TYPE in 30
pages
TYPE in 30
pages
Anna-Marie Pinto PGDP
Dedicated to all ‘‘Typography-curious’’ souls...
FINDING YOUR WAY
1
2 3
4
5
WHAT IS TYPOGRAPHY? EVOLUTION OF TYPE CLASSIFICATION OF TYPE ANATOMY & TERMINOLOGY BIBLIOGRAPHY
1
What is Typography?
INTRODUCTION
Typography is both an art and a technique. Once created through printed materials (remember Johannes Gutenberg’s printing press?), typography is all about arranging type (letters or characters) in a way that enables learning and recognition. However, typography is more than just the design of the letters and characters -- it also involves careful arrangement and selection of point size, line length, and spacing both on a single line and throughout an entire page. If you know the ‘basics of typography, you will be able to lay out an arrangement of headers, paragraphs, etc. in an attractive and convincing way.
Typography is absolutely everywhere -- just look at your phone, a billboard, your coffee cup, or even the different styles used in this blog post. Once you’re conscious about the fact that typography is used all around you, you’ll start to recognize the differences between typefaces and why they might’ve been selected. An artful craft since the days of moveable type, today’s digital designers have an unimaginable array of possibilities when it comes to choosing typefaces. Whether on paper, screen or in e-ink, legibility and expression are paramount.
2
Evolution of Type
Writing is one of the most fundamental forms of communication, and it traces its roots back to hieroglyphs or pictograms. Used by ancient civilizations of the world to represent ideas, these images soon evolved into alphabets and phonographic writing, which led to the development of various typographic systems. Egyptian hieroglyphs and Chinese ideograms are early forms of this picture writing, It is Phoenicians who are credited with creating the very first alphabet and around 1000 B.C.—the same alphabet was used by the
Greeks. In fact, the word Alphabet is a combination of the first two Greek letters, Alpha and Beta. The Romans, after several years, used this Greek Alphabet and on the basis of the same, styled the Uppercase Alphabet, which is still used today. They also refined the art of handwriting and fashioned a number of different styles of lettering. Additionally, they also introduced different scri pts – formal and informal for official and unofficial writings respectively.
Evolution of type timeline
Our modern English alphabet is a child of the Latin alphabet or Roman alphabet, which evolved from a western version of the Greek alphabet approximately 2,700 years ago. The profession of typography was essentially born in Germany with Johannes Gutenberg’s invention of a movable metal type printing press in the early 1450s. The
individual pieces of metal type that Gutenberg worked with were not letters, but letterforms. The model for the first movable types was Blackletter (also know as Block, Gothic, Fraktur or Old English), a heavy, dark, at times almost illegible — to modern eyes — scri pt that was common during the Middle Ages.
Humanist styles superseded Blackletter and was a little easier to read. Old style simply mimicked the handwriting of earlier Italian scholars and scribes. Transitional� is an inadequate name for it, and this category may also be termed Neoclassical or Realist. . The details become very refined. Modern takes the stylistic progression of the Old Style and Transitional
typefaces to its ultimate conclusion: super fat thick strokes contrast with hairline thin strokes with abrupt, right angle serifs. Slab was originally created for advertising, posters and other large media, Abrupt serifs, usually in heavy weights, and a nononsense attitude are the trademarks of this style.
During the 1800s a system of classifying type was derived, and although numerous other systems and subsets of this system exist, this basically is it: Humanist | Old Style | Transitional | Modern Slab Serif (Egyptian) | Sans Serif
3
Classification of Type
Most typefaces can be classified into one of four basic groups: those with serifs, those without serifs, scripts and decorative styles. Over the years, typographers and scholars of typography have devised various systems to more definitively categorize typefaces – some of these systems have scores of sub-categories.
Serif Type Styles
Script Type Styles
• Old Style • Transitional • Neoclassical & Didone • Slab • Clarendon • Glyphic
• Formal • Casual • Calligraphic • Blackletter & Lombardic
Sans Serif Type Styles
Decorative
• Grotesque • Square • Humanistic • Geometric
• Grunge • Psychedelic • Graffiti
Aa
Baskerville Old style
Serifs
Serifed typefaces include semi-structural details on many of the letters. People often refer to them as feet, although that is in no way a proper anatomical term when referring to typography. Their are many different classifications for serifed typefaces, often named
for their origins, including Grecian, Latin, Scotch, Scotch Modern, French Old Style, Spanish Old Style, Clarendon and Tuscan. Some of these classifications can also be placed into broader classifications of typography.
Aa Futura regular
A sans-serif typeface is a typeface without serifs. They can be found in history as early as the 5th century, although the classical revival of the Italian Renaissance return to old style serifed typefaces made them virtually obsolete until the 20th century. Their was much development of sansserif typefaces in Germany
as a revolt against the ornate lettering of the popular Blackletter styles which led to sans-serif typefaces based on the purity of geometric forms. Much like serifed typefaces, there are many different classifications for sans-serif typefaces, including Gothic, Grotesque, Doric, Linear, Swiss and Geometric
Sans serif
Aa Brush Script, Italics
Script
Script typefaces are based on the forms made with a flexible brush or pen and often have varied strokes reminiscent of handwriting. There are many different classifications including Brush Script, English Roundhand and Rationalized Script. However, the broadest forms of classification are Formal Script and Casual Script. Formal Scripts are based on the developments
and writings of 17th and 18th century handwriting masters such as George Bickham, George Shelley and George Snell. Casual scripts developed in the 20th century as a result of phototypesetting and are more varied and the inconsistencies appear to have been a result of using a wet pen rather than a pen nib.
Snap ITC
This is the largest category and also the most diverse. Rarely used for lengthy blocks of text, decorative typefaces are popular for signage, headlines and similar situations were a strong typographic statement is desired. They frequently reflect an aspect of culture – such as tattoos or graffiti – or evoke a particular state of mind, time period or theme.
Many – such as psychedelic or grunge designs – are time-sensitive and fall out of fashion. Some decorative typefaces use unorthodox letter shapes and proportions to achieve distinctive and dramatic results. Some even appear three-dimensional
Decorative
4
Anatomy & Terminology
TYPEFACES VS FONTS Most people assume that these words are interchangeable, but they actually mean two different things. Typographer, Nick Sherman, once used a great analogy to explain the differences between the terms “typeface” and “font.” He suggested comparing these typography terms to the musical terms “song” and “mp3.” When you’re explaining how much you enjoy a particular tune, you say, “I love this song!” You wouldn’t say, “I love this mp3!” The song is the work of art, whereas an mp3 file is just the delivery mechanism. The same rules apply in typography.
You should use the word “typeface” when describing the creative work (what you see). This is a more abstract design term used when referring to the way a specific collection looks or feels. For example, Helvetica is a typeface. If you’re describing the physical embodiment of the collection of letters and characters, you should use the term “font” (what you use -- whether that’s a file on your computer or a case full of metal letters). This is the tangible representation of that collection of letters and characters. For example, Helvetica Bold and Helvetica Light Oblique are fonts. How you could use these two terms in a sentence: “Wow. The typeface you chose really pulls this design together.” “I’ll change the font size to 12pt so it fits in the box.”
Apex A point at the top of a character where two strokes meet.
Arc of Stem A curved stroke that is continuous with a straight stem
Ascender An upward vertical stroke found on the part of lowercase letwters that extends above the typeface’s x-height.
Ball Terminal A circular form at the end of the arm in letters.
Aperture The partially enclosed, somewhat rounded negative space in some characters.
Arm A horizontal or upward, sloping stroke that does not connect to a stroke or stem on one or both ends
Axis An imaginary line drawn from top to bottom of a glyph bisecting the upper and lower strokes is the axis.
Bar The horizontal stroke in letters. Also referred to as Crossbar.
Bowl The fully closed, rounded part of a letter.
Bracket A curved or wedge-like connection between the stem and serif of some fonts. Not all serifs are bracketed serifs.
Counter The open space in a fully or partly closed area within a letter.
Cross Stroke A horizontal stroke that intersects the stem of a lowercase t or f.
Bilateral Serifs A serif extending to both sides of a main stroke. They are reflexive.
Crotch An acute, inside angle where two strokes meet.
Descender The part of the letters that extends below the baseline.
Diagonal Stroke An angled stroke.
Baseline The invisible line where all characters sit.
Beak A sharp spur, found particularly at the top of letters in some 20th centry Romans.
Dot A small distinguishing mark, such as an diacritic on a lowercase i or j. Also known as a Tittle.
Cross Stroke A horizontal stroke that intersects the stem of a lowercase t or f.
Ear A small stroke extending from the upper-right side of the bowl of lowercase g and r.
Eye Much like a counter, the eye refers specifically to the enclosed space in a lowercase ‘e’.
Finial A tapered or curved end.
Hook A curved, protruding stroke in a terminal. Usually found on a lowercase f. something curved or bent like a hook.
Leg Short, descending portion of a letter.
Link A stroke that connects the top and bottom bowls of lowercase double-story g’s.
Lobe A rounded projecting stoke attached to the main structure of a letter. A curved or rounded projection or division.
Cross Stroke A horizontal stroke that intersects the stem of a lowercase t or f.
Loop The enclosed or partially enclosed counter below the baseline of a double-story g.
TERMINOLOGY
TrackingSimilar to kerning, tracking deals with a modification to letter spacing. However, instead of adjusting the spacing between just two letters, tracking is an adjustment to the spacing between all letters an entire word. See the difference below: NO TRACKING
CUSTOM TRACKING
LeadingRemember in high school when you had to double-space your essays? Well, the terms “single-space” and “double-space” can also be called “leading,” which is the distance between the baselines. See leading in action: 12 pt LEADING
30 pt LEADING
KerningKerning is the modification of the space between two letters. For an example, see the image below:
NO KERNING
CUSTOM KERNING
5
Bibliography
BooksCarter, Sebastian. Twentieth century type designers, Lund Publications ltd. Heller S and Talarico L. Typography Sketchbooks, Princeton Architectural Press. Craig, James. Designing with Type, Watson-Guptill. Lupton, Ellen.Thinking with Type, Princeton Architectural Press
Webpageshttp://www. typographydeconstructed. com/category/typeglossary/ http://blog.hubspot.com/ marketing/typographyterms-introduction http://design.tutsplus. com/articles/a-20-minuteintro-to-typographybasics--psd-3326 http://www.typesoffonts. com/types.html http://pencilscoop. com/2013/04/ an-intoduction-totypography-basics