial purposes and converts the lettering in the design to outlines the file will no longer hold any proprietary font data. Plenty of commercial documents have live font data in them. If I had to pay some additional royalty to a type foundry every time I used a digital typeface in my work I would just have to create all my lettering by hand and not give any type designers any more of my business. No more buying fonts from anybody. The legal stuff does cut both ways.

It sounds like the original poster intended to create designs that featured more than just a plain letter on a page. She wanted to create documents for learning curriculum. Even if it's just a few letters repeated on a page, a child's name, etc that still sounds a lot different than merely trying to redistribute font data for financial gain. Still, if I was in her position and had any doubts, I'd just visit the Google Fonts site and find something good (and open source) there to download and not worry about it.

[Abambo]

I never looked into what is copyright and what is licensing terms when using fonts. Please keep in mind, fonts come with a license and that license gives you some rights. With Adobe fonts, you can use the font to create a logo, but you cannot create a single character visual.

Copy/paste from the licensing FAQ:

Can I use the fonts to make stencils, stickers, jewelry, or anything else that features a single letter or glyph?

No. You may not create a product that is individual glyphs from the font files, e.g. an alphabet set of each letter to spell out your own phrase. Creating products from individual glyphs is not allowed in any format.

(Important here is the "anything else that features a single letter or glyph")

And before Apple sued Samsung for round corners and round buttons, I would never thought that this would be an issue.