You guys might be interested in this here:
http://imagaro.com/
I don't think you need the professional version. If anything, the program can also line-trace, fairly accurately, logos and artwork which might be useful as well.
I agree Peter. This has been the bane for many years, and in particular since the advent of all those TrueType fonts - the ones you can get 10,000 fonts for $10.00 on DVD. The problem is some nitwit will take Helvetica, and create an altered version of it, perhaps lower the X-height, and make it a bit fatter, then call it something else, all to avoid paying royalties back to the original creation house. Now there's a new font! Not! Then a designer uses it for something and wants a T-shirt done, however, most designers have no clue when it comes to production, and the artwork will need to be re-output or recreated to make it screen-ready. Herein lies the problem, the screen printer or prepress company now has to research the font, and because this isn't Helvetica, but is close, they end up substituting the wrong font, cause weird spacing issues.
Granted, a library of authentic fonts is expensive. Back when I worked in the industry, the complete 10,000 or 15,000 font library from Agfa cost something like $900 or more; the same from Adobe was much higher. Like everything else, this goes towards the royalties that are paid back to the type-houses such as ITC, Monotype (Agfa now), Merganthaler, and others. The thing is if the real deal is used, then it's easy to identify. In GE's case, however, this is normal. Many companies have variants on standard fonts and have design houses create the fonts for them. There is most likely a complete set of characters too to ensure that all their corporate books, equipment, and everything else has the same look.
John
