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Typography - Task1 / Exercises

22/4/2024 - 31/5/2024 (Week1-Week5)
Amber Tan Jing Jing (0372746)
Typography / Bachelor of Design in Creative Media / Taylors University
Task 1 Exercises


TABLE OF CONTENTS

3. TASK

LECTURES

Week1

Typo_0_Introduction
  • Font:  The individual font or weight within the typeface
  • Example of fonts: Georgia Regular, Georgia Italic and Georgia Bold
  • Typeface: The entire family of fonts/weights that share similar characteristics/styles
  • Example of typeface: Georgia, Arial, Times New Roman, Didot and Futura
Typo_1_Development

1. Early letterform development: Phoenician to Roman
  • Uppercase forms are simple combination of straight lines and pieces of circles as the materials and tools of early writing required.

Figure 1.1 Evolution of Phoenician Letterform
  • The Greeks changed the directions of writing
  • Phoenicians wrote from right to left
  • The Greeks developed a style of writing that the lines of text read alternately from right to left and left to right
Figure 1.2 Boustrophedon
  • Certain qualities of Etruscan strokes have a change in weight from vertical to horizontal, a broadening of the stroke at start and finish
  • Roman letters were developed from Phoenician and Greek letters.
Figure 1.3 Timeline

2. Hand script from 3rd-10th century C.E.
  • Square capitals have serifs added to the finish of the main strokes.The variety of stroke width was achieved by the reed pen held at an angle of approximately 60° off the perpendicular.
Figure 1.4 square capitals
  • Rustic capitals allowed for twice as many words on a sheet of parchment hand took far less time to  write. The pen or brush was held at an angle of approximately 30° off the perpendicular. 
Figure 1.5 rustic capitals
  • Everyday transactions, however were typically written in cursive hand in which forms were simplified for speed. We can see here the beginning of what we refer to as lowercase letterforms.
Figure 1.6 cursive hand
  • "Uncia" is Latin for a twelfth of anything.It might, however, be more accurate to think of uncials simply as small letters.The broad forms of uncials are more readable at small sizes than rustic capitals.
Figure 1.7 uncia
  • Half-uncials mark the formal beginning of lowercase letterforms
Figure 1.8 half-uncials
  • Charlemagne entrusted standardize all ecclesiastical texts to Alcuin of York, Abbot of St Martin of Tours.The monks rewrote the texts using both majuscules (uppercase), miniscule, capitalization and punctuation which set the standard for calligraphy for a century.
Figure 1.9 Caloline miniscule

3. Blackletter to Gutenberg's type
  • With the dissolution of Charlemagne's empire came regional variations upon Alcuin's script. In northern Europe, a condense strongly vertical letterform know as Blackletter or textura gained popularity. In the south, a rounder more open hand gained popularity, called Rotunda.
Figure 1.10 Backletter (Textura)
  • Gutenberg marshaled engineering, metalsmithing, and chemistry to build pages that accurately mimicked the work of the scribe's hand - Blackletter of northern Europe. His type mold required a different brass matrix, or negative impression, for each letterform.
Figure 1.11 Blackletter of northern Europe

4. Text Type Development
 
Figure 1.12 Text type 


Week2

Typo_3_Text_P1

1. Tracking: Kerning and Letterspacing
  • Kerning refers to the automatic adjustment of space between letters. 
  • Letterspacing means to add space between the letters. 
  • Tracking is the addition and removal of space in a word or sentence. There are normal tracking, loose tracking and tight tracking.
Figure 1.13 Tracking
  • Uppercase letterforms are drawn to be able to stand on their own, whereas lowercase letterforms require the counterform created between letters to maintain the line of reading.
Figure 1.14 Counterform

2. Formatting Text
  • Flush left is most closely mirrors the asymmetrical experience of handwriting. 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 imposes symmetry upon the text, assigning equal value and weight to both ends of any line. It transforms fields of text into shapes, thereby adding a pictorial quality to material that is non-pictorial by nature. Its important to amend line breaks so that the text does not appear too jagged.
  • Flush right places emphasis on the end of a line as opposed to its start. It can be useful in situations (like captions) where the relationship between text and image might be ambiguous without a strong orientation to the right.
  • Justified achieved by expanding or reducing spaces between words and, sometimes, between letters. The resulting openness of lines can occasionally produce 'rivers' of white space running vertically through the text. Careful attention to line breaks and hyphenation is required to amend this problem.
3. Texture
  • Type with a relatively generous x-height or relatively heavy stroke width produces a darker mass on the page than type with a relatively smaller x-height or lighter stroke. 
Figure 1.15 Anatomy Of A Typeface

4. Leading and Line Length
  • Text type should be large enough to be read easily at arms length.
  • Text that is set too tightly encourages vertical eye movement, reader can easily loose his or her place. Type that is set too loosely creates striped patterns that distract the reader from the material at hand.

  • Shorter lines require less leading; longer lines more reading .A good rule of thumb is to keep line length between 55-65 characters.

5. Type Specimen Book 
  • A type specimen book (or ebook for screen) is to provide an accurate reference for type, type size, type leading, type line length etc.
  • It is often useful to enlarge type to 400% on the screen to get a clear sense of the relationship between descenders on one line and ascenders on the line below.
Figure 1.16 Sample Type Specimen Sheet:Times Gothic

Week3

Typo_4_Text_P2

1. Indicating Paragraphs

  • 'Pilcrow' (¶) was used in text to indicate paragraph spacing, it is a holdover from medieval manuscripts seldom use today.

  • 'Line space'(leading)is between each line of text. If the line space is 12pt, then the paragraph space is 12pt.

  • There is difference between leading and line spacing. A leading space is the space between two sentences. A line spacing takes into consideration the the descender from one sentence to the descender of another sentence.

Figure 1.17 Leading space vs line space
  • Indentation is the same size of the line spacing or the same as the point size of your text.
  • Extended paragraphs creates unusually wide columns of text. Despite these problems, there can be strong compositional or functional reasons for choosing it.
2. Widows and Orphans
  • A widow is a short line of type left alone at the end of a column of text.
  • An orphan is a short line of type left alone at the start of new column.
  • In justified text both widows and orphans are considered serious gaffes.
  • The only solution to widows is to rebreak your line endings through out your paragraph so that the last line of any paragraph is not noticeably.
  • Orphans, make sure that no column of text starts with the last line of the preceding paragraph.
Figure 1.18 Widows and Orphans

3. Highlighting Text
  • When highlighting text by placing a field of colour at the back of the text, maintaining the left reading axis of the text ensures readability is at its best.
  • Sometimes it is necessary to place certain typographic elements outside the left margin of a colomn of type (extending as opposed to indenting) to maintain a strong reading axis.
  • Quotation marks, like bullets, can create a clear indent, breaking the left reading axis. Compare the indented quote at the top with the extended quote at the bottom.
Figure 1.19 Quotation marks

4. Headline within Text
  • 'A' head indicates a clear break between the topics within a section. 'A' heads are set larger than the text, in small caps and in bold.  'A' head 'extended' to the left of the text.
  • 'B' head here is subordinate to 'A' heads. 'B' heads indicate a new supporting argument or example for the topic at hand. As such they should not interrupt the text as strongly as 'A' heads do. 'B' heads are shown in small caps, italic, bold serif, and bold san serif.
  • 'C' heads, although not common, highlights specific facets of material within 'B' head text. They not materially interrupt the flow of reading. As with 'B' heads, these 'C' heads are shown in small caps. italics, serif bold and san serif bold. 'C' heads in this configuration are followed by at least an em space for visual separation.
Figure 1.20 'A'head
Figure 1.21 'B'head
Figure 1.22 'C'head

5. Cross Alignment
  • Cross aligning headlines and captions with text type reinforces the architectural sense of the page-the structure-while articulating the complimentary vertical rhythms. 
  • Below, one line of headline type cross-aligns with two lines of text type, and (right; bottom left) four lines of headline type cross-align with five lines of text type.
Figure 1.23 Cross Alignment

Week4

Typo_2_Basic

1. Describing Letterforms
  • Baseline: The imaginary line the visual base of the letterforms.
  • Median: The imaginary line defining the x-height of letterforms.
  • X-height:  The height in any typeface of the lowercase 'x'.
Figure 1.24 Point Size

Figure 1.25 Anatomy of Letterforms
  • 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 letterform, indicated by the thin stroke in round forms.
  • Swash: The flourish that extends the stroke of the letterform.
  • Terminal: The self-contained finish of a stroke without a serif. This is something of a catch-all term. Terminals may be flat (T' above), flared, acute, (t' above), grave, concave, convex, or rounded as a ball or a teardrop (see finial).
Figure 1.26 Spur
Figure 1.27 Stem
Figure 1.28 Stress
Figure 1.29 Swash
Figure 1.30 Terminal

2. The Font
  • The full font of a typeface contains much more than 26 letters, to numerals, and a few punctuation marks.
  • Uppercase: Capital letters, including certain accented vowels, the c cedilla and n tilde, and the a/e and o/e ligatures.
  • Lowercase: include the same characters as uppercase.
  • Small Capitals: Uppercase letterforms draw to the x-height of the typeface. Small Caps are primarily found in serif fonts as part of what is often called expert set.
  • Uppercase Numerals: These numerals are the same height as uppercase letters and are all set to the same kerning width.
  • Lowercase Numerals: These numerals are set to x-height with ascenders and descenders. They are best used when ever you would use upper and lowercase letterforms.
  • Italic: The forms in a italic refer back to fifteenth century Italian cursive handwriting. Oblique are typically based on the roman form of the typeface.
  • Punctuation, miscellaneous characters: Although all fonts contain standard punctuation marks, miscellaneous characters can change from typeface to typeface.
  • Ornaments: Used as flourishes in invitations or certificates. They usually are provided as a font in a larger typeface family.
  • Roman：The letterform is so called because the uppercase forms are derived from inscriptions of Roman monuments. A slightly lighter stroke in roman is known as 'Book'.
  • Boldface：Characterized by a thicker stroke than a roman form.
  • Light：A lighter stroke than the roman form. Even lighter strokes are called 'thin'.
Figure 1.31 Describing Typefaces

Figure 1.32 9Typefaces we use

INSTRUCTIONS



Task [1]: Exercises [1] - Type Expression


Figure 2.1 type expression sketches

- smile#1: I want to shape the 'SMILE' into smiling form.
- smile#2: I use the bottom half of the letter 's' to create a smiling face and added teeth.
- smile#3: I place eyes on the bottom half of the 's', making it looks like it's smiling.
- smile#4: I bend the 'l' and use 'i' as eyes, so when viewed vertically, it looks like a smiling face.
- break#1: 'BREAK' splits open from the middle of the words.
- break#2: 'BREAK' splits from the 'e' part, resembling an egg.
- break#3: 'BREAK' splinters open like glass.
- break#4: Use 'k' as an arrow, shooting towards 'break,' then it splits open."
- jump#1: Each letter is jumping.
- jump#2: 'Jump' leaps out from the hole.
- jump#3: Use 'j' and 'p' as two people, 'u' as the rope, 'm' is jumping rope."
- jump#4: Use 'm' as the trampoline, 'j', 'u', 'p' are jumping on it.
- sleep#1: View 'L' as a bed, 'e' , 'e' , 'p' are sleeping on it.
- sleep#2: Make 'sleep' in the shape of 'z', I use 'zzz' to represent sleep.
- sleep#3: I use 'S' to create an animal sleeping , then view 'L'as a bed.
- sleep#4: It means sleep very deep. 

Figure 2.2 Final Type Expression-JPEG,Week3 (10/5/2024)


Figure 2.3 Final Type Expression-PDF,Week4 (17/5/2024)

Figure 2.4 Animation Storyboard, Week4(17/5/2024)

  •  My idea was something hit the word "BREAK", then "BREAK" splinters open like glass."

Figure 2.5 Final Animated Type Expression"Break"-GIF,Week4(17/5/2024)

Task [1]: Exercises [2] - Text Formatting
Figure 2.6 Name without kerning and tracking-JPEG(24/5/2024)
Figure 2.7 Name with kerning and tracking-JPEG(24/5/2024)

 
Figure 2.8 Name with kerning and tracking-PDF(24/5/2024)



INSTRUCTION

HEAD LINE
Font/s: Bembo Std
Type Size/s: 72 pt
Leading: 36 pt
Paragraph spacing: 0 

BODY
Font/s: Bembo Std
Type Size/s: 9 pt
Leading: 11 pt
Paragraph spacing: 11 pt
Characters per-line: 57
Alignment: left justified 

Margins: 123 mm top, 26 mm left + right + bottom
Columns: 2
Gutter: 10 mm



Figure 2.9 8Text Formatting layouts(24/5/2024)
Figure 2.10 Final Text Formatting layout - JPEG(27/5/2024)

Figure 2.11 Final Text Formatting layout - PDF(27/5/2024)
Figure 2.12 Final Text Formatting layout (Grids) - JPEG(27/5/2024)

Figure 2.13 Final Text Formatting layout (Grids) - PDF(27/5/2024)


FEEDBACK

Week 2
General feedback : Overall blog is ok.
Specific feedback : 
smile:(design*1,*4) can be used. (design*2,*3) have too many elements. 
break:(design*2,*3) can be used. (design*1,*4) lack strong impact.
jump:(design*1,*2) can be used. (design*3,*4) didn't express the meaning of the word.
sleep:(design*1,*2) can be used. (design*3) has too many elements. (design*4) didn't express the word clearly.

Week 3
General feedback : Final type expression are"smile","jump","break","sleep".
Specific feedback : Don't use paintbrush tools to draw the destroyed part because it will spoil the words, for example the word "BREAK". Can use blob brush tools or pen tool to draw the destroyed part.

Week4
General feedback : Choose"BREAK"to do the animation.
Specific feedback : The cracks should not start in a straight line at the same time, this will look too simple and monotonous, they can be irregular. Some cracks slow and some cracks fast.

Week5
General feedback : Sir says we have to complete and submit the Task1 Eportfolio before Wednesday.
Specific feedback : Sir teaches us how to kern and track our name.We need to use the 10 fonts that we have already downloaded to do the "kerning and tracking" exercise. Then, he teaches us how to do the text formatting and we have to come out with at least 6 layouts. 


REFLECTIONS

Experience
Through these exercise, I slowly know how to use the Adobe Illustrator. Each exercise has a lecture video that can watch and do. The video teach me step by step to complete the exercise. So now, I know the purpose of most of the tools in Adobe Illustrator. Sometimes, the exercise will be returned to me to revise, in order to make the exercise perfect. In addition, I also get used to InDesign to do the text formatting. Text formatting is very interesting for me. This is because I can use different fonts let my name come in many different style.

Observation
I think the most difficult exercise is animation. This is because animation is composed of pictures frame by frame. Each frame is independent. When I was doing this exercise and looking at the computer for a long time, I felt like I was going blind haha. But when the final exercise comes out, I feel a sense of accomplishment.

Findings
Through these exercise, I have learned more about typography. Typography enable readers to comprehend text more clearly. Without typography, the structure and organization of the text will become confused and all words are squeezed together making it difficult for readers to read. Readers might feel tired when reading text without typography. This will reduce their interest in the content. 

FURTHER READING

Typography Design Form And Communication

Figure 3.1 Typography Design Form and Communication

1. Typography Design Process (pg221 - pg249)

The creative process is a struggle with the unknown. Whether composing music, making a painting, or designing a chair, one is faced with the challenge of how to begin and how to end. Every project offers unique challenges, and no fail-safe formula exists for solving problems.

The design process can range from the use of highly structured methods to the serendipity of chance operations. Often, designers work in a realm somewhere between these two extremes, somewhere between intuition and logic. The solution to a problem emerges on rare occasion as a brilliant scrawl on a dinner napkin, but most often the problem-solving process is a journey that requires courage, patience, and confidence in finding one’s way through uncertain terrain.

The design process is a sequence of events that begins as soon as the designer takes on a problem. It continues until either a deadline is reached or problem criteria have been met. Rarely is the process predictable, a progression in a straight line from point A to point B. The design process is more like reading a road map. There are many ways of reaching the final destination. If side roads are taken, it will probably take longer to get to the destination. But side roads are almost always more interesting than well-traveled highways. 

2. The Typography Grid (pg65 - pg84)

A grid is a skeletal framework used by designers to organize information within a spatial field. It is a system characterized by the dualities of freedom and constraint, simplicity and complexity. It provides a strategy for composing text and other visual information in two- and three-dimensional space, including those of printed materials, film, computer screens, built environments, and typographic installations. Grid systems aid designers in making information clear and optimally accessible—highly desirable traits in a world increasingly inundated by visual noise. When used effectively, typographic grids provide form and space with proportional harmony and aesthetic beauty. The final result is clearer and more accessible communication. 





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