Typography: Task 3

It is crucial to have a better understanding on how to construct a type. Therefore, I started to do some research on analyzing and deconstructing the existing typefaces/font.

Fig 2.1 Overshoot in letterform

Overshoot is the part of the letterform that extends above or below the vertical dimensions of flatter glyphs. The font used here is "Myriad Pro" which is the basic font in Adobe Illustrator.

> Rounded forms always look smaller due to less surface area so curved areas in the letter tend to have an overshoot.

Fig 2.2 Futura Std Font

> I have chose this typeface called "Futura Std book" and started the deconstruction process of certain letters.

Deconstruction of letters

Fig 2.3 Deconstruction of lowercase "b"

Fig 2.4 Deconstruction of lowercase "m"

Fig 2.5 Deconstruction of lowercase "y"

Pre-digitization process (Handwriting letterforms)

Draw diagonal, vertical, horizontal, circular lines and also the letters "A, O, T, M, X" on a piece of graph paper with the tools.

Requirements

Bring 5 different tools and one experimental tool to practice handwriting in class.

Fig 3.1 Handwrite practice

By using the consisting characters "a,e,t,k,g,r,i,y,m,p,n", handwrite them with the chosen tool as practice with the consistency of the typography.
The tool I have selected is the Artline 6.0 medium pen.

Fig 3.2 Handwrite practice of the given characters

Digital Exploration #1 (Adobe Illustrator)

Fig 4.1 Digitized process of type design

> Place the image of the chosen letter and arrange it accordingly to the guidelines (baseline, ascender, descender, x-height..)

Fig 4.2 Few letterform attempts done

> I used the brush tool to draw on the letters. It sounds easy at first but I kept having inconsistent strokes from changing to a different brush size/tool so I redid quite a few times to be able to achieve a better letterform for this exercise.

Final digitized letterforms outcome in AI

Fig 5.1 Finalized letterforms with punctuations (with guides)

Fig 5.2 Ascender line, Cap line, median, baseline, and descender lines as guidelines

FontLab7 Digitized process

Fig 6.1 Letterforms copy pasted to FontLab 7

> Copy-pasting the letterforms one by one that was created on AI to FontLab 7.

Fig 6.2 Scaling the size of the comma in FontLab7

> At first, the comma and the period symbols looked big when it has been pasted from the Adobe Illustrator so I scale the size of it and adjusted the shape accordingly using the scale + pen tool.

Fig 6.3 Working on the letter kerning process

Fig 6.4 Letterforms after kerning

Fig 6.5 forming words from the 11 digitized letterforms

> Attempting to form some words and sentences (also with the help of Chat GPT)before proceeding to the poster design. It was kind of a struggle at first to find the right words with limited letters done and also adjusting the kernings between each letters but just keep practicing and doing it for the better :)

The letter combinations I have formed in the end were "GREAT KING REIGN IN A TYPE GAME".

Making type design poster in AI

Fig 7.1 First layout attempt

Fig 7.2 More layout design attempts

Now onto the last part, poster design. These were the first few layout attempts I made and feedbacks were made from Sir.

Feedback on layout #1 (top)
> Sir has mentioned to us that each of the letterforms should have the same font size so the word "REIGN" needs to be decreased its size to match the other letterforms. However, we can copy-paste the same words if needed.

Feedback on layout #2 (bottom left)

> Sir has said that the layout in this type design is repetitive and it is not just about occupying the white space in the poster. Have to rework on the layout.

Feedback on layout #3 (bottom right)

> Better layout than the previous ones but for the word "REIGN", it is unnecessary to duplicate the letters together to form shadows behind.

After the feedbacks given, I then proceed with a few adjustments on my next layout attempt.

Tip: You can add some textures to your poster by searching on "png paper texture" online and find one that is fitting for your poster.

Fig 7.3 Google search "png paper textures"

I have downloaded two types of paper textures, adding a layer on top of my poster layer, lowering their opacity, trying on the blending mode in the paper texture layers and comparing which of these textures fits better in my poster.

Fig 7.4 Comparing the two paper textures on the poster

Final outcome of Task 3

Font download link:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1zT0gDJKw4ix4fzk_giXXIvfpEZD0BZJw/view

Fig 8.1 Screen grab of new metrics window with sentences
(FontLab7) - 20/6/23

Fig 8.2 Final Digitized type design "Squiggies" (JPEG) - 20/6/23

Fig 8.3 Final Digitized Type Design "Squiggies" (PDF) - 20/6/23

Fig 8.4 Final outcome of type design poster (JPEG) - 20/6/23

Fig 8.5 Final outcome of type design poster (PDF) - 20/6/23

FEEDBACKS

Week 8 - Independent Learning Week

General Feedback:

> Take close-up pictures of each of the letters so it can be more easily identify the strokes/ the weight of the text. Only choose either uppercase letters or lowercase letters and not both.

Week 9

General Feedback:

> Make sure to watch the video in the lecture playlist (Typo Task 3A Typeface Construction) to have a better understanding when creating the letters in AI.

Specific feedback:

> The x-height should always be in 500 points out of 1000*1000 points in AI.

Week 10

General Feedback:

> The digitized process should have consistent/clearer strokes and details. Also making your digitized letters into fonts, not handwritings.

> Do more research on the font types on sites like Google Fonts, Fontshare etc and find fonts that are similar to your digitized letters.

Specific feedback:

We can use the direct selection tool or the anchor point tool to adjust the strokes of the letters.

Week 11
General Feedback:
> Diagonal strokes are naturally bigger, the vertical strokes in the letterforms should be of the same thickness.

Week 12
General Feedback:
> The letterforms should always be in the same point/font size.
Specific Feedback:
> No need to add shadows by duplicating the letterforms. First Layout is kind of repetitive.

REFLECTIONS

Experience

> From the start of this task, it was quite experimental and a good experience for me when creating our own typefaces using different handwriting tools. You can actually see the differences in different tools that have been used and then analyze which one to choose for the digitizing process. As it escalates to the digitizing part, this is where things started to be more technical and honestly it feels a little overwhelming as the task progresses but there's a sense of satisfaction seeing that the type design that I have hand written can be digitized and in the end used as a font which is so cool.

The kerning adjustments can still be a little challenging for me to adjust the letters neatly in the FontLab software but of course through Sir Vinod's video tutorials I kind of had a grasp on fixing the kernings better.

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Mercy Chong HuiZiun (0360929)

Typography: Task 3

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