OUGD603 / Extended Practice
Madison
Background
Brief Length 2 Months
Brief 01 — Madison
Madison Regular is a serif font, developed for body copy usage. It’s serifs and metrics are influenced by 1960’s advertising display type, designed on Madison Avenue, New York City. I developed the start of the typeface at ‘Type Clinic’, a week long typographic workshop in Trenta, Slovenia, in the summer of 2014.
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Target Audience / Tone of Voice
The target audience is obviously designers and typographers willing to spend money on purchasing the typeface. I also considered promoting the typeface to design studios, as I feel type design is a skill that studios may look for when considering placements and internships. The tone of voice within the specimen should reflect the connotations of the typeface, as well as expressing the concept behind it.
At the end of the workshop I had developed an uppercase, lowercase, numerals, and a few glyphs (all in Semi-Bold, not Regular).
Self Initiated Brief
Make the appropriate changes to the regular, to allow a consistent weight across all characters. You may also add common ligatures to increase readability at small scale. Develop a bold font to compliment the regular counterpart, that can be used for display point sizes. Both the regular typeface and the bold should be promoted in the form of a printed type specimen.
Mandatory Requirements
- A full Latin typeface, in Regular and Semi- Bold. - Extended Characters Sets - Ligatures & Mathematic Symbols - A specimen that highlights the typeface’s characteristics. - Minimum of 3 A3 design boards. - Portfolio standard photography outcome.
OUGD603 / Extended Practice
01
Initial Research
1960’s Typefaces
Typefaces used in the 1960’s were photoset designs, with each individual letter cut out. Each character was manually kerned by hand, placed really close to the previous letter. The most common features for headlines and display use were a heavy weight, short ascenders and descenders and extremely close kerning. This is so the largest point size possible is used within a space.
Brief 01 — Madison
Initial Research
A Bodycopy Typeface
Obviously these typefaces are typical of their era, and used for display. An aim was to design the typeface with some of these display features, but also create my first bodycopy typeface. For this reason, Madison has a larger ascender and descender height, and looser kerning.
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Above: Examples of 1960’s advertising typefaces within context. They have all been designed to work closely together.
OUGD603 / Extended Practice
03
Drawing Letterforms
Creating Letters By Hand
The easiest way to begin the typeface is start with sketches of the lowercase n and lowercase o. From there, other characters can be created, such as the lowercase h and the lowercase e.
Brief 01 — Madison
Drawing Letterforms
Printing For Corrections
In order to see inconsistencies within the typeface, the letters were often printed and examined to find mistakes. As the typeface is also designed for print, it’s best to view the letters within context and at approporiate bodcopy point sizes.
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Above Left: The first chosen drawings of the lowercase n and o that were then digitsalised. Above Mid: An example of some corrections that have been printed.
OUGD603 / Extended Practice
Brief 01 — Madison
Existing Typeface
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ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQ RSTUVWXYZ abcdefghijklmnopqr stuvwxyz A test of both weights.
0123456789 !£$&(){}:;“?[]‘,.-_— 04
Existing Typeface
Analysis of Existing Letters
Above you can see the character set that was completed before the start of 3rd year, all in Semi-Bold. There was very little to change about them (apart from the metrics).
Semi-Bold To Regular
A test of both weights.
Although this is a non-standard way of working, my initial inspiration were display typefaces that were found in bold or thicker weights. After researching into the difference in weight, I found that Bold fonts tend to be 700 (of any measurement) in stem thickness, whilst Regular should be 400.
My Semi-Bold was in between at 550, so the Regular was created at 400. Previously I had classified the Semi-Bold as Bold, so this helped creating a better definition.
OUGD603 / Extended Practice
Brief 01 — Madison
Foreign Characters
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ĂĀÀÁÂÃÄÅĄǍÆÇĆĊČĎĐÈÉÊËĒĖĘĚĞĢĦÌ ÍÎÏĪĮİǏIJĶĹĻĽĿŁÑŃŅŇŊÒÓÔÕÖŌŐǑØŒŔŖ ŘŚŞŠȘŢŤȚŦÙÚÛÜŪŮŰŲǓǕǗǙǛŴẀẂẄ ÝŶŸỲŹŻŽÞß àąăāáâãäåǎæçċčćďđèéêëēėęěġģħìíîïī įǐıijķĺļľŀłðñńņňŋòóôõöōőǒøœŕŗřśşšș ţťțŧùúûüūůűųǔǖǘǚǜŵẁẃẅýÿŷỳźżžþ ��������������� ����������
05 Adding Foreign Characters
Researching into Other Languages
Before designing any diacritics for foreign languages, it was important to research into the languages and their character usage. This enabled me to understand alignment, thickness & height of the characters. Although I would have liked to develop Cyrillic & Greek characters, the alphabet is completely alien to me, so the process would be far too time consuming.
Ligatures & Unique Characters
Research was undertaken into functional ligatures (eg. fi, fl, ft), as well as stylistic ligatures (such as at, ct, ch), which would add artistic flare. I also wanted to add unique characters to my typeface that would separate it from existing work, which is why the interrobang, the asterism & the irony mark were added.
Above Left: The full set of diacritic characters in Madison Regular. Above Right: Research into ligatures, daggers and rare glyphs such as the asterism a nd interrobang.
OUGD603 / Extended Practice
06
Specimen Content
Research Method
The content was inspired by the research methods of a project by Neubau, a Berlin based studio. Their recent catalogue ‘Neubau Forst’ is composed of images of trees found when they overlayed their logotype over Berlin, mapping the locations and finding trees there. The same methodology was taken with ‘Madison’ written in Semi-Bold, overlayed over the centre of Madison Avenue. Instead of trees, addresses were noted and then used in the specimen.
Brief 01 — Madison
Specimen Content
Colour
After researching into existing speciments, I realised it was best to use a basic colour scheme. For this reason, only black, grey and ‘New York Taxi’ Orange (Pantone 123U) were used.
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Top Left: Neubau Forst Catalogue. Top Right: An example of an existing specimen’s colour scheme. Bottom Row: The process of finding body copy for Madison’s type specimen.
OUGD603 / Extended Practice
07
Final Specimen
Progression
Brief 01 — Madison
Although most specimens simply display a finalised typeface, it was important to show my progression. In it’s early stages, Madison Semi-Bold was rendered by hand, something interesting to show. For this reason, my working notes and annotations were scanned in and added.
Final Specimen
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OUGD603 / Extended Practice
07
Final Specimen
Pt Size Comparisons
Brief 01 — Madison
Bodycopy is displayed at a variety of point sizes, in both Regular & Semi-Bold. This is so the reader of the specimen can compare it’s legibility at different point sizes. Each section of paragraphs were annotated with the point size they were set in too, to aid this process.
Final Specimen
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OUGD603 / Extended Practice
07
Final Specimen
Address Examples
Brief 01 — Madison
As mentioned before, the addresses used were systematically chosen. The above two spreads show how these addresses were used, at different point sizes and weights. Although the extended characters are for use in other languages, the easiest way to show off as many of these characters as possible was to use the addresses found, and replace the characters with extended letters that are similar in shape.
Final Specimen
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OUGD603 / Extended Practice
07
Final Specimen
Displaying Characters Simply
Brief 01 — Madison
As well as having some fun with specimen, it’s important to also (quite simply) display the characters as they are. This is so that the reader would know exactly what they would be getting if the typeface was bought. These spreads displayed the Regular next to the Semi-Bold so a comparison can be made between the two.
Final Specimen
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OUGD603 / Extended Practice
07
Final Specimen
Playful Characters
Brief 01 — Madison
When demonstrating the usage of ligatures and the unque characters, it was important to use a more playful tone of voice. These characters are less likely to be used in something serious, but in a more artistic and fun way.
Final Specimen
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OUGD603 / Extended Practice
07
Final Specimen
Poster
Brief 01 — Madison
As a cheaper option, an A1 poster has been made, summarising the specimen. This works well to view Madison’s characters all at once. It conveys all of the main characteristics of the face, such as bodycopy usage, display usage, ligatures & unique characters.
Final Specimen
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