Typography / Task 1: Exercise

August 25, 2020

Typography / Task 1: Exercise

25.8.2020 - 24.9.2020 (week 1 - week 5)
Phoebie Ng / 0341172 / Bachelor of creative media
Typography
Task 1 ( Exercises )

LECTURES

Introduction

We were brief on how to create our own portfolio using blogger which we need to use that to record our journey through out the semester. Mr. Vinod also brief us about our module information which clearly show how our module structure would be like. After that, We had learn things about type expression and some of the previous student were shown to us. We were taught by how to use basic function of illustrator and also some of the shortcut for using illustrator that we learn during the lesson. We were also told that we should not take photo of work in room light but sunlight when we need to scan it to digital drawing.

Lecture 1-Introduction

The style and appearance of printed matter. The act of creating letter, creation of type faces. Animation. It also could be seen in website design, app design, sign design. Typography could also use in logo type. Reading is important for studying typography. Different between calligraphy and lettering. Calligraphy refers to the writing styles. Lettering is when you draw out. "Typography is an art, and good typography is art. Therein lies the problem for both teacher and student." (Kane, 2002).

The arrangement in types involves selecting typefaces, point size, line length, line spacing (tracking), and adjusting the space within letters pairs (kerning).
Bad typography affects the comprehension of learning.
Font is refer to the process of making font at a foundry.
Typeface refers to individual type or weight within the typeface.
Type family refers to entire family of fonts that share similar characteristic.

Lecture 2- Development / Timeline

Earlier letter form development- Phoenician to Roman, initial writing meant scratching into wet clay with sharpened sticks or carving into stone with a chisel. The Greeks changed the direction of writing. They developed a style of writing called 'boustrophedon', which meant the line of text read alternately from right to left and left to right.

fig 1.1 example from lecturer slides (25.8.2020)

Hand script from 3rd- 10th century

Square capitals were the written version that can be found in Roman monuments. Both square and rustic capitals were typically reserved for documents of some intended performance.

Blackletter to Gutenberg's type

In south, a rounder more open hand gained popularity, called 'rotunda'. Gutenberg's skills included engineering, metalsmithing, and chemistry.

Timeline for text type classification.

fig 1.2 simple notes of type classification sketches by me (25.8.2020)

Lecture 3 - Basic / describing letter forms

fig 1.3 example from lecture slides (04.09.2020)

As with any craft that has evolved over 500 years, typography employs a number of technical terms.

Baseline The imaginary line the visual base of the letter forms.
Median The imaginary line defining the x height of letter forms
X height The height in any typeface of the lowercase 'x'
Stroke Any line that defines the basic letter form
Apex / Vertex The point created by joining two diagonal stems (apex above and vertex below)
Arm Short strokes off the stem f the letter form, either horizontal (E,F,L) or inclined upward (K,Y).
Ascender The portion of the stem of a lowercase letter form that projects above the median.
Barb The half serif finish on some curved strokes
Beak The half serif finish on some horizontal arms
Bowl The rounded form that describes a counter. The bowl may be either open or closed.
Bracket The transition between the serif and the stem
Cross bar The horizontal strokes in a letter form that joins two stems together
Cross stroke The horizontal stroke in a letter form that joins two stems together
Crotch The interior space when two strokes meet
Descender The portion of the stem of a lowercase letter form that projects below the baseline
Ear The stroke extending out from main stem or body of the letter form
Finial The rounded no serif terminals to a stroke
Leg short stroke off the stem of the letter form, either at the bottom of the stroke (L) or inclined downward (K, R)
Ligature The character formed by the combination of two or more letter forms
Link The stroke that connects the bowl and the loop of a lowercase G
Loop the bowl created in the descender of the lowercase G
Serif The right angled or oblique foot at the end of the stroke
Shoulder The curved stroke that is not part of the a bowl
Spine The curved stem of the S
Spur The extension the articulates the junction of the curved and rectilinear stroke
Stem The significant vertical or oblique stroke
Stress The orientation of the letter form, indicated at the thin stroke in the round forms
Swash The flourish that extends the strokes of the letter form
Tail The curved diagonal stroke at the finish of certain letter forms
Terminal The self-contained finish of a stroke without a serif.
Ornaments Used as flourishes in invitations or certificates

fig 1.4 typography anatomy (04.09.2020)

fig 1.5 ornaments (04.09.2020)

fig 1.6 type faces (04.09.2020)

Lecture 4- Text/ Tracking: Kerning and Letter spacing (part 1)
Letter spacing means to add space between the letters. The addition and removal of space in a work or sentence is referred to as tracking.

Flush left: Each line starts at the same point but ends wherever the last word on the line ends. Spaces between words are consistent throughout the text, allowing the type to create an even gray value.
Centered: This for mat imposes symmetry upon the text, assigning equal value and weight to both ends of any lines. Transform fields of text into shapes, thereby adding a pictorial quality to material that is non pictorial by nature.
Flush right: This format places emphasis on the end of a line as opposed to its start. It can be useful n situations where the relationship between text and image might be ambiguous without a strong orientation to the right.
Justified: Like centering, this format imposes a symmetrical shape on the text. It is achieved by expanding or reducing spaces between words and, sometimes, between letters.

Type that calls attention to itself before the reader can get to the actual words is simply interference, and should be avoided.
Type with a relatively generous x height or relative stroke width produce a darker mass on the page.

fig 1.7 example from lecture slides (11.9.2020)

Lecture 5- Text/ Indicating Paragraphs ( part 2 )

fig 1.8 pilcrow example from lecture sides (11.9.2020)

pilcrow a holdover from medieval manuscript seldom use today.

fig 1.9 line spacing example from lecture slides (11.9.2020)

line spacing between paragraph. If the line spacing is 12 pt , then the paragraph space is 12 pt. This ensures cross alignment across columns of text.

fig 1.10 example of line spacing from lecture slides (11.9.2020)

fig 1.11 example of widow from lecture slides (11.9.2020)

A widow is a short line of type left alone at the end o a column of text.
An orphan is a short line of type left alone at the start of new column.

Designers need to take great care to avoid them. The only solution to widows is to rebreak your line endings through out your paragraph Typographers make sure that no column of text starts with the last line of the preceding paragraph.

When highlighting text by placing a field of color at the back of the text, maintain the left reading axis of the text ensures readability is at it's best.

fig 1.12 typefaces example from lecture slide (11.9.2020)

Lecture 6- Understanding

fig 1.13 symmetrical example (18.9.2020)

fig 1.14 symmetrical example (18.9.2020)

The uppercase letter forms below suggest symmetry, but in fact it is not symmetrical. It is not symmetrical. The uppercase letter forms may appear symmetrical, but close examination shows that the width of the left slope is thinner than the right stroke.

The complexity of each individual letter form is neatly demonstrated by examining the lowercase ‘a’ of two seemingly similar San serif typefaces - Helvetica and Univers.
fig 1.14 example of Helvetic and Univers 18.9.2020)

The height generally describe the size of the lowercase. the curve stroke must rise above median in order to appear to be same size as the vertical and horizontal strokes they join.

The counter form, the space describes, often contained by the strokes of the form.

fig 1.15 letter and counter form 18.9.2020

fig 1.16 important aspects in typo that create great contrast 18.9.2020

Lecture 7- Screen & Print
In the past, typography was viewed as living only when it reached paper. Today, typography exists not only on paper but on a multitude of screens. It is subject to many unknown and fluctuating parameters, such as operating systems, system fonts, the device and screen itself.
type for screen
typefaces intended for use on the web are optimized and often modified to enhance readability and performance on screen in a variety of digital environment.
hyperactive Link/ hyperlink
A hyperlink is a phrase that you can click on to jump to a new document or a new section within the current document.
Font size for screen 16 px text on screen is about the same size as text printed in a book or magazine; this is accounting for reading distance.
System Fonts for screen : Open Sans, Lato Arial, Helvetica, Times New Roman, Times, Courier New, Courier, Verdana, Georgia, Palatino, Garamond.

INSTRUCTIONS

TASKS

Exercise 1-Type Expression

We were assigned exercise of type expression. 6 words and and 10 different font family were provided for us. The following words were given: Bang! , Bloom , Twirl , Tired , Mad and Hug. We could sketch our idea on paper or any tablet we could use, then we could digitize it into illustrator.

First sketches ( Exploration )

fig 2.1 to fig 2.4 are the first sketches of the words that I had chosen which is 'Mad', 'Bloom', 'Tired' and 'Twirl'. I didn't really follow the font family was provided during the sketching session as I want to explore more style without any restriction at first.

fig 2.1 type expression exercise sketches-Mad (30.8.2020)

fig 2.2 type expression exercise sketches-bloom (30.8.2020)

fig 2.3 type expression exercise-Tired (30.8.2020)

fig 2.4 type expression exercise sketches-Twirl (30.8.2020)

Mad: I had used Radial blur effect to make the letters seems like moving fast which how our heart move really fast and unpredictable when we are mad.

Tired: I had included some basic shapes on the letter 'T' which looks like a person that was tired and also Gaussian blur effect on it, it is because sometimes when you are tired, your eyesight would be blur.

Twirl: I had used envelope distort effect to make the letters looks twirling.

Bloom: This is the simplest design among the 4 designs which I just add 3 'o' between the 2 'o' of the words itself to make it looks like flower blooming. It would be nicer if it is done by animation.

Drafts in jpeg

fig 2.5 type expression exercise,1st drat in jpg (30.8.2020)

fig 2.6 type expression exercise,2nd draft in jpg (30.8.2020)

final outcome

fig 2.7 type expression exercise, final outcome in jpg (30.8.2020)

fig 2.8 type expression exercise, final outcome in pdf (30.8.2020)

Exercise 2-Animation of words

we were asked to produce an animation of type expression among 1 of the type expressions we had made last week. I don't really know which one to chose so I try some of them to see how it works.

progression

fig 2.9 mad animation progression (6.9.2020)

fig 2.10 bloom animation progression (6.9.2020)

fig 2.11 tired ver 1 animation progression (6.9.2020)

fig 2.12 tired ver 2 progression (6.9.2020)

Follow by the instruction that Mr. Vinod gave, I did all the design in illustrator and transfer them into photoshop.

final outcome in gif

fig 2.13 bloom animation final outcome (6.9.2020)

fig 2.14 tired version 1 animation final outcome (6.9.2020)

fig 2.15 tired version 2 animation final outcome (6.9.2020)

fig 2.16 mad animation final outcome (6.9.2020)

Bloom version 1 : For this animation, which is fig 2.11, I want to show how flower is bloom and I think it is a simple movement of how the petals are moving to their right position

Tired version 1 : For this version of tired animation, which is fig 2.12, I want to show how when people is tired, their sight will not be that good, so as you can see the letter 'E' is slowly disappearing.

Tired version 2 : For this version of tired, which is 2.13, it has the same concept with version 1 but this time all the letter are dropping slowly and show disappeared half way which shows how some of us are offline when we are tired and our sight is not that good.

Mad : For this short animation, which is fig 2.14 I want to express the feeling of madness by having a lot of letter 'M' 'A' 'D' stabbing together and moving fast to slow to show how our hear move fast and unpredictable when we are mad.

final outcome

fig 2.17 type expression animation final outcome (6.9.2020)

Exercise 3-formatting text

We were introduced to a new software InDesign to do this exercise. According to the lecture video, we need to produce our own name card, an text about us.

progression

fig 2.18 name card progression (16.9.2020)

fig 2.19 name card progression (16.9.2020)

fig 2.20 name card progression (16.9.2020)

fig 2.21 text progression (16.9.2020)

I had chose Futura among 10 type face provided as I think it is classical and simple. I then create 4 different layout for our card design. 3 of the designs were follow by the tutorial video and I tried to a different design myself. We were asked to write something about ourselves about 100 to 200 words.

drafts in jpeg

fig 2.22 draft page 1 (16.9.2020)

fig 2.23 1st draft page 2 (16.9.2020)

final outcome in jpeg

fig 2.24 final outcome page 1 (24.9.2020)

fig 2.25 final outcome page 2 (24.9.2020)

final outcome in pdf

fig 2.26 final outcome in pdf (24.9.2020)

Exercise 4-formatting text (text layout)
Mr. Vinod demonstrate more on formatting text using InDesign for us. We were asked to do exercise of creating text layout in class using the article by Mr. Shamsul.

progression

fig 2.27 formatting text progression (24.9.2020)

fig 2.28 formatting text progression (24.9.2020)

fig 2.29 formatting text progression (24.9.2020)

fig 2.30 formatting text progression (24.9.2020)

fig 2.32 formatting text progression (24.9.2020)

fig 2.33 formatting text progression (24.9.2020)

fig 2.34 formatting text progression (24.9.2020)

I first create the margin and pasted the text and make sure all the text are aligned together.

final outcome in jpeg

fig 2.35 formatting text final outcome (24.9.2020)

fig 2.36 formatting text final outcome (24.9.2020)

fig 2.37 final outcome (24.9.2020)

final outcome in pdf

fig 2.38 final outcome in pdf 24.9.2020

FEEDBACK

week 2

General feedback : Mr. Vinod looked at my blog, he said that it is OK but I need to add horizontal line and change some of the words bold to differentiate with other content.

Specific feedback : Mr. Vinod said that I need to redo my Twirl, Mad and Tired as there are better design in my sketches that I could use for my final outcome. The word Bloom was fine.

week 3

Specific feedback : Mr. Vinod looked at my animation work for type expression, he said that both of my tired animation are nice and both of them could work.

week 4

General feedback : no feedback

week 5

General feedback : Mr. Vinod said that my work doesn't have cross alignment and can't see alignment between the headings and the texts.

REFLECTION

Experience : week 1: This was actually the first time I used illustrator. The first class really reminded me of how to use some simple tools. It was quite hard for me to use illustrator as I am new to it. I did searched up online like how to create effects to the words that helped me a lot. week 2: I had experience to use other illustrator tool and how illustrator and Photoshop would work together. It actually really fun to watch how few of the images combine to become an animation. week 3: for this week I had experience on how to use InDesign and I found it quite useful and it was really fun by playing around the software. week 5: for this week, I am a little bit sad because my work are not accepted by Mr. Vinod as I have a lot of mistakes, I need to be more careful next time.

Observation : week 1: I realized that typography are not that easy to do as it requires design principles and also the difference between using procreate in IPad and Illustrator, both of them have their own pros and cons. week 3: I found that formatting text requires a lot of principle.

Finding : week 1: I had found out how to use and apply effects onto letters by using illustrator. Other than that, I also explored some of the ways to express words by visualizing it. week 2: I had found out how to actually use art board to create multiple images and how to use Photoshop to create animation. week 3: I learned some of the typography knowledge through out this week by reading books online. week 5: I found that even the submission is passed, I could also make improvement on my work as practice.

FURTHER READING

week 1

Typography essentials

100 Design principles for working with type

fig 3.1 book cover 24.9.2020

http://ezproxy.taylors.edu.my/login?url=https://search-ebscohost-com.ezproxy.taylors.edu.my/login.aspx?direct=true&db=nlebk&AN=2026728&site=eds-live&scope=site

Using letter as form. Each letter is a shape unto itself. The individual form of the letter could be use partially. It has build in relationship with any typeface that accompanies it.
Using counter spaces as form. The shape inside and around the shape of a letter called counter spaces. It could add on the weight of the display.
Emotional content implied by the text. Letter forms can amplify the emotional weight of the text.
Considering the medium. How and where letter form appear, consider whether the text appears on a reflective surface. Is the reader old or young, in case, a larger typeface and higher legible should be used. As with reflective surface, the distance, color contrast with background, size and weight should be consider.
Being expressive. A strong typographic personality can be very effective. Any effects can be used to express the meaning of the text.
Consider background contrast. The different between object and the background. Studies had shown that the same amount of white type on black ground is better to read than black type on white ground. If there is not enough contrast, it depends on lots of factors including letter weight, strokes width, point size.. The amount of text, length of lines, light condition and paper surface could be factors as well.
Extremely scaling. When very large elements are used in contrast with normally scaled typographic elements.

week 2

Playing with type : 50 Graphic Experiments for Exploring Typographic Design Principles

fig 3.2 book cover 24.9.2020

It is a book that shows how we can play with type. Some of the example like type as image, type as pattern and texture and more. There are pictures of how we can create an image by using type. How we can apply basic principles by playing with type. There were also examples of how turning black and white drawings into vector graphics. There were a lot more visual examples in this book. I like how this book shows a lot of images, without so much of words. I would like to recommend this book for my friends to have better understanding of typography.

week 3

Typographic design : form and communication / Rob Carter [and four others]

fig 3.3 book cover 24.9.2020

somethings I learned while reading

A typographic arrangement is partly governed by visual punctuation. Visual punctuation clarifies the reader/ viewer's understanding of the content and structure of a typographic arrangement.
The proportions of the individual letter form are an important consideration in typography.
Typographic legibility is widely misunderstood and often neglected by designers.
Like typographic anatomy, typographic syntax has a language that must be learned if one is to understand typographic design.
The element of design -- letter, word, line,column.

week 4

layout workbook : A Real world Guide to building Pages in Graphic design

fig 3.4 book cover 24.9.2020

To design is much more than simply to assemble, to order, or even to edit; it is to add value and meaning, to illuminate, to simplify, to clarify, to modify, to dignify, to dramatize, to persuade, and perhaps even to amuse.
Inspiration is found or discovered and transformed into thoughts and ideas.
The designer must willingly, actively, and carefully examine everything and pay close attention to details.
The recognition of the value of the journey, as opposed to the imagined value points of ending, informs the idea of process.
Good type is good because it has natural strength and beauty. The best results come, as a rule, from finding the best type for the work and then guiding it with the gentlest possible hand.

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Phoebie Ng (0341172)