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Assignment 4 Show Me

assignment 4 asked me to design. my own typeface for a magazine called TYPE, in addition I had to prepare three articles around what males a type face interesting, how a typeface is constructed and the question mark.

The first thing I did was prepare the articles, whilst doing that I began to collect some magazines titles that I liked the look of. It was clear from my favourites I collected I wanted something with a little character, only a few standard looking fonts were included, the ones that could be used elsewhere and maybe. not be obvious they was the same font. The other challenge I had was that this was a magazine about type, sop certain fonts were out of the question, like a handwritten script type for example. I started to think of old printing presses and maybe there was a way. to do something in a modern style. I started to experiment, but even that was its own journey.

A selection of magazine I soaked up hoping to create something new.

I made a grid in photoshop, just three lines for a baseline, median line and an Uppercase height Line, I had thought that the font would be more impactful in uppercase, but didn’t want to shut down any lower case experimentation. The grid was good but very rigid, I didn’t take into account a gutter for each character, I decided to make something that worked for each letter and also offered more versatility. I did some loose scribbling but the grids were too flexible. I. then turned to the ipad and turned on the grids available in the procreate software, this was much better, I could turn the grids off when. they was a distraction draw shapes and curves more acutely, any small mistakes were easy to undo. I had found my preferred workflow.

The first grid I made was too rigid
The second one was more useful

I tried to draw purposefully, looking for a theme or common thread that would weave through my typeface design.

  • curly terminals! not the only thong that was terminal, I soon stopped this line of experimentation.
  • These initial sketches started to evolve
  • I started to play with this one more, the idea was no straight edges
  • it looked like a novelty font, I decided to try some serifs. I learned they was a good way to add character to the familiar shapes
  • too thin..
  • … and still too basic
  • I started to get heavier, this one felt very 60’s, I liked the shape in the “E”
  • The T seemed to be the character that had the least potential to decorate, something I had noticed form my movie collection.I focused on the T to ensure it had something special.
  • This started to feel like it was going somewhere
  • I experimented with shape, and forming letters from them.

Once I had something to work too I moved the sketches into adobe illustrator, it was here that I added two serifs together and created. a familiar shape, it was from this I decided to base the font, I had read. in my research that typographers will look for something to add, a theme or a method, my serifs together looked like a bat with wings extended. It felt Gothic, like an old printing press maybe, this fit nicely, I called my typeface Barbastelle gothic, named after a genus of a bat.

In adobe illustrator I tried to build with shapes to add some method to the construction and consistency to the shape.
It did help create a flow. The head and tail serifs, I combined to make that. “bat” shape in the P

I had the start of my final design

I really enjoyed this assignment, it felt like a real challenge and was very rewarding, I don’t think my font would find its way. on many font foundry websites but i was pleased with what I created with my new knowledge on the anatomy of a typeface. It is something I would like to have another stab at another time.

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Assignment 4: Magazine Illustration

For this assignment I had to choose from four options, these were to be used for a magazine, the options were lost, disaster, discovery and guilty secret.

These had to be drawn from still life, I could select any items I wanted to work with. I chose to go with guilty secret. I worked up a spider diagram and highlighted in red what visual elements I could use.

I had a bit of a problem, I wanted to use a skull but did not have access to one to either work from or photograph.  I looked up the definition of still life.

A still life is defined as a collection of inanimate objects arranged together in a specific way.

As the subject matter was unobtainable I put together a photo montage, this still seemed to fit within the still life parameter.
The skull represented something horrific or evil, maybe even a death or murder. For the secret aspect I felt  a “shushing” finger would represent this perfectly, signaling for someone not to speak. I very nearly didn’t add the blood drips, it’s quite macabre but it did bring a sinister element
and it really helped sell the narrative.
I wanted to use a rough texture in the background, I see this a lot in magazine articles. The hand I chose to keep flat to break up the red, for the skull I used a lot of fine lines, outlining the main areas in a thicker line.
When using colour I wanted something quite abstract and very dynamic. Red could be the colour of guilt, for example “they were caught red handed”  I wanted to use that as the main hue,  I didn’t want to use an absolute black and white for the ends of my tonal value, so I opted for a very dark red and light grey for my pallette.

Here is the artwork mocked up on a magazine, I was really happy with the way this turned out. The textures worked well, and the flat areas of the hand against the textured background offered nice contrast, the line work also worked well offering some subtlety.