Mac is Not a Typewriter

What are the advantages of a multiple column grid?
- The user of a multi-column grid is able to align several elements and organize them so they create a cohesive design. Breaks up the space. Create A-Symmetry. Use different column widths. FLEXIBILITY

How many characters is optimal for a line length? words per line?
- 45 to 75 characters per line (66 is mid-range, multi-column 40-50 - type size can help) Really wide = more leading

Why is the baseline grid used in design?
- the bottom of every line of text (the baseline) falls on a vertical grid set in even increments all the way down the page / all the text on your page lines up across all the columns, creating a harmonious vertical rhythm

What is a typographic river?
- Spaces between words in a body of text that create a blank flow of space vertically

From the readings what does clothesline or flow line mean?
- A flowline is an invisible line that leads your eyes through the text. Justified text only and when there aren't enough characters per line
- Clothesline - elements that align across the spread

How can you incorporate white space into your designs?
- Grouping things, don't put text on edges, keep white space towards the outside

What is type color/texture mean?
- The density of text - changing with leading and boldness

What is x-height, how does it effect type color?

- Larger the x-height, the darker the color

In justification or H&J terms what do the numbers: minimum, optimum, maximum mean?

- When a body of text is justified, it creates uneven spaces between words to lengthen or shorten the line to make the margins even. Minimum refers to tight spaces, optimum is optically correct, and maximum has large spaces between words

What are some ways to indicate a new paragraph. Are there any rules?

- The first paragraph should not have an indentation if other paragraphs do. You can bold the first line, add color fields, change the leading of the first line, change the kerning, change size, style, and color.

What are some things to look out for when hyphenating text?

- Do not hyphenate more than one word in a line. Avoid hyphenations that create words with syllables. Avoid more than two in a paragraph. Don't end the paragraph with a hyphenation.

What does CMYK and RGB mean?

- These are color spectrum (additive and subtractive) Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Black - Red, Green, Blue

What does hanging punctuation mean?

- It is when a quotation mark is not aligned in the body text, but is hanging just outside of it

What is the difference between a foot mark and an apostrophe?

- A foot mark is used for defining feet and is straight up and down. An apostrophe is angled and used to create conjunctions

What is the difference between an inch mark and a quote mark (smart quote)?

- Inches are vertical and quote marks are angled

What is a hyphen, en dash and em dashes, what are the differences and when are they used?

- En dashes are used to denote a time frame Monday - Friday (can't make on blogger) / Em dash - used for a pause or clause. It is the length of two dashes / A hyphen connects two words

What are ligatures, why are they used, when are they not used, what are common ligatures?

- Letters are joined as a single unit. fi, fl, ft, fffl, all these are combined onto one plate, they are not used with letters that fit on their own plate

My Flash

My Web

My Final Type Posters

Finally...

Sorrow

I have lost my flash drive, or left it in KC. So, I cannot post my final Type comps at the moment

Vis Con

I enjoyed the readings on the server. It gave me some ideas of how to represent my survey using typography. I thought that it was cool how you could make that visually interesting and get the point across. It doesn't have to be a bland pie chart. Unfortunately without my flash drive, the images will have to wait.

My Survey

Click Here to take survey

Series 2

Series 1

12 Interesting Crops

Refined Posters

Identifying Characteristics

Platelet.

The letter A. Most notable is the rounded apex and the two story lowercase letter. It has medium long legs, but nothing out of the ordinary.

B - round bowls with the middle bar not quite touching the stem. Lowercase b is just an uppercase form with a high reaching ascender.

C - nothing special except both lower and uppercase are identical

D- the bowl on the lowercase d is the same size as the uppercase D.

E- Uppercase has rounded top and bottom bars. Eye of the lowercase e is huge

F- lowercase reaches way higher than the cap-height

G - No spurs. Lowercase is a two story g which is uncommon in san serif fonts

H-P have similar characteristics to other letters

CEPT l – lowercase has a noticeably high ascender that can be recognized and distracting in body text

Q - both assume cap-like proportions

R-V - nada

W - Cap has a sharp apex and vertex, while lowercase is rounded

X - since all letters are monocase, there is no x-height for this font

Y - lowercase has a short descender in proportion to the rest of the letter

Z - upper and lower are the same

#s - they bounce up and down on the baseline

Font Research

Conor Mangat design Platelet in 1993. He was born in 1968 and is still alive.

It is a San serif font. According to Émigré, the font is under the geometric category.

WIKI: In typography, a sans-serif or sans serif typeface is one that does not have the small features called "serifs" at the end of strokes. The term comes from the French word sans, meaning "without".

In print, sans-serif fonts are more typically used for headlines than for body text.^[1] The conventional wisdom holds that serifs help guide the eye along the lines in large blocks of text. Sans-serifs, however, have acquired considerable acceptance for body text in Europe. They first appeared in the early 1920s and are characterized by geometric construction suggesting use of a compass.

3 Other Typefaces: Eurostyle, Futura, Gotham

Answers: There was a massive flood in the central US in 1993. It was deemed a “100 year floods”. Also the basement of the World Trade Center was bombing. A van with a bomb was parked below the North Tower. Six people died and injured over 1,000. The development of the first Pentium Chips were finalized and shipped out. World Wide Web is born at CERN.

The inspiration for Platelet came from the California license plate. Similar to the composing restrictions of the typewriter, the manufacture of license plates also requires the use of monospaced type; not only for mechanical requirements, but also to fulfill the need of fitting a fixed number of characters onto each plate while maximizing their legibility at a distance.

While Platelet is perhaps too fanciful for application on standard license plates, its usage might be suitable for the vanity plates, which the DMV offers at a higher price. The vanity plate owner is allowed to choose a customized arrangement of characters that usually spells a name, word, visual pun, palindrome, etc. Since the characters on vanity plates usually have a meaningful arrangement, they are immediately more memorable than a string of random characters, and therefore the design of letterforms could afford a lesser degree of legibility.

The “m” and “w” solve density problems by thinning out the middle stem. The lower case b is a mix of upper and lower to help readability. (Emigre Type Magazine)

Conor Mangat was born in 1968, in South East London. He studied Visual Communication locally, at Ravensbourne College of Design and Communication, graduating in 1991. The following year, he relocated to Southern California to join the MFA program at CalArts (from which he graduated in 1994), going on to complete a range of old and new media projects for the likes of MetaDesign in San Francisco, Metro Newspapers in Silicon Valley, FontShop International, and Monotype Typography. Since returning to London in 1999, he has established a freelance typographic design practice, while also studying towards a Masters in Typeface Design at Reading University.

Current work:

Do you have an opinion on the typographic representation of the euro?

If so, you are invited to participate in an online survey on the subject, which is part of a dissertation study that I am carrying out at The University of Reading in England.

When it was first announced, the euro symbol drew much informal comment, but little serious formal study. It has since slipped quietly into everyday usage with little further mention, and so it seems appropriate to gauge opinion once again - before it becomes just another topic for design history classes.

The survey (which is only seven questions) should take no more than a few minutes to complete, and will remain online for the next month or so, depending on the level of response. Please also encourage your colleagues and friends to take part, by pointing them to:

http://freespace.virgin.net/conor.mangat/euro/index.html

Your responses will not be used for purposes other than this study, though you should be aware that completion of the survey indicates your permission to be quoted/referenced in any subsequent project documentation.

Many thanks in advance for your time and cooperation (and apologies if you receive this message more than once).

- Conor Mangat

Font Classifications

Old Style – roman typefaces in 15 & 16 c., supposed to feel like calligraphy.
Caslon, Bembo, Janson

Transitional – sharper serifs, more of a vertical axis than old style, mid 18 c.
Didoni, Eurostile, ITC Franklin Gothic

Modern - designed by Bodoni in late 18^th c., thin straight serifs, sharp contrast of thick and thin
Kepler, ITC Century, Electra

Slab Serif – also called Egyptian, bold and decorative typefaces, 19^th c., heavy slab like serifs
Clarendon, American Typewriter, Belizio

Sans Serif – became common in 20^th c., small, lilting counter, calligraphic variations in line weight
Akzidenz Grotesk, Franklin Gothic, Future

Script – all are different, imperfection of handwriting, 21^st c., different weights, strokes, and connections
Mistral, School Script, Choc

Blackletter – used on newspapers, labels, scriptures, tattoos, etc. Famous for Old English, also became famous between 15^th and 16^th c.
Engravers Old English, Fette Fraktur, San Marco

Grunge – postmodernism and deconstructive typography (1980s), jarring aesthetic, appropriation of existing types
Escalido Streak, Dead History, Turbo Ripped

Monospaced – resemble typewriters, letters have specific width that are not the same, good for programming
OCR A, Courier, Orator

Undeclared – serifs attatched to sans serif typefaces

Optima, Copperplate Gothic,

Vis Com Post

So, what kind of paper to we want to print these things out on? Also, why is this due the day after the type project is due? I know you guys know when other stuff is due in classes. I also thing History of Design needs to not assign 4 page papers that make me go to a toy store.

I also am not super happy with my Nirvana. I guess I will just have to wait for critique to figure it out

Underware

I picked Underware do to its name. I think it’s funny, and it reminds me of a song. Reguardless, this is why they are important…

This type group was founded by three students from the Royal Academy of Arts in the Hague, in the Netherlands. (mouthful) They started Underware in 1999, so happy 10 year anniversary guys! The coolest thing I think they have done is developed the font that can only be read with the conditions of a sauna. It has to do with the ink and paper. They also conduct many workshops that run for extremely extended ours. They thrive on the creations that are the outcomes of group collaborations.

TypeRadio is a radio station that the company hosts that utilizes one on one interviews. The website consists of media clips that are about twenty minutes long that discuss anything from new typefaces to how people got started in the type and design field.

They are the designers of the South Park font. How cool is that? The font is called Bello and it is used in the title. That font is also used on a professional soccer team, FC Honka. They also design many typefaces that are used in Germany.

House Industries

I decided to write this one about House Industries because I just watched the season premiere of House, and it was GOOOD!!! House Industries was established by Andy Cruz and Rich Roat in 1993. Allen Mercer joined the twosome and the direction of the company moved forward to a product based company instead of focusing on service. Their first release of typefaces came in a batch of ten that was separated by categories. They were put on floppy disks and became the predecessor for how they would bundle the fonts later on. They became famous for these packaging designs. Every package was specific to a time period and style.

House Industries have a very diverse library of typefaces such as: Neutraface, Chalet, and OpenType font families including Studio Lettering and Ed Benguiat Fonts. I really like the Scubyzhouse. I am a big fan of Scooby Doo, so I could see the resemblance to the green lettering used on the old cartoons.

As I browse the website for their fonts, I realize I have seen one somewhere! Build-A-Bear uses the House Industries’ font “Fun House”. It is neat to see something in the real world that actually corresponds to something I am studying in class. Sadly, that is usually not the case.

Adobe Representative

Adobe is the typography mogul of today and the hero of the future. They have been in the type industry on computers since 1982. They are most famous for their contribution to the type world with the introduction of PostScript. PostScript is a language that is used by laser printers and on graphic systems. It basically lets whatever is using it know how the text is supposed to look.

Another huge breakthrough occurred when Microsoft teamed up with Adobe Systems to create the OpenType format. This allows for a cross-platform file format. Macs and PCs can convert to the OpenType format and transfer to one another. This makes life so much simpler for the crazy designer. Adobe converted all of their fonts into this format for windows based PCs. Since Adobe has several programs that are linked together in their creative suite, and Microsoft has multiple programs that use fonts, and cross platform font format makes everything simple for everyday users and professionals. This format also allows character expansion, supports personalized layouts, and can be used with specific typographic controls.

Adobe has created some of its own typefaces including: Trajan, Lithos, Chaparral, Utopia, and Poetica. They teamed up with several designers to create these fonts.

Vis Com Post 9/08

Even though I am sick right now, I will keep chugging away at my computer trying to decide if my refinements to one through five are good enough. It is really hard for me to figure out what makes a good gesture drawing. I don't really understand what I should be looking for or what I should strive for in this instance.

I am sad that I missed critique today. I really didn't feel well. I don't think it is Swine Flu because of my symptoms, but I didn't want to risk it. I did my 50 sketches of the seahorse for today. I have one that looks like it is made out of seaweed. The photocopied ones are kind of odd. I don't know how I feel about them. They seem bland.

I hope I will be better Thursday!

Adrian Frutiger

Adrian Frutiger was born March 24, 1928 in Interlaken, Switzerland. As common with most specialty crafts at the time, Frutiger began working as an apprentice in a printer’s shop. Later, he went to study at the Zurich School of Arts and Crafts.

When he was through with his education, Frutiger moved to Paris. He worked at a typefoundry, and this was about the same time he started creating his own typefaces. The first typeface he released was called President. He created this in 1952 and it would shape the rest of his fonts. Other fonts he created include’ Phoebus, Ondine, Meridien, Egyptienne, Univers, Apollo, Serifa, OCR-B, Iridium, Frutiger, Glypha, Icone, Breughel, Versailles, Avenir, and Vectora.

Univers was realeased in 1957 by the Deberny & Peignot type foundry. It is unique because when it was first designed, it had twenty-one different variations. These variations went by a number instead of a name. Currently there are twenty-seven variations. Univers works well on a large scale and is still very legible with a tiny font size. This may be do to the large x-height.

The Univers grid has different squares that show the variations of the font based on stroke, weight, and kerning.

http://www.typophile.com/node/12118

John Baskerville

Born in England in 1706, John Baskerville was ready to become a printing master. At an early age he was skilled in the art of stone engravings, but he started his life work as a printer and publisher in 1757. He moved on to be the expert printer at the University of Cambridge. As a master printer, Baskerville did not just stop at making fine print art, but he even improved inks and the presses he used.

Baskerville was highly influenced by the Italian Renaissance. He used their base forms but exaggerated the contrast of thick and thin strokes. The italics were really a show of his calligraphic skills. The Baskerville font really made use of this contrast. It is a serif typeface. It falls under the traditional category.

His letters usually were by themselves on a page without an icons or symbols to disrupt them. Baskerville was well known as a perfectionist. His typesetting almost seemed to be an obsession.
Although we view him now as one of the most prized typographers, Britain seemed to dislike his work. It wasn’t “up to par” with the other typographers of the time, but France and Italy caught on quick to his style and embraced him as their own.

John Baskerville departed this world in 1755. His memory lives on in font books everywhere.

http://www.infoplease.com/ce6/people/A0806405.html

http://www.biography.com/articles/John-Baskerville-9201386

http://typophile.com/node/14119?

Definitions 2

Definitions about Type

1. Absolute Measurement – measurements of fixed values; expressed in finite terms that cannot be altered

2. Relative Measurement – no prescribed or absolute size; it compares to something else in order to obtain a measurement

3. Point – unit of measurement used to measure the type size of a font; height of the type block (not the letter itself)

4. Pica – unit of measurement equal to 12 points that is commonly used for measuring lilnes of type

5. Em – relative unit of measurement used in typesetting to define basic spacing functions; linked to size of type. Increases and decreases correlating to the type size; also used for defining paragraph indents

6. En – unit of relative measurement equal to half of one em; it’s a type of dash (pgs 12-30)

7. Legibility – depends upon the ease with which the eye can identify letters, and distinguish them from one another; this can be relative since an isolated letter could be legible, but a grouping could be unreadable

8. Rag – occur when highly noticeable shapes form by the line ends of text blocks that distract from the reading; exaggerated slopes or noticeable inclines

9. Type Alignments – the arrangement of continuous lines of text - asymmetrical

a. Flush Left – type set to an even left margin, giving an uneven right margin

i. Pros – nearly eliminates margins, more readable, good with columns, word spacing stays constant

ii. Cons – seems informal, asymmetry disturbs balance

b. Flush Right – type set to an even right margin, giving uneven left margin, asymmetrical

i. Pros – good for small bodies of text, also good when left doesn’t work

ii. Cons – reduced readability

c. Centered – type set on a central axis, with even word spacing and ragged left and right margins

i. Pros – effective for single pages in formal context (title pages)

ii. Cons – reduced readability; absence of even left margin makes it hard for the eye to find the next line

d. Justified – space between the words is adjusted in each line, giving even margins both left and right

i. Pros – even margins give a neat rectangular text area

ii. Cons – space between words will vary from one line to the next, requires hyphenation, wide columns and large number of characters

10. Word Spacing – traditionally the spacing has been based upon a space equivalent to the body width of a lowercase i

a. Increases readability, greater continuity, and less interruption of the sentence

11. Rivers – river effect is created where white space gaps align through the text

12. Indent – text lines are moved from the margin by a specific amount; easy entry to a paragraph

13. Leading – the space between lines of text in a text block; increases readability

14. Kerning – automatic adjustments to the spacing of particular letter pairs; VA, Ta

15. Tracking – adjustments of overall space between letters rather than just two characters; creates an airy field

16. Weight – difference in the darkness of type images by width of lines; light, medium, heavy, bold, and black

17. Scale – increases in point size; more than 2 points

18. Typographic Variation – serves to clarify visually for the reader specific emphasis and prioritization

a. Typefaces, weights, sizes, bold, italic, small-cap fonts

19. Orphan – the final one or two lines of a paragraph separated from the main paragraph to form a new column; avoid at all costs

20. Widow – a lone word at the end of the paragraph

Vis Con - Reading 1

During the first part of the reading, which had to do with trademarks, all I could think about was the trademarks for Honda and Hyundai. They are so similar in size, shape, and color. The only real difference is the slant, and since these are mostly advertised on the actual car they represent, the fast moving vehicle is not really a good place to promote two extremely similar trademarks.

The next part was about communication. It mostly made me think of how technology really does use what they describe. The part about the graphics as a way of communicating ideas, values, and beliefs to the viewer really made me think about the business class I took in high school. We had to design a logo that when people saw it, they could easily identify the brand and what the meaning and philosophies behind the brand are.

The comic part...I didn't really enjoy it, nor did it make me think about anything more than X-Men.

Josef Muller Brockmann

Josef Muller Brockmann is a man defined by words such as mathematical, minimalist, clean, and even throw in Bauhaus and International Style. He was born on May 9, 1914 in Switzerland. He could be described as “highly modern”. He was the founder of the tri-lingual journal, “New Graphic Design.” This journal explores graphics by placement, design, type, theories, societies, and cultures.

His work in 1951 focused around concert posters that really defined his style. His way of designing these posters expressed his truly mathematical mind and emotional detachment from his subjects and projects.

The GRID. Brockmann created a grid that specifies itself with columns and rows. Gutters and margins are also key components on this grid. Designs can occupy one module or several modules. Variations are never ending.

“I still reserve the right, at any time, to doubt the solutions furnished by the Modular, keeping intact my freedom, which must depend on my feelings rather than my reason.” Brockmann

The quote above illustrates problems that many graphic designers have with using a grid. They find that it limits creativity, and does not allow for larger processes to be displayed on the project. But, as you see above, Brockmann even denies using the strict guidelines of his very own creation for every project. He understands the need to break the mold and not be mathematical.

He published several works, such as, The Graphic Artist and his Design Problems, A history of Visual Communication, A History of the Poster, and Grid Systems in Graphic Design”. He has also won many awards. He died in Zurich in 1996.

Jan Tschihold is...

Tschichold began his schooling the art of calligraphy and designing at the Leipzig Academy of Graphic Arts and Book Production. He was born in Germany in 1902 and died in 1974. He joined the Modernist movement after the 1923 exhibition of Bauhaus. He was arrested in 1933 by the Nazis for his ideas and media promotions. He was deemed a danger to the German people, which tells his followers something about how openly expressive he was with his ideas and how public he was with his art and type. Tschichold made many posters that express the avant-garde of New Typography. He is important for using serifless typefaces. These were important because they were revolutionary approaches to typography design. In 1946, Tschihold became the art director at Penguin Books.

The typefaces that Jan Tschihold is famous for are Transit, which he developed in 1931. Saskia which he worked on from 1931 to 1932. Zeus was also developed in 1931. His most recent typeface was produced in 1966/1997. It is called Sabon. The latter can be reproduced on both Monotype and Linotype systems.

Tschihold wrote a several books of his craft including The New Typography. It was first published in Germany in 1928. Many artists agree that this is the epitome of modern typography. This book includes Tschihold’s theories and guides the reader through different aspects of art including; architecture, art history, social criticisms, and even his take on photography as an art form. At the end of the book, Tschihold gives the reader guidelines to follow when using certain type groups and the size of the project or sheet.

A classic, and more traditional, typography book that Tschihold wrote is Treasury of Alphabets and Lettering. This book holds type and letters from the past and Tschohold’s own time. He selected by hand the one hundred and seventy letters and type. This book explores letters a

s an art form, and how that interpretation allows for good and bad design. Word spacing, line spacing, styles, groups of letters, and signs are looked at on a whole and individually within designs. It was first published in 1966.

Other works that Jan Tschihold contributed to or produced on his own include; The Form of the Book: Essays on the Morality of Good Design (Classic Typography Series), Asymmetric Typography, and Designing Books. Planning a Book. Atypographer’s Composition Rules. Fifty-Eight Examples by the Author. Of course, being an extremely influential artist and a corner stone in the twentieth century, other authors have jumped on the band wagon and written their own odes to this type master. Some document his famous posters while others, like Christopher Burk’s book, document Tschihold himself and his modernist take on typography.

The Tschihold grid was created, of course, by Jan Tschihold. It is a grid that uses a specific formula to create a layout that promotes proportion. It is supposed to help the designer to cre

ate clear compositions. It also allows for the gather of all design elements, such as graphics and texts. The Grid

Definitions Part 1

Define Grid - This can be defined as something that breaks up space into regular units; a regular system of coordinates

Why do designers use a grid? Benefits and functions?

- It helps designers organize the information they have. It increases uniformity throughout the page or design. The advantage of using a grid is that designers have a tested structure that they can input their information in. It's function is to help designers with a basic template.

Modular Grid - It's a grid that divides the whole into smaller parts called modules.

Define Margins - The area between live space and the outer edge of the design

Define Columns - A line of units following one after another

Define Grid Modules - smaller parts of a grid that hold information

Define Flow lines - Lines that go between symbols our characters

Define Gutter - The space between modules

Define Hierarchy - A system where individual objects or categories are ranked by importance or features

Ways to achieve clear hierarchy - Placement, weight or type size, scale, graphic elements

Define Type Family - A set of type faces that have the same design characteristics

Define Type Styles - Weights: regular, bold, italic - Widths: regular, condensed, extended