Animated: Please, no. Web pages have far too many annoying
non-stop looped animated ads. Text would be even worse.

However, afaik, sometimes a different color (often red?)
was used in some manuscripts for special "markup". I'm
reminded (as a recorder player) being told that the word
"hemiola" referred originally to red (color of blood) markup.

What I'm referring to is that modern computer technology
permits the use of color (and animation, perish the thought)
as part of the definition of a character. "Color-blind"
people should be considered; they are too often ignored.

Nevertheless, at least from the standpoint of rendering technology,
if not yet typographical-design software (and font-data handlers),
it is practical to use color as part of the design of a set of
characters. Swapping among many pens as one wrote, to change
colors very often, was plainly quite impractical, but that's no
longer a restriction.

As to how color would serve semantic aspects of a character, I haven't
really devoted any particular thought; nevertheless, inspired
artist/typographers should have some ideas. Although serious type-design
software (afaik) seems to be monochromatic, icon design/editing software
is plainly polychromatic. Extending type-design software to include icon-
design tools would be a first attempt.

Naturally, I'm well aware that there are probably lots of fonts
that use color for decorative purposes, but, afaik, all glyphs are
strictly graphic files; you can't type text with them.

Best regards,

--
Nicholas Bodley |@| Waltham, Mass.
Opera browser fan/user
typing black text on a white ground