Cool Typography -- Looks 3D

This artist I found does sidewalk chalk designs, but they look 3D. Most of them are detailed images but there was one with the word 'WORLD'. If you google 'Chalk Guy is back', you can see all of his work but here are 2 images:

hand painted type

TypArchive is a site with loads of images of handpainted typography signage. Since its related to Project 4 I though it would be neat to share.

http://www.typarchive.com/

Typotheque, digital type foundry

Hey I'm sure everyone's heard of Dafont.com, but I was poking around on Google when I found Typotheque thanks to autocomplete. It has a ton of articles, examples of others' studio work, and a bunch of other great stuff as well as fonts for Mac and PC :)

http://www.typotheque.com/site/index.php

Interesting Stuff about readability, type, and roads that affects just about everyone

I ran across this New York Times article about Clearview, a typeface designed to replace the aging Highway Gothic font used on all of America's roadsigns. The article talks about the details that make a font more readable in the first place, and what the designers had to go through to create type that eventually was a great improvement over the existing standard established in the 1940s.

Clearview is slowly debuting as governments all over the US replace aging signs.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/12/magazine/12fonts-t.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1

type sculpture

I am a huge fan of all things involving letterform, and also especially fond of 3D type and thought this sculpture installation by Richard Evans called "Information Leak" was really awesome.

" What I tried to do was visually represent the way information is so easily leaked in todays society, through the internet and television. Pretty much anything you can imagine, you can get your hands on. With such an abundance of information, I feel as though it over-flows into our lives."

Visit his blog about the project here for more details of the concept and process :

http://feedrichfmp.blogspot.com/

Typographical Inspiration

I found this great website with inspirational designs in typography as well as

• Fashion
• Industrial Design
• Motion Graphics
• Photography

Typography Video Blog

Hey everybody!!

    I was surfing YouTube the other day and I found this great video blog by a RISD Graphic Design student.  She posts some links that are fun and can be appreciated by Typography students, and some links she mentions are good resources.  She also has some fun Typography based videos that can bee seen on the right side of the page under "uploads".  Click here to check it out!

Here is a quick video she made which teaches about Type (part 1)  and part 2

Here is another video she did about identifying types

I just thought this was interesting, fun and maybe something everyone would enjoy!

Class Notes 8/26/10

A Brief History of Typefaces – Lecture 8/26/10

*First typeface was based off Calligraphy.

Invention of Printing

• · Johannes Gutemberg – Movable type (Germany, early 15^th century). Monks were scribes that made beautiful black letters before printers.
• · At beginning, Chinese movable writing system too challenging, Latin alphabet better for movable type.
• · Uppercase letters stored in the Upper Drawer!!!
• · Nicolas Jenson – created gothic calligraphy with new Italian taste for humanistic handwriting based on classical models. 15^th century Venice. Learned everything in Germany. He was French. Roman typeface.
• · Italics saved money by being smaller. Became popular by Aldus Manutius, Venetian publisher 15^th century.
• · Garamond – 16^th century

Enlightenment and Extraction

• · Geogroy Tory – proportions of alphabet reflect the ideal human form. Humanist, quasi-scientific. Engravings with grids.
• · Engraved letters had more fluid lines, 18^th century.
• · William Caslon – Crisp, upright engraved recall fluid strokes of flexible steel pen and pointed quill.
• · John Baskerville – contrast b/w thick and think elements. “His letters were blinding people due to their thinness”
• · Firmin Didot – Baskerville to the extreme

Monster Fonts

• · Didot and Bodoni
• · 19^th century àindustrial revolution à advertising initiated the fonts.
• · High, wide, shadows, large scale letters
• · Use type cuts for heavy papers and fonts. Made with wood, not lead. More durable.
• · Serifs distorted – Rob Roy Kelly. Become more decorative element

Reform and Revolution Devolve/Avant Garde

• · Edward Johnston – research for essential alphabet. 1906. Brought back middle ages and 19^th century arts and crafts movement.
• · Willam Morris – “Golden Type” 1980. Reform from Jenson, Renaissance like.
• · De Stijl Movement – Theo Van Doesburg, Netherlands. 1919. Pure clean lines, architecture. Blocks. Perpendicular elements.
• · Bauhaus – Germany. Herbert Bayer 1925. Universal font.
• · Paul Renner – Futura, 1927 Germany, Widely used today.

The 2010 Overdue Book Calendar

I recently found/bought this calendar on Etsy from the fabric designer, AuntJune. This clever calendar allows you to write in all the books you've checked out and their due dates. And since you buy it (at the low price of $4 for the 2010 edition!) you can print them out and give them as gifts. Or alter the dates using your own editing program and use it for years to come. Which is definitely what I plan to do. I thought it was interesting to see design representing so much more than just good aesthetic sense, but also ingenuity and clever problem solving.

Starting the semester with a great piece of inspiration

Hello!


Jessica Hische is an amazing typographer and illustrator, who captures the beauty of vintage typography to create wonderful pieces usually handmade.


Check out her website here!