what i learned winter quarter‌ a typography journal
introduction Art 338: Typography II is a challenging but rewarding class. This journal takes the reader on a day-by-day journey through the class. At the top of each page there are key points on what the entry will discuss. There is everything from typesetting rules to project critiques in the magazine. Each entry was written the day of the class so the most important points were recapped. At the end of the journal there is a preview of the artworks created in this class.
typography journal | 3
type measurement legibility workhorse typeface
typographic refinement 1.6
When talking about type and design there are two main measurements, points and picas. These measurements come from times when type was set physically. There are 12 points in a pica and 6 picas in an inch. Another term that comes from the physical typesetting times, is leading. Leading is the space between lines measured from baseline to baseline. Auto settings for leading will be too tight. Usually it needs to be set to 120–145% of the type size. When starting out a project it is very important to choose a good workhorse typeface. This means that it will have many different weights and styles. This is important because it is hard to tell if you will need something to be italic or bold at the beginning of the project. Also numerals are very important but can sometimes be forgotten. Line length and rags are also very important. These elements really control how the viewer reads. Too short of a line length with make the reading choppy and harder to understand. Too long of a line length will be hard for the viewer to see the next line. Rags deal more with the overall look of the paragraph. Soft rags are ideal. Overall typography refinement helps with legibility.
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leading sizing serifs & san serifs
legibility exercise 1.8
This exercise makes it clear which typefaces will be legible at what sizes and what proper leading for those sizes are. By having the different adjustments right next to each other, it is easy to see the differences between them. For the serif font, Bembo STD, the slightly larger size 10 pt with 13 pt leading is the easiest to read. With the sans serif font, Avenir, it is most readable at size 9 pt with 14 pt leading. When the leading was increased in the san serif example, there was too much space between lines. However, when it was increased in the serif example, there was too much space but it did not seem as dramatic as in the san serif example. The serif font was more easily read at larger sizes where as the san serif font was still readable at smaller sizes. Overall, I think that size and leading depend on the typeface being used.
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hierarchy logic in type crystal goblet
practical typography 1.13
In our class discussion today we talked about Butterick’s Practical Typography: Why Typography Matters. In this text he discusses the butterfly ballot and why it is problematic. It is clear that voters could be easily confused by the ballot because the bubbles to fill in do not clearly line up with the names. The way that it is laid out is quite confusing and the hierarchy is confusing as well. There are lots of things bolded and most things are in all caps but others are not. There does not seem to be a logic to the typography. In the examples of the resumes, Trixie’s resume has a very easy reading order. It can be read by a potential employer very quickly and easily. The things emphasized appear to be important. In Violet’s resume the hierarchy is strange and the gray boxes take away from the content. The emphasized text seems to be less important in some cases. Butterick mentions Beatrice Warde’s essay “The Chrystal Goblet.” The main point of this essay is that typography should be so seemingness that it is almost invisible. When discussing this in our group we decided that we agree with certain uses of typography but in other case we think that typography should be emphasized to add meaning to the project. For example, in body text we think that typography should be the invisible servant but in another project, having typography be bold can add to the meaning of the piece.
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hierarchy leading line length
project one crit. 1.15
This critique made it clear how important it is to have really clear hierarchy within your piece. Legibility problems that were seen throughout had to do with type that was too light or too bold for a body font. There was not enough leading in some cases and too short of a line length. Problems with hearty included the title not having enough strength or visual weight. The author’s name was not prominent enough and unimportant elements were given too much emphasis in some cases. There were some problems with composition and finding out how to make the type interesting compositionally and not necessarily boring.
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shortcuts ligatures
type composition 1.20
I learned a few new things from Practical Typography: Type Composition most of these were keyboard shortcuts. One of the these was the short cut for curly quotes which is option + shift + bracket or for double no shift. This is a handy shortcut to know. In lecture I also learned that option + 8 makes a bullet point. These are good shortcuts for making typing easier and faster when working on a project. Most of the other things in the reading was just a review of knowledge. However the ligature for the exclamation point and the question mark was a fun little symbol that I didn’t know existed.
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organizing fonts free fonts font licenses
font management 1.22
Today in lecture we learned about font management. The main points I took away from this lecture were to organize your fonts so that you can find them when you need them and to turn off the fonts that you don’t use instead of deleting them. We also discussed how to choose fonts and where to buy or download fonts. The websites we talked about included: Google Fonts, Lost Type Co-Op, League of Movable Type, Font Squirrel, Fontspring, House Industries, My Fonts, and Fonts.com. We also talked about the importance of knowing the terms of use for each font when they are purchased. Purchasing fonts is purchasing a license to use that font in a certain way. We also talked about different programs used for managing fonts and the pros and cons of each of those programs.
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breaking up text titles background colors
dialogue final crit. 1.27
Today in class we critiqued the dialogue project. Overall there were lots of issues with breaking up the text. Some of the ways that we discussed breaking up the text included: subtitles and pull quotes. The text we had to work with was a lot and since it was a dialogue the names were repeated. It was interesting to see the ways that different people showed the change in person speaking. Some people repeated initials, as I did, and others would change colors. The titles of the projects were somewhat boring and that impacted whether or not the reader wanted to read. Another thing that was discussed was the use of a background color and how that either worked or didn’t work with the text. In many cases, having the background color helped but in other cases it made legibility hard and something needed to be changed.
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paragraph styles character styles tabs
typesetting in InDesign 1.29
Today in lecture we talked about using styles in InDesign. For this next project it is going to be extremely important that everyone uses paragraph and character styles for their text so that when we go to format the entire booklet together we can just easily change things. The benefits of using styles is that something like leading, type size, or rules can be adjusted throughout the entire document with the click of a button. Another handy thing in paragraph styles is tabs. One thing I didn’t know about the tabs is that you can align them to a certain character, such as a decimal. I tend to use paragraph and character styles in my InDesign documents already but this lecture reinforced everything I already knew.
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designing with grids breaking the grid
understanding the grid 2.3
Today in class we discussed grids. One of the main things that I took away from this lecture is even if you’re following a grid, it is okay to break the grid. We looked at a few examples of grids and some of the ones that worked best were ones that had elements that weren’t in geometric frames. For example, there was a cut out image of a person that interacted with the text instead of just being stagnant in a column. When elements don’t follow the grid perfectly it makes for a more dynamic piece.
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working in groups unifying styles
individual booklet crit. 2.5
During the individual book critique all the different approaches to designing the booklet were very clear. Not only were the covers very different but the ways that text was set was very different. When we came together as a group it was somewhat difficult to figure out a style that would encompass everything everyone had done. The first two sections were very different from the last two, which is what made creating a unifying style so challenging. The way that the rules are grouped are very different in these sections so coming up with a plan on how to treat those elements was a bit difficult.
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characters accents character widths
non-latin typefaces 2.10
Today in class we discussed typefaces in other languages. One thing that we had discussed before today’s lecture was making sure a typeface has characters that might be used for other languages if that was applicable. Some projects you might need to use Spanish accented characters or a tilde and you would need to be able to insert these characters into the text. Another thing we discussed was how there are totally different characters. An example of this is Chinese characters. These will have very different widths and that was what lead Johannes Gutenberg to create movable type for Western languages. The challenge of this was the width of the “w” is very different than that of a “t” or something else.
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reviewing work attention to detail
group booklet crit. 2.12
This critique made it clear how different the same content could be. Everyone had a very unique approach to designing the booklets. It was also interesting seeing how different groups combined the designs of each individual booklet or started from a totally different starting point. The covers of the booklets developed so much from the original ones. When reviewing other groups booklets it became clear how important it is to review work before turning it in. Some booklets did not italicize book titles or follow some of the rules that the author was talking about. These are little details that are very important to think about when designing the booklet. An example of this was one of the rules said that poems should always be centered and in one of the booklets I looked at the passage was not centered. These are little details that are so important because when the reader looks at it, it will be very clear whether or not the rule is followed.
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formatting different articles working with pictures and text
primary zine concepts 2.17
The Zine project has proven to be very interesting because every student has gone out and done research on type and everyone has come up with different ideas. The compilation of the ideas was really fun because even if topics were similar there were very different directions to be taken with it. The ideas generated were also so broad and finding a way to organize them was difficult but definitely helpful. I think formatting these articles in the magazine will be an interesting challenge because the contents of each piece will be very different. Some of the concepts proposed will be very image heavy and others will be focused more on the text with the support of images.
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figuring out grids grids in magazines
grid structures 2.19
In class we analyzed a magazine in a group to try and figure out the grid structure. My group chose two particularly hard grids to analyze. While our margins were all consistent throughout that magazine, the grid did not seem to be completely consistent. We finally decided that it had about an 11 column grid but it was challenging because the text did not follow the grid perfectly. We thought that there might be two overlapping grids or the text might be placed on the page without the use of a grid. After listening to other groups present their grids, it seemed like most magazines had a very clear grid structure. And it was much easier to see that grid structure on other spreads and in other magazines.
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cohesiveness text for screen
type studies & spreads 2.24
Today we worked on the Zine project in class and coming up with two sample spreads of how to use our grid. For the two sample spreads I chose to do one on tattoos and typography and the other on the 5 top typographers. I chose these because the typographers one had a lot more text than the tattoo article. They both were pretty picture heavy, showing the examples of work or tattoos. When I got to this stage I realized how challenging it is to make something look cohesive but yet interesting. Formatting all of those pictures was really challenging because all of them are in rectangular shapes and that can start to become very boring. Another challenge is that text for the screen has to be larger than text for print. Because of the larger size, it was hard to fit everything on one page and so lots of content that I thought was going to be just one page turned into a spread or multiple spreads.
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color organic shapes in a grid
finalizing the grid 2.26
Today we spent all of class working on the magazine project. Before class I did a lot of research on magazines that I liked and what I liked about them. A few of the main things I liked included: breaking the grid with either circle or irregular shaped images, larges photos with white text on top, separating the magazine into sections, and having ample white space. In class I focused on sketching out a map of what all the pages should look like. I started thinking about taking backgrounds of some images out. I also started thinking more about color and what sorts of colors I want to use and if I want to have a consistent theme throughout the whole Zine or if I want to change it up based on the pictures used in the articles. I think I want to have an overall color scheme but I want it to be very flexible and work with all the images. I like the use of black and white too and letting the images be the main source of color.
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choosing a typeface thick-thin contrast size
type for the screen 3.2
In this lecture we talked about what a good typeface for the screen consists of. Typefaces that are good for the screen in body text don’t vary a lot in thick-thin relationships. Although typefaces with high contrast can be used for headers. There should also be a high x-height but not too extreme. Differentiating between different characters like 1, I, and L is important. Optical sizing can be useful as well. Text for the screen is very different than text for print, which is very apparent in the Zine project. Designing for the screen means that body text is going to be much larger, usually 14–16 pt. Because of this, less text can fit on the page and the line length can become too short very easily.
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planning placing text
zine book map 3.4
In class we looked at another person’s magazine and critiqued it. We also developed a book map. The small-group critique checklist had many important elements to check that sometimes designers forget about. These things included making sure all the necessary elements are there and making sure there were no typos. It is important to always review documents for these types of issues and sometimes having a second set of eyes helps a lot. Another thing that we looked at with other people was the layout of our magazine and we developed a book map. When looking this over with a partner, I was able to receive feedback on what made logical sense and what did not. We also discussed other things like how to fill a random empty page with some content that maybe we thought to put elsewhere. The book map was really an important step in the project because once text was in the document, it showed exactly how much space it would take up. Because of this, we were able to develop a plan and get a rough estimate on how many pages we would have. This was extremely helpful for me because I like to have a plan and even though my plan definitely changed, it was a good starting point.
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too much text more images
zine pre-crit. 3.9
Today we critiqued our magazines while they were in process. One of the major problems was too much text on a spread. I think that since the text for screen was so much larger than we are used to working with it was challenging to find a good balance between text and images. Some of the things I learned while doing the diptych project were different techniques for breaking up text. After this critique I realized I needed to use a lot more images and not be afraid of having an article take up multiple spreads. I also used elements such as pull quotes and subheads so that the text looked a little more inviting. A key thing to take away from this critique is to have about 50% graphics and 50% text for a well-balanced layout in a magazine like this.
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presenting though process
zine final crit. 3.11
During the final critique, one of the main topics we discussed was presentation of our work. All of the projects turned out really great but overall presentations needed work. Some of the presentations that worked the best were ones where the designer was very excited about their project. Another thing that made some presentations interesting was discussing the concept behind the project. When the project had a main theme, it was interesting to learn about. In the future I will definitely discuss the thought process behind the theme and show more enthusiasm about my projects because it really does make a huge difference. Talking about one’s work is really an important skill.
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final layout for diptych
the projects THE PLACE WITHIN An Interview with Bill Moyers & Joseph Campbell
THE HERO M: Why are there so many stories of the hero in mythology? C : Because that’s what’s worth writing about. Even in popular novels, the main character is a hero or heroine who has found or done something beyond the normal range of achievement and experience. A hero is someone who has given his or her life to something bigger than oneself.
M: So in all of these cultures, whatever the local costume the hero might be wearing, what is the deed?
C : Well, there are two types of deed. One is the physical deed, in which the hero performs a courageous act in battle or saves a life. The other kind is the spiritual deed, in which the hero learns to experience the supernormal range of human spiritual life and then comes back with a message.
M: Does your study of mythology lead you to conclude that a single human quest, a standard pattern of human aspiration and thought, constitutes for all mankind something that we have in common, whether we lived a million years ago or will live a thousand years from now?
THE JOURNEY M: I like what you say about the old myth of Theseus and Ariadne. Theseus says to Ariadne, “I’ll love you forever if you can show me a way to come out of the labyrinth.” So she gives him a ball of string, which he unwinds as he goes into the labyrinth, and then follows to find the way out. You say, “All he had was the string. That’s all you need.”
C : That’s all you need — an Ariadne thread. M: Sometimes we look for great wealth to save us, a great power to save us, or great ideas to save us, when all we need is that piece of string.
C: There’s a certain type of myth which one might call the vision quest,
C : That’s not always easy to find. But it’s nice to have someone who can give
going in quest of a boon, a vision, which has the same form in every mythology. That is the thing that I tried to present in the first book I wrote, The Hero With a Thousand Faces. All these different mythologies give us the same essential quest. You leave the world that you’re in and go into a depth or into a distance or up to a height. There you come to what was missing in your consciousness in the world you formerly inhabited. Then comes the problem either of staying with that, and letting the world drop off, or returning with that boon and trying to hold on to it as you move back into your social world again.
you a clue. That’s the teacher’s job, to help you find your Ariadne thread.
THE DRAGON M: How do I slay that dragon in me? What’s the journey each of us has to
But if you think, “Oh, no! I couldn’t do that!” that’s the dragon locking you in. M: Like all heroes, the Buddha doesn’t show you the truth itself, he shows you the way to truth. C : But it’s got to be your way, not his. The Buddha can’t tell you exactly
it is, and don’t be afraid to follow it.
how to get rid of your particular fears, for example. Different teachers may suggest exercises, but they may not be the ones to work for you. All a teacher can do is suggest. He is like a lighthouse that says, “There are rocks over here, steer clear. There is a channel, however, out there”.
M: Is it my work or my life?
M: In all of these journeys of mythology, there’s a place everyone wishes
make, what you call “the soul’s high adventure”?
C : My general formula for my students is “Follow your bliss.” Find where
C : If the work that you’re doing is the work that you chose to do because you are enjoying it, that’s it. But if you think, “Oh, no! I couldn’t do that!” that’s the dragon locking you in. “No, no, I couldn’t be a writer,” or “No, no, I couldn’t possibly do what So-and-so is doing.”
M: When I take that journey and go down there and slay those dragons, do I have to go alone?
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C : If you have someone who can help you, that’s fine, too. But, ultimately, the last deed has to be done by oneself. Psychologically, the dragon is one’s own binding of oneself to one’s ego. We’re captured in our own dragon cage. The problem of the psychiatrist is to disintegrate that dragon, break him up, so that you may expand to a larger field of relationships. The ultimate dragon is within you, it is your ego clamping you down.
to find. The Buddhists talk of Nirvana, and Jesus talks of peace, of the mansion with many rooms. Is that typical of the hero’s journey — that there’s a place to find?
C : The place to find is within yourself. I learned a little about this in athletics. The athlete who is in top form has a quiet place within himself, and it’s around this, somehow, that his action occurs…. There’s a center of quietness within, which has to be known and held. If you lose that center, you are in tension and begin to fall apart.
final booklets
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zine grid structure
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zine spread
Resources
Resources
5
Designers with Go-To Typefaces
Mr. Chip Kidd
Associate art director, Knopf Favorite type:
Blender
Photos by Christopher Sturman
a 2003 typeface from Gestalten
What do you like about Blender? I’ve been using it a lot over the past few years (and yes, I bought the license to it before doing so) because it has a classic sans-serif presence that feels fresh, due to almost undetectable quirks in the characters that have curved edges.
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Daily Type | 43
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Designed by Jessica Ross Set in Lato and ITC Century Std March 2016