Design Ideas Your Own Way
G LY P H APRIL 2015
ISSUE 1
Type Casting
Steven Brower’s first job was in book design
Grooming the Font
Robert Bringhurst, The Elements of Typographic Style
Back to Basics
Stopping Sloppy Typography
Type Cube
The purpose of this project is to create typographic solutions to express a scientific theory.
Table of Contents
GLYPH
Design Ideas Your Own Way
Table of Contents
APRIL 2015 ISSUE 1
Features
4 Opinion 8 Buisness 10 Typeface review 12 Pratical Tips 14 Web Type 16 Type Casting 22 Grooming the Font 26 Type Cube 30 Back to Basics
Columns How Good is Good? by Stefan Sagmeister Taking Your Fonts to Market by Stephen Coles Velo Serif by Indra Kupferschmid Typography in Ten Minutes by Stephen Coles Abandon 5 Obsolete Habits by Mike Butterick
2
Cover Designed by Jessica Roberts
Contact the Editor: 859-956-7896 Monthly Publications; Address subscripton orders and inquiries to P.O. 879 New York, NY; or call 859-956-6321
Editor-in-chief Design Director Designers Picture Editor Copy Editor Proofreaders
From The Editor Remembering from back in Middle School, 7th grade, and in my very first computer class and we were learning how to type. Remembering that if it weren’t for my teacher, I would never have had the opportunity to gain my love for computer design. Then once I entered high school, I quickly jumped into computer and graphic classes there. I took digital design classes and web design classes. It wasn’t until my junior year when I decided that I would go become a graphic design major in college. I had a secrete love for art and design. I think I even shocked my parents when I showed them my drawing and graphic portfolios from class. No one knew I had this artistic talent, well, neither did I. I really took to my art classes in high school and college and each and every day I am still learning something new. Art and design allows me to let out my inner child and allows me to be the person who I want to be.
Production Manager Department Editors
Lauren Powell Rebekah Jones John Sims, Jessica Roberts Jim DePaul Abbey Levine Melissa martinez, Jade Taylor Blake Stanley Ralph Wolf, Beth Howell
Opinion
How Good is Good? by Stefan Sagmeister
Stefan Sagmeister talks about the state of current design, ethics, advertising and aesthetics. In September design felt impotent and frivolous. There is nothing inherent in our profession that forces us to support worthy causes, to promote good things, to avoid visual pollution. There might be such a responsibility in us as people. In August, when thinking about my reasons for being alive, for getting out of bed in the morning, I would have written the following down. 1. Strive for happiness
impact the First Things First manifesto had on my profession would certainly point in that direction.
2. Don’t hurt anybody The first sentence on page 1 of Victor Papanek’s “Design for the Real World” reads: “There are 3. Help, others achieve the same
professions more harmful than industrial design, but only very few of them. And possibly only one profession is phonier: Advertising design. In persuading people to buy things they don’t
Now I would change that priority: 1. Help others 2. Don’t hurt anybody
need, with money they don’t have, in order to impress others that don’t care, it is probably the phoniest field in existence today.” I do know that bad design can harm our lives. From the problems this little piece of bad typography caused in Florida to unnecessary junk mail and overproduced packaging, bad design
3. Strive for happiness
makes the world a more difficult place to live in.
Good design + bad cause = bad
Bad design + good cause = good?
My studio was engaged in cool projects, things designers like to do, like
At the same time, strong design for bad causes or products can hurt us even more.
designing a cover for
On the other hand, bad design for a good cause can still be a good thing. We
David Byrne
designed the logo for The Concert for New York, a huge charity event for the fire and policeman in Madison Square Garden, involving among others Paul McCartney, Mick Jagger, The Who.
We had a good time designing them, and since the products and events these pieces promoted were fine, I don’t think we hurt anybody who bought them.
Just consider this age old and powerful symbol symbol and its transformation into
One of the many things I learned in my year without clients, a year I had put aside for experiments only, was
a very successful identity program by the Nazis.
that I’d like a part of my studio to move from creating cool things to significant things. The 80s in graphic design were dominated by questions about the layout, by life style magazines, with Neville From a design point of view, the statue of
Brody’s Face seen as the big event. The 90s were
liberty playing a guitar is a trite cliché. I am
dominated by questions about typography, readability, layering, with David Carson emerging as the dominant
not suggesting that the logo had much to
figure.
do with the over $ 20 million raised for the
With prominent figures like Peter Saville recently talking
Context is all-important: The Christian
Robin Hood Foundation, well, actually, a tiny
about the crisis of the unnecessary and lamenting about
cross had one meaning in 16th century
portion was raised through the logo in the
the fact that our contemporary culture is monthly, there
Europe and another one in 20th century
from of merchandize sales.
might now finally be room for content, for questions about what we do and for whom we are doing it. The incredible
India.
How Good is Good? ago, I got invited to participate in a media design exhibition in Vienna, Austria. One of the perks that came with the exhibit was a free, full-page ad in Austria’s best newspaper, space I was free to fill with whatever I liked.
How to be good? Well, does help by definition have to be
It’s an idea for a packaging that might be applied Poor Sting practically ruined his career with all his
in zones of large catastrophes, earthquakes and
do gooding, transforming himself from the cool
such. At the time I was naively thinking of far
leader of the Police to just another sappy rain forest away locations, India or Africa, not for a second
selfless? Am I allowed to get something out bard.
conceiving that my hometown New York itself
of myself? If I do help, am I permitted to
might be turned into the largest catastrophe
have fun while doing so? I read an interview with an art director in
When philosopher Edward DeBono talks about
zone.
values, he puts them into four equally important
It is basically a large, hollow Lego like block
sections:
containing basic foods like milk powder,
England discussing his award winning
water, dried fish, rice. After the food has been
campaign ad campaign for an association
Me-values: ego and pleasure
consumed, the empty packaging can be filled
for the blind, featuring a striking image of a
Mates-values: belonging to a group, not letting it
with sand or dirt and used as an interlocking
guide dog with human eyes stripped in.
down
brick to build a shelter.
He mentioned that he knew that a picture
Moral-values: religious values, general law, general In the ad I explained the idea and asked other
of a cute puppy would have raised more
values of a particular culture
designers, packaging manufacturers and aid
donations for the association, but was more Mankind-values: human rights, ecology
organizations to contribute.
interested in winning awards. He had no
Responses came into my laptop immediately.
problems with this attitude.
I often make the mistake of concentrating on just a
Many from students who just wanted to help,
couple of these values in my life. We all have heard some from Austrian packaging companies When GE gives 10 million to the WTC victim of the philanthropist who gave away millions to
interested in participating and many from
families, is it ok for them to look good for
charity and was a genuine asshole to all his friends. designers and architects offering ideas.
doing so?
Or the guy who is totally devoted to his family and friends but hates himself, drives a Suburban and
Also, it was an opportunity to feel and look good
Or, a more extreme case: Is it ok for Philip
works for a Nuclear Missile Plant.
myself: The caring designer.
Morris to go and give 60 million to help out
Or Mr. Bin Laden himself: I am sure he is totally
Among all the positive responses was also a
various charities and then spend another
devoted to his religious values as well as to the
violently negative one;
108 million promoting this good deed in
values of his own culture, but does not really care
- the writer stating that this is the absolute worst
magazine ads?
about human rights much.
idea he ever saw in this context, that it’s a case
If you are homeless and you just got a hot meal from St. Johns in Brooklyn, one of the
of designing poverty, just plain ignorant and For a full life I would have to be involved in all four.
stupid.
organizations the money went to, you don’t really give a shit if the people who gave it to I do think there is a role for everyone. It does not
I got really nervous. I am just not used to having
you tout their own horn afterwards.
really matter if I am the Mayor of New York, or if
my work hated that much. Maybe I should have
I design the tourist brochures for New York or if I
stuck to CD covers.
Even though it really is a ridiculous case,
sweep the streets in New York. There is always
The e-mail did prompt me to get quickly in
isn’t it still preferable to blowing the entire
room to be nice to a co-worker, to send a sweet
contact with aid organizations and I had
168 million on a regular ad budget?
letter to Mom, to love Anni.
subsequently a discussion with the Director of
And: Why are so many celebrities involved
Of course there are different degrees of separation. of them all.
in charities?
The rescue worker down at Ground Zero is directly It turns out that in emergency cases, Care tends
Five years ago, my feeling was they just
involved, when I design a pin to raise money to
to buy food whenever possible locally in bulk:
wanted to promote their careers. Now I am
help the rescue worker, I’m a couple of degrees
That way they don’t have to package, there is
somewhat less cynical. It is conceivable
further removed. But I might just function twice as
less garbage, they avoid shipping problems and
Emergency Preparedness at CARE, the largest
that many simply came to realize the pursuit effective as a designer than I would as a rescue
the food will be compatible with local tastes.
of money/fame/success does not hold the
And similar thinking applies for shelter: It’s to
worker.
contentment it promised and are on the lookout for more significance.
everybody’s advantage to use as much local Well, while pondering those questions half a year
building material as possible. Care just supplies
5
Opinion
some additional resource materials
Francis Hopkinson, a writer, artist and a
Cipro comes with a complicated, difficult to understand
like rolls of plastic or corrugated metal
signatory of the declaration of independence
information pamphlet. It could also inform quickly and
sheets and utilizes the ingenuity of the
designed the American Flag (never got paid
efficiently about when and how to take it as well as side
population. This results in sturdier, better- for it though). built shelter. It turns out, my e-mail writer was right:
Design can help us remember
This is a stupid idea.
effects. Design can help people rally behind a cause Robbie Canals poster series wheat pasted all over New York in the 80-ies probably spoke to the already
SO: I have to be part of an organization,
converted, but showed me there are other people out
part of a problem to be able to come up
there who are not happy with the administration. I guess
with a solution. Do-gooding from afar, as
I picked these posters over the hundreds or thousands
a tourist, won’t do.
The towers of light by Julian Laverdiere and
of posters designers created that would qualify as an
Paul Myoda, at this moment proposed as a
example because I saw those actually pasted on the
In the meantime in New York I was also
temporary memorial down at Ground Zero,
street. There is this entire subsection in design, the
at the center of a disaster, I was not
are a beautiful emotional response. They are
peace or environmental poster, where only hundreds
tourist anymore. One of the tasks at hand ghost limbs; we can feel them even though
are actually printed, only dozens go up in the street and
was the creation of a symbol that could
the rest is distributed to design competitions.This of
also work as a fundraiser for various charities hit hard by current events.
they are not there anymore.
Design can simplify our lives
course does NOT help people rally behind a cause, it only helps the ego of the designer.
Design can inform and teach
Our idea was a pin, made of the rubble of the World trade Center, a piece of metal that refused to be destroyed. After the WTC disaster over 1 000 000
From the abstract geometric
tons of rubble was removed from the site Everybody who had to buy tokens in the New
signs and animals of the
and brought by truck and barge to the
York subway system would agree that the
cave paintings to the graphs
Fresh Kills landfill in Staten Island.
Metro card eased the way we go around the
in the New York Times,
city.
designers give us a better
“Design can make someone feel better”
understanding of the issues.
As a stand in for all the promotions and
After we designed the CD cover for the
ads that raised money for Non-Profit
The plan here is to make this into a large-scale project. We can raise $ 1.5 million per 100 000 pins sold. Most of current graphic design done by
Design can raise money
professional design companies is used to Rolling Stones there was quite some press
organizations I am showing here the
promote or sell, which is fine, but design
interest in Europe and a number of Austrian
Breast Cancer symbol which made a
can also do so much more.
and German TV stations came to New York
an impressive amount of money for
for an interview.
cancer research.
This was just around the time my Mom was
Design can unify
celebrating her 70 Birthday. I made a T-shirt
Design can make us more tolerant Russian designer
saying "Dear Mom! Have a great Birthday"
Andrey Logvin simple poster called Troika speaks for itself.
and wore it during the interview. The Austrian Winter Sorbeck, design teacher and fictional main station agreed to air the interviews exactly on character in Chip Kidd’s new novel The Cheese Monkeys, her Birthday.
says at one point: Uncle Sam is Commercial Art, the American Flag is graphic design. Commercial Art makes
Mom felt better.
you BUY things, graphic Design GIVES you ideas. If I’m able to do that, to give ideas, that WOULD be a good
Design can make the world a safer place.
reason to get out of bed in the morning.
Good Design + Good Cause = Good
6
How Good is Good?
About Sagmeister: Address 206 West 23rd Street Floor 4 New York, NY 10011 US
Company Name Sagmeister & Walsh.
Website http://www.sagmeisterwalsh.com/
Telephone (212) 647-1789
Photo Credit: Justin Hackworth
Graphic Designer and Typographer Stefan Sagmeister is known for upsetting norms, tricking the senses through design, typography, environmental art,
conceptual exhibitions and video. His diverse client list includes the Rolling Stones, HBO and the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum.
Sagmeister’s work has earned him accolades from all realms of art and design, including the American Institute of Graphic Arts Medal, the National Design Award from the Smithsonian’s Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum, as well as two
Grammy Awards for package designs for albums by the Talking Heads and Brian Eno and David Byrne. Solo shows with
Sagmeister’s work have been exhibited throughout the U.S. and around the world, including shows in Paris, Zurich, Tokyo, Prague and Seoul, among others. He is the author of “Things I Have Learned in My Life So Far,” an eclectic mix of visual audacity and sound advice that blends Sagmeister’s personal revelations, art and design.
A native of Austria, he received his M.F.A. from the University of Applied Arts in Vienna and earned a master’s degree from
Pratt Institute, where he was a Fulbright Scholar. He resides in New York City where his firm, Sagmesiter & Walsh, is based.
Business
Taking Your Fonts to Market: Foundry, Reseller, or Go Solo? Stephen Coles on November 20, 2014
When people ask about selling their fonts, the conversation almost always begins with the ol’ bottom line: “I wanna make some bank! Who offers the best royalty rate?” But the question of commission or discount percentage should be only one of many: What else is in the contract? What services do they guarantee? Do I respect their brand? What kind of audience do they speak to? Is their library a good fit for my typeface design? Is signing with a retailer even the right thing to do?
It’s also important to understand the difference between a foundry (AKA vendor or publisher) and a reseller (AKA distributor or retailer). Here’s a rundown of your options.
1. Signing with a Foundry A foundry can be considered a font manufacturer. Examples are Linotype, Monotype, P22, and FontFont. Foundry type can be
distributed through multiple channels, such as their own web shop and the shops of their resellers. When you submit a typeface to a foundry for release it is usually an exclusive deal. They will maintain the right to sell the font according to their contract.
Royalties range from 20%-50% but there is also an important distinction: most foundries pay a percentage of the wholesale price of the font. In this model, as the font goes further down the distribution chain, the designer is getting less of the retail
price. Other foundries, like FontFont, give a percentage of the suggested retail price — no matter where or how the font is sold, the designer gets the same cut.
Advantages
• •
Maintain some control of brand, pricing, and the ability to sign with multiple resellers
•
Who is their clientele?
•
What marketing materials and other tools do they use to
•
Disadvantages
•
•
•
•
8
Reach more customers and diverse markets
Questions to ask yourself about a reseller
Must be somewhat business savvy Receive a portion of each sale
•
How is their customer service? draw customers?
How many fonts and foundries are already in their shop? Do I risk getting lost among similar offerings?
What do they offer if I sell my fonts exclusively through them
Taking Your Fonts to the Market
2. Signing with a Reseller
3. Going it Alone
A reseller offers fonts from multiple foundries. The major
Building a foundry and selling fonts exclusively on your own web
Resellers sign a contract with a foundry/publisher and offer
benefits, as Hoefler & Frere-Jones, Jeremy Tankard, and Lineto
type resellers are Fonts.com, FontShop, MyFonts, and Veer. the fonts in that foundry’s library. The foundry usually receives between 40–65% of the retail price of the font. Each reseller
has a different customer base and produces different kinds and quantities of promotional materials. Examine them thoroughly and ask about their marketing strategies. Some independent foundries (like ShinnType and Mark Simonson) have found success in reaching a wide audience by offering their fonts
shop brings you 100% of sales, of course. Exclusivity has its
will attest. It can give your brand a certain boost in value. But
unless you are already well known, it can be a lot of very hard
work to get customers to your shopfront, while lesser fonts are
benefitting from broader exposure and marketing. There is also that nagging feeling that you don’t know how much more you could be selling were your fonts available elsewhere.
through many different resellers. Others go for a more exclusive strategy (like Porchez Typofonderie at FontShop, Jukebox at
Veer) benefiting from a boost in promotion that comes when a
Advantages
exclusive reseller.
•
retailer can claim they are the exclusive reseller.
Advantages • •
•
Full control of brand and pricing
•
Maintain a relationship with every customer
Receive 100% of sales revenue
Reach more customers and diverse markets
Disadvantages
sign with multiple resellers
•
Maintain some control of brand, pricing, and the ability to
Disadvantages •
•
Must be somewhat business savvy Receive a portion of each sale
•
Must be business savvy
•
Potential for substantial overhead (marketing, website,
• •
Spend more time administrating, less time drawing type e-commerce costs)
Responsible for customer support
Maintain a relationship with every customer
Questions to ask yourself about a reseller •
Who is their clientele?
•
What marketing materials and other tools do they use to
•
• •
How is their customer service? draw customers?
How many fonts and foundries are already in their shop? Do I risk getting lost among similar offerings?
What do they offer if I sell my fonts exclusively through them?
Charting a Course to the Market So the first decision to be made with each of your fonts is whether you want to go the foundry or reseller route. If you decide to
submit your fonts to a foundry, find the outfit and agreement that is right for you. If you choose to build your own foundry, decide whether you want to sell the fonts exclusively on your own, or through one or more resellers.
Success can be wrought from any of these models. Much depends on what’s important to you, the fonts you’re selling, and what kind of work you’re willing to put into distributing them.
I almost certainly neglected something in this summary and I welcome any rebuttals or filling of holes from those who are actually making a buck from drawing type. There are hundreds of you out there and many lessons to glean from your experience.
Typeface Review
Velo Serif
Designer Ben Kiel,
Christian Schwartz, Mitja Miklavčič
Foundry House Industries
Classification Serif Slab Serif
Featured in Typefaces of 2014
Elsewhere Velo in use
Reviewed by Indra Kupferschmid on March 19, 2015 Velo Serif won my heart four seconds after hitting
(a generous x-height doesn’t improve legibility infinitely).
was surprised. I have a super-soft spot for squarish
the glyphs rather uniform and monotonous, especially in
my inbox with seductive gifs and a big ‘ä’. No one serifs. I love Zapf Book, not Palatino, I collect Old
Hamcherry, have researched Corvini, and stare at
Antikva Margaret in awe. Velo Serif brings several of
However, the boxy shapes and large counters still make
the Regular Italic. The bold weight of the text styles with its higher stroke contrast is the most readable one to me.
these loves together in one contemporary retro type
But Velo Serif is not charted for long novels anyway. The
by resisting the obvious temptation for ball terminals).
styles may assist here and there): sparkling large words in
family, but avoids becoming too gimmicky 1970s (e.g.,
The first features that spring to your eye are the
ridiculously large x-height and the wide super-elliptic
forms of the lowercase. They are capital without being majuscule. Where other display serifs go for delicacy
and long extenders, Velo rides the opposite way. The bolder styles get so wide that they feel more at home in packaging and advertising than headlines.
Alongside the main act, the twelve display styles,
there are four text styles available, which — contrary
to the classic display/text-relationship — have a lower x-height and narrower shapes. This makes them less obtrusive in running text and easier to read
overexcited display styles prompt big splendid uses (the text the almost
monoline* Thin Italic, cigarette packages in
Regular, and
please, please, please, a tearoff calendar in the Black
style that uses the lovely
curvy alternate figures.
In short:
“Attack design doldrums with stylistic souplesse. Fashionable figures break away from the populist peloton. Comprehensive characters for culturally correct creations. Sturdy serifs nimbly negotiate any typographic terrain.”
Velo Serif
Attack design doldrums with stylistic souplesse. Fashionable figures break away from the populist
peloton. Comprehensive characters for culturally correct creations.
Sturdy serifs nimbly negotiate any typographic terrain.
Not only have the House team and
Ben Kiel, Mitja Miklavčič, and Christian Schwartz won “Best Super Elliptical Squarish Serif of 2014” in my book,
they’ve also scooped “Most Eloquently Worded Typeface Descriptions and Promo Blurbs of the Decade”.
* I hesitate to call Velo Serif a slab
serif. The Thin styles become almost
monoline, yes, but the bracketed serifs are notably thinner than the stems. I admit that Ye Olde Classification
System has no good drawer for these kinds of squarish serifs (and even
that term is inadequate; I only use it because I don’t know a better one, yet).
Obsessed with topics such as the
history of sans-serifs, font rendering, and the classification of typefaces, Indra Kupferschmid is a German
typographer, teacher, and traveling activist for the good cause of good type.
11
Practical Tips
Typography In Ten Minutes Stephen Coles on November 20, 2014
This is a bold claim, but i stand behind it: if you learn and follow these five typography rules, you will be a better typographer than 95% of professional writers and 70% of professional designers. (The rest of this book will raise you to the 99th percentile in both categories.)
Ready? Go.
1.
The typographic quality of your document is determined largely by how the body text looks. Why? Because there’s more
body text than anything else. So start every project by making the body text look good, then worry about the rest.
In turn, the appearance of the body text is determined primarily by these four typographic choices:
2.
Point size is the size of the letters. In print, the most comfortable range for body text is 10–12 point. On the web, the range is
15–25 pixels. Not every font appears equally large at a given point size, so be prepared to adjust as necessary.
3.
Line spacing is the vertical distance between lines. It should be 120–145% of the point size. In word processors, use the
“Exact” line-spacing option to achieve this. The default single-line option is too tight; the 1½-line option is too loose. In CSS,
use line-height.
4.
Line length is the horizontal width of the text block. Line length should be an average of 45–90 characters per line (use your
word-count function) or 2–3 lowercase alphabets, like so:
In a printed document, this usually means page margins larger than the traditional one inch. On a web page, it usually means
not allowing the text to flow to the edges of the browser window.
5.
And finally, font choice. The fastest, easiest, and most visible improvement you can make to your typography is to ignore the
fonts that came free with your computer (known as system fonts) and buy a professional font (like my fonts Equity
and Concourse, or others found in font recommendations). A professional font gives you the benefit of a professional
designer’s skills without having to hire one.
abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyzabcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyzabcd
As you put these five rules to work, you’ll no¬tice your documents starting to look more like pro-fessionally published material.
Typography In Ten Minutes
“All it takes is ten minutes— five minutes to read these rules once, then five minutes to read them again.” If you’re ready for a little more, try the summary of key rules:
Summary of key rules
1.
The four most importantty po graphic choices
13.
All caps are fine for less than one line of text.
you make in any document are point size, line
14.
If you don’t have real small caps, don’t use them at
spacing, line length, and font (passim), be
all.
cause those choices determine how thebody
15.
Use 5–12% extra letterspacing with all caps and
text looks.
small caps.
2.
point size should be 10–12 points in printed
16.
kerning should always be turned on.
documents, 15-25 pixels on the web.
17.
Use first-line indents that are one to four times the
3.
line spacing should be 120–145% of the point
point size of the text, or use 4–10 points of
size.
space be¬tween paragraphs. But don’t use both.
4.
The average line length should be 45–90
18.
If you use justified text, also turn on hyphenation.
characters (including spaces).
19.
Don’t confuse hyphens and dashes, and don’t use
5.
The easiest and most visible improvement you
multiple hyphens as a dash.
can make to your typography is to use a pro
20.
Use ampersands sparingly, unless included in a
fessional font, like those found in font recom
proper name.
mendations.
21.
In a document longer than three pages, one
6.
Avoid goofy fonts, monospaced fonts, and
exclamation point is plenty (see question marks and
system fonts, especially times new ro¬man
exclamation points).
and Arial.
22.
Use proper trademark and copyright symbols—not
7.
Use curly quotation marks, not straight ones
alphabetic approximations.
(see straight and curly quotes).
23.
Put a nonbreaking space after paragraph and
8.
Put only one space between sentences.
section marks.
9.
Don’t use multiple word spaces or other white-
24.
Make ellipses using the proper character, not
space characters in a row.
periods andspaces.
10.
Never use underlining, unless it’s a hyperlink.
25.
Make sure apostrophes point downward.
11.
Use centered text sparingly.
26.
Make sure foot and inch marks are straight, not
12.
Use bold or italic as little as possible.
curly.
13
Web Type
Abandon 5 Obsolete Habits Mike Butterick on April 16, 2015
If Leo Tolstoy were alive and working in San Francisco as a web
Having outlived their original rationale, these habits are no more
developer, he might tell us that poorly designed websites are
justifiable for today’s web than typewriter habits like underlining are for
all alike; each well-designed website is well-designed in its own
today’s printed documents.
way. And, having watched the web evolve over its first 20 years, I would agree.
Likewise, the web-design habits of the mid-’90s continue to influence today’s web. These habits also arose from the technological limitations of
We’ve seen how typewriter habits have maintained a peculiar
a previous era. The limitations are obsolete. But the habits are still with
influence on the typography of today’s documents (e.g., research
us. Five have been especially tenacious:
papers). These habits arose from the mechanical limitations of the typewriter. When the typewriter disappeared, so did the
Yet not only are these habits still with us, they’ve hardened into
limitations. But the habits remained. Detached from their original
entrenched web-design idioms. Don’t take my word for it. Go to any
justification, they’ve become pointless obstructions.
major website with this checklist. You’ll count at least four. These habits are everywhere.
1.
Tiny point sizes for body text. This practice was made
necessary by small displays, which otherwise couldn’t fit much
But bad habits don’t become good habits through repetition. We know
text. But today’s displays are large.
this to be true of spelling, grammar, and usage in American English. Sure, our language changes. But slowly. Not by popular vote. Certainly
2.
Huge point sizes for headings. These arose from the
not by popular error.
elephantine default styling of HTML heading tags in old browsers. But today’s CSS allows finer control.
So it is with typography.
3.
Web design: neither here nor there
Reliance on a small handful of system fonts, like Arial,
Georgia, and Verdana. This arose from a lack of technology for downloadable fonts. But today, we have webfonts.
And that’s the odd wrinkle we have to overcome when we talk about the web. Because to convince you to abandon the typewriter habits
4.
Page edges crammed with inscrutable wads of
in printed documents, I’m able to cite a persuasive body of evidence:
navigational links. These emerged on the early web because
namely, the professional typographic practices of the last 500 years, as
content was so sparse. Links gave readers something else to
reflected in the books, newspapers, and magazines we read daily.
do—click and move. (Hence the idiom became surfing the web, not reading the web.) But today, getting content onto the web is
The web, however, has no equivalent tradition. We can’t fill this gap
relatively easy, and navigational confusion tends to be a greater
merely by holding the web to print traditions. That would be limiting and
risk than boredom.
illogical. But it’s equally illogical to refuse to compare the web to any benchmark on the grounds that it’s sui generis (because it’s not—the
5.
Layouts built with large blocks of color. These were
web is primarily a typographic medium), or that it’s new technology
made necessary by the bandwidth limitations of the early
(because it’s not—the web is 20 years old), or that it’s still evolving
web. (They also filled space on those content-deprived web
(because that’s true of every technology, including print).
pages.) But today, high-speed connections are common, even on mobile devices.
Abandon 5 Obsolete Habits
Nevertheless, we’ve kept web design hovering in an odd state of neither Therefore, my typographic advice for websites is more a principle than a here nor there. How? Like the poor worker of proverb—by blaming the
prescription.
tools. If you ask a web designer “why aren’t we doing better with web typography?” you’re likely to hear either “we can’t, because such-and-
We can disagree about what design excellence will eventually mean
such won’t work in the old browsers” or “we can’t, until such-and-such
on the web. In fact, we should disagree, because that’s what stimulates
works in the new browsers.” The culture of web design encourages
experimentation and discovery. Doing it wrong is a prerequisite to doing it
us to rely on the past and the future as excuses for why we can’t take
right.
accountability for the present. These excuses keep today’s web design in a bubble, conveniently impervious to criticism.
But with the web, we can’t have it both ways. We can’t accept the benefits of web technology without raising the bar for ourselves. We can’t use the
For more about web-design inertia, see my talk “The Bomb in the
web for 20 years as a design medium yet exempt it from design criticism.
Garden.”
We can’t blame the tools for our failure to overcome our own inertia. And we can’t expect the web to grow up while we cling to juvenile and obsolete
But impervious to criticism also means impervious to progress. When
habits.
expectations are held artificially low, there’s no incentive to do better.
We must set these habits aside. Especially the five listed above. Anyone
Thus next year’s websites end up looking much like last year’s. And the
who is still relying on those habits is either lazy or careless. You are
inertia sustains itself indefinitely. Again, don’t take my word for it—the
neither.
ongoing ubiquity of obsolete web-design habits is the proof.
Before
After
1.
Small point size for body text (that doesn’t change with 1.
Bigger point size for body text (that changes to suit the
window size)
window size)
2.
Enormous headings, redundantly highlighted with gray.
2.
Headings that are smaller while still being distinct.
3.
All fonts are system fonts—Arial, Trebuchet, and Courier.
3.
Better fonts (Equity, Concourse, and Triplicate).
4.
Navigation links dominate the foreground; body text relegated 4.
Navigation less prominent and integrated into the body text.
to the background.
Colored rectangles used sparingly to denote special sections.
5.
Layout filled with colored rectangles—the large green rectangle 6.
at left, and farther down the page, rectangles of pink, green,
gray, yellow, and two shades of purple.
5.
Liberal use of white space.
What we get from technology tends to be a matter of expectations, not patience. So we should expect more of the web. Because when we do, we necessarily expect more of ourselves. And when we expect more of ourselves, we expand possibilities for everyone.
Let’s not settle for less.
15
Type Casting
Type Casting
by Steven Brower
Steven Brower’s first job was in book design as a publisher of mass-market books. These books are known as pocket books.
My first job in book design was at New
book. Indeed, the level of design of
viewer. The interiors tended to be printed on
market books. I was thrilled to be hired.
box of Cheerios.
time. The edges were often dyed to mask the
American Library, a publisher of massIt was exactly where I wanted to be. I
love the written word, and viewed this as my entrance into a world I wanted
to participate in. Little did I suspect at
the time that mass-market books, also
known as “pocket” books (they measure approximately 4” 7”, although I have
yet to wear a pocket they fit comfortably into), were viewed in the design world
as the tawdry stepchild of true literature
and design, gaudy and unsophisticated. I came to understand that this was due to the fact that mass-market books,
sold extensively in super- markets and
convenience stores, had more in common with soap detergent and cereal boxes than with their much more dignified
older brother, the hardcover first edition
16
paperbacks was as slow to evolve as a On the other hand, hardcover books, as if dressed in evening attire, wore
elegant and sophisticated jackets. Next in line in terms of standing, in both the
literary and design worlds, was the trade paper edition, a misnomer that does not refer to a specific audience within an
area of work, but, rather, to the second
edition of the hardcover, or first edition, that sports a paperbound cover. Trade paperbacks usually utilize the same
interior printing as the hardcover, and
are roughly the same size (generally, 6” 9”).
Mass-market books were not so lucky.
The interior pages of the original edition were shrunk down, with no regard for the final type size or the eyes of the
cheap paper stock, prone to yellowing over different grades of paper used. The covers
were usually quite loud, treated with a myriad of special effects (i.e., gold or silver foil,
embossing and de-bossing, spot lamination,
die cuts, metallic and Day-Glo pantone colors, thermography, and even holography), all
designed to jump out at you and into your
shopping cart as you walk down the aisle. The tradition of mass-market covers had more in
common with, and, perhaps, for the most part is the descendant of, pulp magazine covers
of earlier decades, with their colorful titles and over-the-top illustrations, than that of its more stylish, larger, and more expensive cousins.
Type Casting What I Learned So, when I made my entry into the elite world of literature, I began in the “bullpen” of a mass-market house. I believed I would be afforded a good opportunity to learn something about type and image. Indeed, in my short tenure there, I employed more display typefaces in a year and a half than I will in the rest of my lifetime. And, I abused type more than I ever dreamed possible. There, type was always condensed or stretched so the height would be greater in a small format. The problem was that the face itself became distorted, as if it was put on the inquisitionist rack, with the horizontals remaining “thick” and the verticals thinning out. Back then, when type was “spec’d” and sent out to a typesetter, there was a standing order at the type house to condense all type for our company 20 percent. Sometimes, we
Typefaces
Genre
Square serif Western Script and cursive Romance LED faces Science Fiction
Nueland African Latin Mystery
Fat, round serif faces Children’s Sans serif Nonfiction Hand scrawl Horror 1950s bouncy type Human/Teen titles
would cut the type and extend it by hand, which created less distortion but still odd-looking faces. Once, I was instructed by the art director to cut the serifs off a face, to suit his whim. It’s a good thing there is no criminal prosecution for type abuse. The art director usually commissioned the art for these titles. Therefore, the job of the designers was to find the “appropriate” type solution that worked with these illustrations to create the package. It was here that I learned my earliest lessons in the clichés of typography. Massmarket paperbacks are divided into different genres, distinct categories that define their audience and subject matter. Though they were unspoken rules, handed down from generation to generation, here is what I learned about type during my employ
Type Casting And so it went. Every month, we were given five to six titles we
this endeavor. A nice thing about this approach is that it has a
themes hung up on the wall. For a brief period I was assigned
my job easier, because I did not have to paste up much type
were responsible for, and every month, new variations on old
all the romance titles, which, themselves, were divided into
subgenres (historical, regency, contemporary, etc). I made the conscious decision to create the very best
romance covers around. Sure, I would use
script and cursive type, but I would use better script and cursive type, so distinctive, elegant, and beautiful that I, or anyone else, would
recognize the difference immediately. (When,
six months after I left the job, I went to view my achievements at the local K-Mart, I could not pick out any of my designs from all the rest on the bookracks.)
Soon after, I graduated to art director of a small publishing house. The problem was, I still knew little of and had little confidence
in, typography. However, by this time, I knew I knew little about typography. My
solution, therefore, was to create images that contained the type as an integral part
certain informality and familiarity with the audience. It also made for the cover (as one had to do back in the days of t-squares and wax), since it was, for the most part, self-contained within
the illustration. This may seem
“My solution, therefore, was to create images that contained the type as an integral part of the image, in a play on vernacular design, thereby avoiding the issue entirely. Thus began a series of collaborations with talented illustrators and photographers, in which the typography of the jacket was incorporated as part of the illustration.”
of the image, in a play on vernacular design,
thereby avoiding the issue entirely. Thus began a series of collaborations with talented
illustrators and photographers, in which
the typography of the jacket was incorporated as part of the illustration.Mystery books especially lent themselves well to
like laziness on my part, but hey, I was busy.
Eventually, my eye began to develop, and my awareness and
appreciation of good typography increased.
As I’ve said, it is a common mistake among young designers
to think a quirky novelty face equals creativity. Of course,
equal creativity and usually calls attention to the wrong aspects
of the solution. The importance of good letterspacing became paramount.
primary concern. The beauty of
a classically rendered letterform now moved me, to quote Eric Gill,
as much “as any sculpture or painted picture.” I developed an appreciation for the rules of typography.
Bodoni
Garamond
utilized in any given design, usually the combination of a serif face and a sans serif face. There are thousands
to choose from, but I find I have reduced the list to five or six in each category that I have used as body text throughout my career:
18
Serif
to, the content of the piece. It is no substitute for a well-
As a general rule, no more than two faces should be
right
the material within was now my
Cheltenham
hand.
the
serif face to evoke the mood of
than being the total sum of individual expression, it simply
reasoned conceptual solution to the design problem at
Finding
combination of a serif and sans
Caslon
calls attention to itself, detracting from, rather than adding
learned
a quirky novelty face does not
this couldn’t be farther from the truth. If anything, for the
viewer, it has the opposite of the intended effect. Rather
soon
designers fall into, like utilizing
The Rules The Rules
I
the pitfalls that most novice
Sans Serif Franklin Gothic Futura Gill Sans News Gothic Trade Gothic
Type Casting
You should never condense or extend
handed-down wisdom is: If you need a
always be paramount in the designer’s
distortions. Much care and consideration
working. These solid drop shadows always
whim of the designer, or even the client—
type. As I stated, this leads to unwanted went into the design of these faces, and they should be treated with respect.
There are thousands of condensed faces to choose from without resorting to the horizontal and vertical scale functions. Do not use text type as display. Even
though the computer will enlarge the top
beyond the type designer’s intention, this may result in distortions.
Do not use display type as text. Often,
display type that looks great large can be difficult to read when small.
Do not stack type. The result is odd-looking spacing that looks as if it is about to tumble
drop shadow to make it read, the piece isn’t look artificial, since, in reality, there is no
such thing as a solid drop shadow. There should be a better solution to readability.
Perhaps the background or the color of the type can be adjusted. Perhaps the type
seen a shadow in life that is blue, yellow, or green? It should certainly never be
white. Why would a shadow be 100 percent lighter than what is, in theory, casting the
shadow? White shadows create a hole in
Justified text looks more formal than flush
seems. The computer settings for type are rife with inconsistencies that need to be
corrected optically. Certain combinations of letterforms are more difficult to adjust than
others. It is paramount that even optical (as opposed to actual) spacing is achieved,
regardless of the openness or closeness of the kerning. It helps if you view the setting upside down, or backwards on a light box
the text.
left, rag right. Most books are set justified, while magazines are often flush left, rag right. Centered copy will appear more
relaxed than asymmetrical copy. Large
blocks of centered type can create odd-
looking shapes that detract from the copy contained within.
Column width. It is also common today to see very wide columns of text, with the
copy set at a small point size. The problem is that a very wide column is hard to read
because it forces the eye to move back and
or sun-filled window, or squint at the copy to forth, tiring the reader. On the other hand, a achieve satisfactory spacing.
very narrow measure also is objectionable,
caution you in the judicious use of drop
up, with the eye jumping from line to line.
Be careful with drop shadows. I would
shadows. Shadows these days can be rendered easily in programs such as
Adobe’s Photoshop and Illustrator, and
convincingly, too. The problem is, it is so
easily done that it is overdone. Thus, the
wholesale usage of soft drop shadows has become the typographic equivalent of clip
art. Viewers know they have seen it before. Rather than being evocative, it mainly
evokes the program it was created in. The
read.”2
market books tend to be 8 point for reasons
should never be a color. Have you ever
stacking successfully, but this requires
of each word. This is not as simple as it
in 1931, “A book is primarily a thing to be
If you must use a solid drop shadow, it
shadow, and not where you want it to go:
be given to letterspacing the characters
with which a piece is read. As Eric Gill said
Type size. A final consideration is the size
infinite number of possible variations.
no match for the heft of an O sitting on top
care. Also, as I noted, much care should
that defines the level of difficulty and ease
should be paneled or outlined. There are an
on top of itself. The thinness of the letter I is the background, and draw the eye to the of it. As always, there are ways to achieve
approach, and it is the audience—not the
because the phrases and words are too cut We, as readers, do not read letter by letter, or even word by word, but, rather, phrase
by phrase. A consensus favors an average of ten to twelve words per line.1
Don’t forget to adjust leading. Lastly, too
much leading between lines also makes the reader work too hard jumping from line to
line, while too little leading makes it hard for the reader to discern where one line ends and another begins. The audience should
of the type. As a rule of thumb, mass-
of space. A clothbound book, magazine, or
newspaper usually falls into the 9.5 point to
12 point range. Oversized art books employ larger sizes—generally, 14 point to 18 point or more.
Use the right type. Choosing the right typeface for your design can be time-
consuming. There are thousands to choose from. Questions abound. Is the face legible at the setting I want? Does it evoke what I want it to evoke? Is it appropriate to
the subject matter? There are no easy
answers. When a student of mine used Clarendon in a self-promotion piece, I
questioned why he chose a face that has
1950s connotations, mainly in connection with Reid Miles’ Blue Note album covers. He answered, “Because I thought it was
cool.” I lectured him profusely on selecting type simply based on its “coolness.”
Later, I relayed the incident to Seymour Chwast, of the legendary Pushpin
Group (formerly http://www.google.com/
Type Casting Breaking the Rules Of course, there are always exceptions to the rules. An infinite number of faces can be used within one design, particularly when you
employ a broadside-style type solution, a style that developed with the woodtype settings of the nineteenth century. Another style,
utilizing a myriad of faces, is that influenced by the Futurist and Dada movements of the early twentieth century. As Robert N. Jones stated in an article in the May 1960 issue of Print magazine: “It is my belief that there has never been a type- face that is so badly
designed that it could not be handsomely and effectively used in the hands of the right . . . designer.”3 Of course, this was before the
novelty type explosion that took place later that decade, and, again, after the advent of the Macintosh computer. Still, Jeffery Keedy, a contemporary type designer whose work appears regularly in Emigre, con- curs: “Good designers can make use of almost anything.
The typeface is the point of departure, not the destination.” Note the caveat “almost.” Still, bad use of good type is much less desirable than good use of bad type.
When I first began in publishing, a coworker decided to let me in on the “secrets” of picking the appropriate face. “If you get a book on Lincoln to design,” he advised, “look up an appropriate typeface in the index of the type specimen book.” He proceeded to do so. “Ah, here we go—‘Log Cabin!’” While, on the extremely rare occasion, I have found this to be a useful method, it’s a good general rule of what not to do.
About Steven Brower Steven Brower is an award-winning former Creative Director for PRINT, a former art director at the New York Times and currently for The Nation, co-author and designer of Woody Guthrie Artworks (Rizzoli, 2005), and author and designer of Satchmo: The Wonderful Art and World of Louis
Armstrong (Abrams, 2009). In addition his writings on design and pop culture have appeared in
several publications. He is the director of the “Get Your Masters with the Masters” MFA program for working professionals and educators at Marywood University in Scranton, PA.
Photo Credit: www.marywood.edu
Notes 1. Eric Gill, “An Essay on Typography” (Sheed and Ward, 1931), p. 136; (Godine, 1988). 2 and 3. Richard Hendel, On Book Design (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998).
20
Adapted from Publication Design (Delmar Learning, 2004).
Grooming the Font
22
Grooming the Font
Grooming The Font by Robert Bringhurst
“Typography is to literature as musical performance is to composition: an essential act of interpretation, full of endless opportunities for insight or obtuseness.” Robert Bringhurst, The Elements of Typographic Style
Bringhurst’s book The Elements of Typographic Style (1992) is considered one of
the most influential reference books on typography and book design. The work has been translated into ten languages, and is now in its third edition.
Writing begins with the making of meaningful marks. That is to say, leaving the traces of meaningful gestures. Typography begins with arranging meaningful
marks that are already made. In that respect, the practice of typography is like
playing the piano – an instrument quite different from the human voice. On the
piano, the notes are already fixed, although their order, duration and amplitude
are not. The notes are fixed but they can be endlessly rearranged, into meaningful music or meaningless noise.
Pianos, however, need to be tuned. The same is true of fonts. To put this in more
literary terms, fonts need to be edited just as carefully as texts do – and may need to be re-edited, like texts, when their circumstances change. The editing of fonts, like the editing of texts, begins before their birth and never ends.
You may prefer to entrust the editing of your fonts, like the tuning of your piano, to a professional. If you are the editor of a magazine or the manager of a publishing house, that is probably the best way to proceed. But devoted typographers, like
lutenists and guitarists, often feel that they themselves must tune the instruments they play.
Grooming the Font Legal Considerations
Ethical and Aesthetic Considerations
A font license grants the owner the right to use a typeface
If it ain’t broke….
in a specific manner as outlined in the license. (Note that in this article we are going to use the terms “font” and “typeface” rather interchangeably.)
“Every typeface comes with a license of some sort – even those free online typefaces.” The big caveat about font licenses is that every type
house or designer has the right to create a license of any type. So it is imperative that as a designer you check the
set, character encoding, fitting and sidebearings, kerning
table, hinting, and, in an OpenType font, the rules governing character sub-situation. What doesn’t need tuning or fixing shouldn’t be touched. If you want to revise the font just for
the sake of revising it, you might do better to design your own instead. And if you hack up someone else’s font for practice,
like a biology student cutting up a frog, you might cremate or bury the results.
specific license for any typeface you use commercially
If the font is out of tune, fix it once and for all: One way to
User License Agreement that is “attached” to every font
it like by line, putting space in here, removing it there, and
before you use it. You can find these rules in the End-
you download or buy. (And if you don’t have one, you can find it with a quick online search.)
Digital fonts are usually licensed to the user, not
refine the typography of a text is to work your way through repositioning errant characters one by one. But if these
refinements are made to the font itself, you will never need to make them again. They are done for good.
sold outright, and the license terms may vary. Some
Respect the text first of all, the letterforms second, the type
produced by them is an infringement of their rights. No
should take precedence over the layout of the font, the
manufacturers claim to believe that improving a font
one believes that tuning a piano or pumping up the tires
of a car infringes on the rights of the manufacturer – and this is true no matter whether the car or the piano has been rented, leased or purchased. Printing type was
designer third, the foundry fourth: The needs of the text
integrity of the letterforms over the ego of the designer, the
artistic sensibility of the designer over the foundry’s desire for profit, and the founder’s craft over a good deal else.
treated the same way from Bi Sheng’s time until the
Keep on fixing: Check every text you set to see where
treated that way still. In the digital realm, where the font
make them. Little by little, you and the instrument – the font,
1980s. Generally speaking, metal type and phototype are is wholly intangible, those older notions of ownership are under pressure to change.
The Linotype Library’s standard font license says that
improvements can be made. Then return to the font and that is – will fuse, and the type you set will start to sing.
Remember, though, this process never ends. There is no such thing as a perfect font.
“You may modify the Font’ Software to satisfy your design
If there are defective glyphs, mend them: If the basic
provision: “You do have the right to modify and alter Font
better to abandon it rather than edit it. But many fonts
requirements.” FontShop’s standard license has a similar Software for your customary personal and business use, but not for resale or further distribution.” Adobe’s and Agfa Monotype’s licenses contain no such provision. Monotype’s says instead that “You my not alter Font
Software for the purpose of adding any functionality....
You agree not to adapt, modify, alter, translate, convert, or otherwise change the Font Software….”
If your license forbids improving the font itself, the only legal way to tune it is through a software override. For example, you can use an external kerning editor to
override the kerning table built into the font. This is the least elegant way to do it, but a multitude of errors in
24
Any part of the font can be tuned – lettershapes, character
fitting and kerning can be masked, if need be, by this means.
lettershapes of your font are poorly drawn, it is probably combine superb basic letterforms with alien or sloppy
supplementary characters. Where this is the case, you can
usually rest assured that the basic letterforms are the work of
a real designer, whose craftsmanship merits respect, and that the supplementary characters were added by an inattentive
foundry employee. The latter’s errors should be remedied at once.
You may find for example that analphabetic characters such as @ + ± × = - − © are too big or too small, too light or too dark, too high, or too low, or are otherwise out of tune with
the basic alphabet. You may also find that diacritics in glyphs
such as å çé ñ ô ü are poorly drawn, poorly positioned, or out of scale with the letterforms.
Grooming the Font
If text figures, ligatures or other glyphs you need on a regular basis
If you need to add many such characters, you will need to make
almost always need figures, but most digital fonts are sold with
OpenType). If these are for your own use only the extra characters can
don’t reside on the base font, move them: For readable text, you
titling figures instead. Most digital fonts also include the ligatures
fi and fl but not ff, ffi, ffl, fj or ffj. You may find at least some of the
missing glyphs on a supplementary font (an ‘expert font’), but that
a supplementary font or, better yet, an enlarged font (TrueType or
be placed wherever you wish. If the fonts are too be shared, every new glyph should be labeled with its PostScript name and Unicode number.
is not enough. Put all the basic glyphs together on the base font.
Check and correct the sidebearings: The spacing of letters is part of the
If, like a good Renaissance typographer, you use only upright
except for refining the kerning. Remember, however, that kerning tables
parentheses and bracketscopy the upright forms from the roman to the italic font. Only then can they be kerned and spaced correctly without fuss.
If glyphs you need are missing altogether, make them: Standard ISO digital text fonts (PostScript or TrueType) have 256 slots
and carry a basic set of Western European characters. Eastern
European characters such as ą ć đ ė ğ ħ ī ň ő ŗ ș ť ů are usually
missing. So are the Welsh sorts ŵ and ŷ, and a host of characters needed for African, Asian and Native American languages.
The components required to make these characters may be
present on the font, and assembling the pieces is not hard, but
you need a place to put whatever character you make. If you need only a few and do not care about system compatibility, you can
essence of their design. A well-made font should need little adjustment, exist for the sake of problematical sequences such as ƒ*, gy, “A, To, Va and 74. If you find that simple pairs such as oo or oe require kerning, this is a sign that the letters are poorly fitted. It is better to correct the sidebearings than to write a bloated kerning table.
The spacing of many analphabetics, however, has as much to do with
editorial style as with typographic design. Unless your fonts are custom made, neither the type designer nor the founder can know what you
need or prefer. I habitually increase the left sidebearing of semicolon, colon, question and exclamation marks, and the inner bearings of
guillemets and parentheses, in search of a kind of Channel Island
compromise: neither the tight fitting preferred by most anglophone
editors nor the wide-open spacing customary in France. If I worked in French all the time, I might increase these sidebearings further.
place them in wasted slots – e.g., the ^ < > \ | ~ ` positions, which
Three options for spacing of basic analphabets in Monotype digital
™ 0/100 l, which can be reached through insertion utilities or by
between. Making such adjustments one by one by the insertion of fixed
are accessible directly from the keyboard, or slots such as ¢ ÷ 123 typing character codes or by customizing the keyboard.
Centaur: foundry issue(top); French spacing(bottom); and something in
spaces can be tedious. It is easier by far, if you know what you want and you want it consistently, to incorporate your preferences into the font.
Type Cube
Type Cube
by Lauren Powell
The purpose of this project is to create typographic solutions to express a scientific theory.
One must understand and explain a difficult subject matter in order to show it graphically to the
viewer. This project is a study of how type interacts with one another in a 3D space. There are six
sides to the cube, which show 6 or more interactions for each side. The concept of this cube and the information graphically displayed relates to the physics of sound levitation. The cube will be located at the College of arts and sciences in Washington DC.
26
Type Cube
27
Type Cube Sound levitation is apart of physics
that not a lot of people know about. It goes in depth about waves and sound.
A basic acoustic levitator has two main parts, a transducer, which
is a vibrating surface that makes
sound, and a reflector. Often, the transducer and reflector have
concave surfaces to help focus the sound. A sound wave travels away
from the transducer and bounces off the reflector. Three basic properties
of this traveling, reflecting wave help it to suspend objects in midair. The
wave, like all sound, is a longitudinal
pressure wave. In a longitudinal wave, movement of the points in the wave is parallel to the direction the wave
travels. It's the kind of motion you'd
see if you pushed and pulled one end of a stretched Slinky.
Most illustrations, though, depict sound as a transverse wave, which is what you would see if you rapidly moved one end of the Slinky up and down. This is simply because transverse waves are easier to visualize than longitudinal waves. Second, the wave can bounce off of surfaces. It follows the law of reflection, which states that the angle of incidence, the angle at which something strikes a surface, equals
the angle of reflection, the angle at which it leaves the surface. In other words, a sound wave bounces off a surface at the same angle at which it hits the surface.
A sound wave that hits a surface
head-on at a 90 degree angle will
reflect straight back off at the same
angle. The easiest way to understand wave reflection is to imagine a Slinky that is attached to a surface at one
end. If you picked up the free end of
the Slinky and moved it rapidly up and then down, a wave would travel the
length of the spring. Once it reached the fixed end of the spring, it would reflect off of the surface and travel back toward you. The same thing
happens if you push and pull one end of the spring, creating a longitudinal wave.
28
Type Cube Finally, when a sound wave reflects off of a surface, the interaction between its compressions and rarefactions causes interference.
Compressions that meet other compressions amplify one another, and compressions that meet rarefactions balance one another out. Sometimes, the reflection and interference can combine to create a standing wave. Standing waves appear to shift back and forth or vibrate in segments rather than travel from place to place. This illusion of stillness is what gives standing waves their name.
Standing sound waves have defined
nodes, or areas of minimum pressure, and antinodes, or areas of maximum
pressure. A standing wave's nodes are at the heart of acoustic levitation. Imagine
a river with rocks and rapids. The water is calm in some parts of the river, and it
is turbulent in others. Floating debris and foam collect in calm portions of the river. In order for a floating object to stay still
in a fast-moving part of the river, it would
need to be anchored or propelled against the flow of the water. This is essentially what an acoustic levitator does, using
sound moving through a gas in place of water.
â&#x20AC;&#x153;A sound wave that hits a surface head-on at a 90 degree angle will reflect straight back off at the same angle.â&#x20AC;? By placing a reflector the right distance away from a transducer, the acoustic levitator creates a standing wave.
When the orientation of the wave is
parallel to the pull of gravity, portions
of the standing wave have a constant
downward pressure and others have a constant upward pressure. The nodes have very little pressure. In space, where there is little gravity, floating
particles collect in the standing waveâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s nodes, which are calm and still. On
Earth, objects collect just below the
nodes, where the acoustic radiation
pressure, or the amount of pressure that a sound wave can exert on a surface, balances the pull of gravity.
Back to Basics
Back to Basics: Stopping Sloppy Ty p o g r a p By John D. Berry
There’s a billboard along the freeway in San
Francisco that’s entirely typo- graphic, and very
simple. Against a bright blue background, white letters spell out a single short line, set in quotation marks: “Are you lookin’ at me?” The style of the letters is
traditional, with serifs; it looks like a line of dialogue,
which is exactly what it’s supposed to look like. Since this is a billboard, and the text is the entire message of the billboard, it’s a witty comment on the fact that
you are looking at “me”—that is, the message on the billboard—as you drive past.
this straight apostrophe is like a fart in a symphony—
billboard for the first time, we both simultaneously
normal quotation marks at the beginning and end of
But, as my partner and I drove past and spotted this voiced the same response: “No, I’m looking at your apostrophe!”
The quotation marks around the sentence are real quotation marks, which blend in with the style of the lettering—“typographers’ quotes,” as they’re
sometimes called—but the apostrophe at the end of
“lookin’” is, disconcertingly, a single “typewriter quote,” a straight up-and-down line with a rounded top and a teardrop tail at the bottom.
To anyone with any sensitivity to the shapes of letters, whether they know the terms of typesetting or not,
30
h y
boorish, crude, out of place, and distracting. The
‘
the sentence just serve to make the loud “blat!” of the apostrophe stand out. If that
had been the purpose of the
billboard, it would have been
very effective. But unless the
billboards along Highway 101
have become the scene of an
exercise in typographic irony, it’s just a big ol’ mistake. Really big,
and right out there in plain sight.
Back to Basics The Devil Is in the Details
Automated Errors
This may be a particularly large-scale example, but it’s not
As my own small gesture toward improvement, I’ll point out a couple
we read—and that we, if we’re designers or typographers,
become slightly less commonplace, at least for awhile.
unusual. Too much of the signage and printed matter that
create—is riddled with mistakes like this. It seems that an
amazing number of people responsible for creating graphic matter are incapable of noticing when they get the type wrong.
This should not be so. These fine points ought to be
covered in every basic class in typography, and basic typography ought to be part of the education of every
graphic designer. But clearly, this isn’t the case—or else a lot of designers skipped that part of the class, or have
simply for- gotten what they once learned about type. Or,
they naively believe the software they use will do the job for them.
Maybe it’s time for a nationwide—no, worldwide—program of remedial courses in using type.
of the more obvious problems—in the hope that maybe, maybe, they’ll Typewriter quotes and straight apostrophes are actually on the wane, thanks to word-processing programs and page-layout programs that
offer the option of automatically changing them to typographers’ quotes on the fly. (I’m not sure what has made the phenomenon I spotted on
that billboard so common, but I’ve noticed a lot of examples recently of text where the double quotation marks are correct but the apostrophes are straight.) But those same automatic typesetting routines have
created another almost universal mistake: where an apostrophe at the beginning of a word appears backwards, as a single open quotation mark. You see this in abbreviated dates (‘99, ‘01) and in colloquial
spellings, like ‘em for them. The program can turn straight quotes into typographers’ quotes automatically, making any quotation mark at
the start of a word into an open quote, and any quotation mark at the
end of a word into a closed quote, but it has no way of telling that the
apostrophe at the beginning of ‘em isn’t supposed to be a single open quote, so it changes it into one.
Back to Basics
“The only way to catch this is to make the correction by hand— every time.” Anemic Type The other rude noise that has become com-
mon in the symphony hall is fake small caps.
Small caps are a wonderful thing, very useful
and some- times elegant; fake small caps are a distraction and an abomination.
Fake caps are what you get when you use a
program’s “small caps” command. The software just shrinks the full-size capital letters down
by a predetermined percentage—which gives
you a bunch of small, spindly- looking caps all
huddled together in the middle of the text. If the design calls for caps and small caps—that is,
small caps for the word but a full cap for the first letter—it’s even worse, since the full-size caps
draw attention to themselves because they look so much heavier than the smaller caps next to them. (If you’re using caps and small caps to
spell out an acronym, this might make sense; in that case, you might want the initial caps
to stand out. Otherwise, it’s silly. (And—here comes that word again - distrating)
If it weren’t for a single exception, I’d advise everyone to just forget about the “small caps” command—forget it ever existed, and never, ever, touch it again. (The exception is Adobe InDesign, which is smart enough to find the real small caps in an OpenType font that includes them, and use them when the “small caps” command is invoked. Unfortunately, InDesign isn’t smart enough, or independent enough, to say, “No, thanks,” when you invoke “small caps” in a font that doesn’t actually have any. It just goes ahead and makes those familiar old fake small
caps.) You don’t really need small caps at all, in most typesetting situations; small caps are a typo- graphic refinement, not a crutch. If you’re
going to use them, use real small caps: properly designed letters with the form of caps, but usually a little wider, only as tall as the x-height or a little taller, and with stroke weights that match the weight of the lowercase and the full caps of the same type- face. Make sure you’re using
a typeface that has true small caps, if you want small caps. Letterspace them a little, and set them slightly loose, the same way you would (or at least should) with a word in all caps; it makes the word much more readable.
Pay Attention, Now There are plenty of other bits of remedial typesetting that we ought to study, but those will do for now. The obvious corollary to all this is, to pro- duce well-typeset words, whether in a single phrase on a billboard or sev- eral pages of text, you have to pay attention.
Proofread. Proofread again. Don’t trust the defaults of any program you use. Look at good typesetting and figure out how it was done, then do it yourself. Don’t be sloppy. Aim for the best.
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“Words to live by, I suppose. And, certainly, words to set type by.”
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