Typography Task 3: Type Design & Communication

22nd May 2023 - 30th June 2023 / Week 8 - Week 13

Asma' Binti Mohd Jailani / 0354335

Typography / Bachelor of Mass Communication (Honours) / Taylor's University Lakeside Campus

Task 3: Type Design & Communication



LECTURES

Click here to refer to Task 1


INTRODUCTION


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TASK 3: TYPE DESIGN & COMMUNICATION

For our final task, we were required to create and design a typeface using the letters: a e t k g r i y m p n ! # . ,
We were then required to make design an A4 poster using the font that we had designed. 


1. Research

Before proceeding with the sketch and design process of creating a font, Mr Vinod advised us to conduct research on fonts. I decided to go with the components of a font, as I figured that starting from there would help me to figure out how best to space out the components of my font and would help me to decide how to size and space my font. I referred mostly to the below image. 


Figure 1.1: Typography Anatomy Diagram

Reference: Tsui, C. (2020). Letterforms: Typographic Anatomy — Studio Chavelli: Calligraphy & Design. Studio Chavelli: Calligraphy & Design. https://chavelli.com/blog/the-anatomy-of-letterforms


2. Font and Writing Exploration

Before actually sketching anything out, we were tasked to draw diagonal, vertical and horizontal strokes, O's, and the letters AOMTX, with five different writing materials. One out of the five tools had to be an unconventional material that people usually did not use for writing (exp: a spoon, a nail, a chopstick, etc.)

However, many of us had misunderstood what Mr Vinod meant by 'unconventional', and we simply brought writing materials that we thought were a little strange, rather than what was actually required.

Figure 2.1: Week 8 Practice Results

We were then required to conduct further exploration using the writing materials by writing 5 variations of styles with each of the 5 tools, before choosing our favourite from amongst all the styles. I settled on using a cotton swab and ink for the unconventional writing tool. Below is the styles I selected from practicing writing with the 5 tools:

Figure 2.2: Week 9 Practice Results

I decided to go with the Milkliner Bold Pen style, as I liked the soft feel that the rounded edges of the strokes gave. 

In order to move onto the digitisation stage of our project, Mr Vinod first advised us to find a font that was most similar to our chosen style, before analysing it and breaking it down in order for us to have a better idea of how to digitise our own font from scratch. I settled on Redressed from Google Fonts, as it looked most similar to the look I was trying to achieve. 


Figure 2.3: a, e, t, k of the Redressed typeface

I immediately noticed how the bottom curved strokes for a, t, & k all shared the same flourishing little flick. 

Figure 2.4: The letter 'a' from Redressed

Upon taking a closer look at the letter 'a', while I had initially thought that the upper curve of the 'a' was actually protruding over the stem, it was actually in line with the rest of the vertical stroke. 

Figure 2.5: The letter 'e' from Redressed 

I then went on to analyse the letter 'e'. While at a glance, it looks like the top and bottom half of the letter are aligned, the bottom half of the letter actually slightly overshoots the top, making the letter look more stable. 

Figure 2.6: The letter 't' and 'k' from Redressed

Finally, I decided to study the letter 't', and compare it with the letter 'k', as the both were letters with ascenders. I was surprised by how much longer 'k''s vertical stroke was in comparison to the letter 't''s. I also noticed how the crossbar of the letter 't' was positioned against the vertical stroke in such a way that more of it juts out on one side, rather than having the crossbar jut out equally from the vertical stroke. 


3. Digitisation

I proceeded with the digitisation process of making our typeface in Adobe Illustrator. Below are the dimensions that I worked with in Illustrator. 

Baseline: 0 pt

Median Line: 500 pt

Cap Line: 700 pt

Ascender Line: 725 pt

Descender Line: -225 pt


In order to ensure uniformity across all the letters, I followed Mr Vinod's advice of starting from horizontal, vertical, and curved strokes. These strokes could then be replicated and used to build the foundation of the typeface we would design. 

I relied mostly on layering different shapes on top of one another before using the Shape Builder tool to cut out and combine the shapes I needed to make the different strokes. 

Figure 3.1: AI art board filled with stroke samples

After constructing my strokes, I then moved on to constructing my letters. 

Figure 3.2: Construction of draft 1 of the letter 'g'

Above is an example of how I went about constructing the letter g, by layering shapes on top of each other. The end result can be seen below:

Figure 3.3: Draft 1 of the letter 'g'

The letter 'g' was the most challenging, and required the most revisions in order to make the letter more synchronised with the other letters in my typeface. Below is the series of revisions I went through with this letter before settling on the final version (Draft 5):

Figure 3.4: Series of drafts for the letter 'g'

While not as tedious, the other letters of my typeface also required several revisions before I finally settled on their final drafts.

Figure 3.5: Series of drafts for the letter 'p'

Figure 3.6: Series of drafts for the letter 't'

One of the mistakes I made while in the process of digitisation and designing, was trying to stick too much to the original sketch I made in Figure 2.2. Mr Vinod reminded me that the sketch was meant to be merely inspiration, and that we were expected to evolve our typeface and elevate it from our prior sketch. Rather than prioritising the original design, Mr Vinod stated that uniformity of the final typeface was much more important.

After much trial, error and revision, I finally settled on my finalised typeface: 

Figure 3.7: Finalised typeface

4. Developing the finalised font in FontLab

In order for our font to be usable, we had to then transfer it into FontLab. After transferring the font into FontLab I adjusted the kerning.

Figure 4.1: Adjusted font in FontLab


5. Poster Design

With our now usable font, we had to design an A4 poster showcasing our brand new fonts. During the design process, Mr Vinod suggested the idea of filling up empty space in our poster with slightly transparent text. While it may work for other students' fonts, I felt that with my font, it just made it more difficult to read the text, so I decided against implementing the idea.

Figure 5.1: Discarded poster idea due to bad readability


Final Submission


Figure 6.1: Final Type and Design Communication "Flick AJ" JPEG

Figure 6.2: FontLab New Metrics Window with chosen sentence


Figure 6.3: Final Type and Design Communication A4 Poster "Flick AJ" JPEG

Figure 6.4: Final Type and Design Communication "Flick AJ" PDF

Figure 6.5: Final Type and Design Communication A4 Poster "Flick AJ" PDF


FEEDBACK

Week 12

General Feedback
  • All the letters that you created need to be featured in the poster you create
  • Posters are all about impact - a lot of white space in borders decreases impact
  • Anything that is related will be seen as part of a whole (exp: if your poster has multiple fonts of different sizes, the words that are the same font size will be seen as being grouped together, and will be read as one group even if the placement of words are far apart on your poster)

Week 11 

General Feedback
  • All font in the poster needs to be the same size
  • Font name and name + student id must be 12pt

Specific Feedback
  • Finer details in font need to be standardised

Week 10

General Feedback
  • use a single stroke and apply it to all your letters (horizontal, vertical, curved line) so the typeface feels like part of a font family
  • Font Lab = File - font info - enter your ascender and descender height - copy paste your letter into font lab after selecting the respective letter - keep, do not round - adjust left and right bearings, they can’t be 0
  • Don’t forget to kern all your letterforms - can use kerning pairs to help with kerning
  • How to name font = use last name// put name of font and then initials//postscript is the foundry of the font
  • Commas are not the same size as your stem stroke, study and measure your chosen example

Week 9
  • Not present due to covid

Week 8
  • No class was held due to independent learning week, was told to continue practicing writing styles for digitisation. 

REFLECTIONS

Experience 
This task was definitely the most tedious out of all our assignments thus far. I struggled a lot with creating uniform strokes for my font, and simply navigating Illustrator for the purpose of constructing letters. It was a rather steep learning curve, but once I got the hang of things and constructed all my strokes, things went a lot smoother. 

Observation
Through observation, one can see that each font has been carefully designed according to specific parameters set by the designer. What may seem like a whimsical creative gesture is actually a calculated and though out decision, leading to a uniform and precise typeface when looked at as a whole. 

Findings
I've come to the conclusion that fonts are definitely something that the public takes for granted, without realising how much thought has been placed into maintaining uniformity and readability of the letters. Designing a font takes a great amount of thought, planning, constructing, and so so so much time. 


FURTHER READING


This article from Canva by Janie Kliever emphasises on the purpose of contrast in design. 

It focuses on the importance of contrast in establishing hierarchy and visual interest, and how moderation is key when using contrast. If all your design elements contrast, nothing will stand out. The author then lists out 20 tips on how one can best implement contrast in their own design. They are as follow:

  1. Contrast with Dark and Light Colors
  2. Contrast with Color Hue
  3. Contrast with Color Temperature
  4. Contrast with Color Intensity
  5. Contrast with Shape: Organic vs. Geometric
  6. Contrast with Shape: Edges & Corners
  7. Contrast with Texture
  8. Contrast with Scale & Size
  9. Contrast with Visual Weight
  10. Contrast with Spacing & White Space
  11. Contrast with Compositional Choices
  12. Contrast with Something Unexpected
  13. Contrast with Repetition & Patterns
  14. Contrast with Position & Orientation
  15. Contrast with Proximity & Separation
  16. Contrast with Visual Cues
  17. Contrast with Complex & Simple Features
  18. Contrast with Font Combinations
  19. Be Cautious When Contrasting with Typography
  20. Contrasting with Typography Style & Weight

Funnily enough, many people tend to already implement these tips without even realising that they're actually utilising contrast. The tip that I found most interesting was number 5, as I don't think I've actually given much notice to the role that shapes play in giving a design contrast. I think the use of organic vs. geometric shapes is honestly pretty genius, especially in the example given in the article, and I'll definitely try to use it myself in future projects. 

Reference: Kliever, J. (n.d.). Designing with contrast: 20 tips from a designer - CANVA. Canva. https://www.canva.com/learn/contrasting-colors/


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