Welcome back from break! We'll start off class by introducing course goals and projects. Then there will be a history lecture for the Roman alphabet & typeface classifications. We’ll spend some time working on letter anatomy, ways to identify typefaces, and typeface lettering.
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— History of the Roman Alphabet, Typeface Classifications, & Typeface Anatomy (pdfs)
— (xx min) History of the Roman Alphabet & Typeface Classifications
— (15.51 min) Letter Anatomy Definitions
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— Exercise: Typeface anatomy practice and drafting missing alphabet letters.pdf
— (13.83 min) Typography That Works: By Ellen Lupton
(For Lupton watch ONLY the following videos: Sans Serif Type (2.45 min), Basic Architecture (5 min), The Project: Sans + Structure (6.38 min)
— (8.12 min) A few ways for you to find & identify typefaces for projects
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1. Finish the in class assignment. Take pictures of your work and upload them to Google Slides.
2. Project 1: Business card
Use your name, address, the main way you would like to be contacted (either phone/text or email) and your top three interests/skills (e.g. drawing, photography, typography)
*If you do not wish your personal information be made public, you may make up an address & contact information.
Business card parameters:
3.5” x 2” — the card can be either vertical or horizontal
1. Start with one typeface family
2. Choose 1 typeface size and 1 typeface style (e.g. Roman)
3. Solve composition, hierarchy/groupings, and alignment issues
4. Add emphasis: bold or italic
5. Add scale
Work in black, white, and grey for this week. When you are satisfied with your business card design(s) upload it to Google Slides.
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— Day & Link Coming
— Day & Link Coming
The Secret Life of Fonts (video 35.00)
16th Century Printing & Binding (video)
Identifying typefaces:
What font (Chrome extension to identify type online)
Scanning apps — converting images/sketches to vector:
Letter Shaping Game
The Bézier Game
Plotting Vector Points with Jessica Hische
Letter Building: Scaling & Shaping
Horizontal & Vertical Bézier Handles
Lettering Tutorial
Vector Lettering Techniques
Today we’ll review the in class assignment and homework from last week. Afterwards, we’ll be looking at ways to modify / adapt type for creating lettermarks.
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— (12.38 min) Modifying Type Lecture
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— (15.46 min) Introduction to Mind Mapping using tonal adjectives
— (14.56 min) Samples of forced connections
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— Optional: Lettermark sketching ideas (pdf)
— The law on fonts and typefaces
— Customizing or modifying fonts (Hoefler & Co)
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Part 1: Refine your business card based off in class feedback. Strengthen alignments, hierarchy and visual voice for your text, if needed.
Part 2: Create a custom initial mark for your name. You might chose to adapt / modify a chosen typeface or create your own custom letters. Do a brain dump of 30 sketches exploring letter combinations for 1-2-and/or 3 initials.
The first 10 sketches will probably be your normal sketching process.
For the second 10 sketches you could use descriptive adjectives about yourself to explore ideas, e.g. edgy, whimsical, childlike, etc.
For the last 10 sketches try out the “Forced Connections” technique, where you take your 3 interests (e.g. hiking, baking, fishing) and make a list of visual attributes that can be combined with your initials to make an initial mark.
For example, fishing = fish hook + the letter A.
Sketch your 30 ideas and select your top one.
Part 3: When you are satisfied with your business card design(s), place your chosen inital mark into your design. Take a picture of your sketches and upload them & your business card to Google Slides.
You may use color and imagery, but only after you have solved the typographic layout, groupings, alignments, hierarchy, emphasis (bold & italic), negative space, and scale.
Holiday: Please read through the Homework tab below and take a look at the Resources & Links tab to see if there are any helpful links for you & your project.
1. (6.06 min) Plotting Vector Points: Jessica Hische
2. (4.30 min) How to vectorize hand lettering
Optional Article: Hand Lettering and vector points steps
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Part 1: Finish your business card design. Refine your initial mark and place the final mark within your business card design. Upload to Google Slides.
Part 2: In a separate layer in your file, label what typeface classification JUST YOUR NAME belongs to and label aspects of type anatomy listed below. Upload a copy of your name with the layer of labels visible to Google Slides.
— Typeface classification
— Baseline
— Median
— X-height
— Cap-height
— Ascender height
— Descender height
— Mark the stress
and
— Write up at least 2 aspects of anatomy for each letter in just your name.
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— Day & Link Coming
— Day & Link Coming
BRINGING YOUR INITIAL MARK INTO ILLUSTRATOR:
Recommended reading:
1. Shape Type: A letter shaping game
*3. Plotting Vector Points: Jessica Hische (video)
*4. Hand Lettering and vector points steps
*5. How to vectorize hand lettering (video)
6. Bezier Curves in Illustrator
8. Lettering: Logo, Font & Lettering Bible (Look in Jill's Lessons Folder for complete PDF file)
Creating text effects for custom letters (videos):
1. Creating stroke widths in illustrator
2. Text effects: Drop shadows and line patterns within drop shadows
3. How to warp text in Illustrator
5. Decorative text shadowing in Illustrator
6. Creating swirls with variable widths
Recommended videos on logo design:
*George Bokhua—Logo Design with Grids: Timeless Style from Simple Shapes
This week we’ll start on letter spacing, word spacing, and leading.
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— (30.01 min) Letter spacing lecture
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— (8.14 min) Space letters / Negative space, part 2 by Sean McCabe
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— (1.54 min) Setting up your kerning preferences in InDesign
— (10.57 min) Spacing demo in InDesign
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Do:
— Adventures in Space: Spacing, Part 1 & Adventures in Space: Kerning, Part 2 (site)
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— Style Mood Board (Indesign file)
— Kerning / Tracking / Leading Key Commands (pdf)
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For the next few weeks you will be working on a type driven design project. You will be designing only the front face and back panel of a package. Please choose one of the following as your topic (to read the text and client summary, click on the Project 2 below):
Part 1: Start by creating a Style Board. Upload your board to Google Slides.
While creating your mood board, find small visual groupings of text in "bugs", "flags", "stamps", emblems, and/or "nested text", etc. Samples could be found from packaging, posters, ads, books, magazines, etc. Add your samples to your moodboard.
Part 2: Choose one body text typeface for your project, open your InDesign template for your project and copy/place the package text from the PDF file into your InDesign file using your chosen body text typeface.
Focus your attention ONLY on hierarchy, grouping, alignments, scale weight/emphasis and typographic tone. (Similar to the approach you used for your business card).
It doesn't have to look pretty, yet. Upload your InDesign rough to Google Slides.
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— Day & Link Coming
— Day & Link Coming
Today we will be practicing letterspacing, tracking, & kerning in class. Then we discuss typeface combinations and practice combining type for headlines & body text. The remainder of the class will be reviewing homework from last week.
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— (30.16 min) Choosing typefaces lecture
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> Click here for Tuesday's Google Slides exercise
> Click here for Thursday's Google Slides exercise
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— Stop Feeling Dumb About Pairing Fonts
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— (6.95 min) Lynda.com: Fractions and numerals
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Part 1: Continue to design your package. Consider text groupings, hierarchy, alignments, scale, weight/emphasis.
Experiment with creating small visual groupings of text in "bugs", "flags", "stamps", emblems, and/or "nested text", etc.
Part 2: When you get a layout structure you think is working well, choose a second typeface classification to use as the flavor/emphasis for your design.
Part 3: You may add color, ornamentation, imagery and/or illustration to your package design face. Upload screenshots of your project to Google Slides for a work-in-progress review.
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— Day & Link Coming
— Day & Link Coming
Lynda.com: Nigel French — InDesign Typography, Part 1 (videos)
Font Combination Sites:
The differences between type styles and type weights (Site)
Four techniques for combining fonts
7 Typography Resources, and 1 Type Joke
A collection of font pairings from Typekit
Eight tips for combining typefaces
This week we will be practicing letterspacing, tracking, & kerning in class. Then we will discuss paragraph alignments and spacing issues and practice correcting paragraph spacing issues. The remainder of the class will be reviewing homework from last week.
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— Paragraph Alignments and Checklist (pdfs)
— (17.09 min) Paragraph Alignments Lecture
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— (41 min) Paragraph Alignments Spacing Demo :: InDesign
Part 1: In a separate layer in your file, label what typeface classification your product name belongs to and label the parts of type anatomy listed below. Take a screen shot of this layer and upload it to Google Slides.
— Typeface classification
— Baseline
— Median
— X-height
— Cap-height
— Ascender height
— Descender height
— Mark the stress (if your typeface has it. Many sans serif typefaces have no apparent stress)
and
— Label at least TWO aspects of anatomy for EACH letter just in your product name
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— Day & Link Coming
— Day & Link Coming
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Part 2: Keep refining. Your project will be due in two weeks. (not next week, which has a holiday)
Project feedback among Zoom groups and / or Slack.
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— (6.57 min) How to find and make psd digital mockups for your projects
Project 2 is due next week. Please take screenshots of your final designs / PSD comps and upload them to Google Slides:
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— Day & Link Coming
— Day & Link Coming
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— Optional: Insert sleeve dieline (ai)
Choose a band or individual artist/album where you can obtain the following material:
Part 1: The band name or individual artist name. The names of the band member(s) and what instrument(s) they play. Then collect your track list of songs titles and the time length for each song.
Part 2: Collect a few paragraphs of marketing copy for the back cover. This text might promote the band/artist or this album, or it might be the history of the band/artist if it's interesting, or it might be an interview snippet, or it might be a write up of the music which influenced the sound of the band/artist, etc.
Part 3: A 30 second sound byte of their music to share with your feedback groups.
Part 4: START a style board for the project. For this week, the only items of your style board I would like you to focus on is: finding a potential typeface for the title of your album and a second typeface for the body text of your album. Then choose 5 adjectives that capture the feeling of your artist/band's music.
Part 5: Choose the single album dieline and place the Illustrator dieline into a 30” x 20” Indesign file.
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Part 1: Keep working on your style board: add color ideas, viual ideas: Illustrations/ photography/ graphic elements, patterns, textures, etc.
Part 2: Begin the design for your album. Next week we’ll be looking at the pacing of your text & visual storytelling on screen. However far you get will be fine, progress is the goal, not perfection.
Today we will work on small type exercises using the typeface & title of your band.
1. The first exercise will be type modifications: Using the adjectives from your style board as inspiration, sketch ideas for modifying your existing typeface for the title of your album.
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(e.g. I pictured the beach. It sounds like summer. It reminds me of my childhood. It feels like someone running. It has to be the first association and it can seem random)
Use their visual association to generate a word list of items that could be used to create forced connections with your typeface to help push it’s tone.
(e.g. I pictured the beach. It sounds like summer. It reminds me of my childhood. It feels like someone running. It has to be the first association and it can seem random) Use their visual association to generate a word list of items that could be used to create forced connections with your typeface to help push it’s tone.
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For people who use their left hand: https://www.smashingmagazine.com/2017/06/left-handed-brush-lettering/
Refine your style boards, if needed. Continue working on your album. We’ll be looking at your work on screen next week.
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— Day & Link Coming
— Day & Link Coming
CSS KEYFRAMES:
BLEND MODE:
CSS background-blend-mode Property
Advanced effects with CSS Background Blend Modes
CSS CLIPPING PATHS:
CSS Introduction to Clipping Using Clip-path
Wrapping Content around Images Using CSS Shapes
How to make your HTML responsive by adding one line of CSS
Today we’ll be going over absolute and relative measurements: leading, line lengths, ems and ens, and type specifications.
Keep working on your album project.
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— Day & Link Coming
— Day & Link Coming
Today we’ll be going over punctuation and typographic dos & don'ts.
— Punctuation and Dos & Don'ts (pdf)
— (9.40 min) Punctuation lecture
— (16.49 min) Indesign Demo :: Typographic Details
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Finalize your design based off of feedback. Fix any of your microtypography issues. Upload screenshots and PSD mock ups for next week.
— Creative brief
— Mood Board
— The front cover of the album
— The back cover
and
— Add a link to one of the songs from the album for others to listen to.
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— Day & Link Coming
— Day & Link Coming
Recommended Grid Books:
1. Grid Systems in Graphic Design: A Visual Communication Manual for Graphic Designers, Typographers and Three Dimensional Designers by Josef Müller-Brockmann
2. Layout Workbook A Real-World Guide To Building Pages In Graphic Design Layouat Workbook by Kristen Cullen
3. Making and Breaking the Grid: A Graphic Design Layout Workshop by Timothy Samara
4. Layout Essentials: 100 Design Principles for Using Grids (Design Essentials) by Beth Tondreau
5. Best Practices for Graphic Designers, Grids and Page Layouts: An Essential Guide for Understanding and Applying Page Design Principles by Amy Graver
Day & time TBD.
Day & time TBD.
Inspired by this blog:
100 Days of Fonts
Make a PDF file of your 5 day type combinations and bring in your combinations to the first day of class. We'll have a show & share in the morning on the first day.
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— Please purchase Kimberly Elam's book: Grid Systems: Principles of Organizing Type
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Bring the following items to the first Type 2 class next quarter:
– PDF of your type combinations.
– Your Elam book
– Tracing paper
– Ruler
– Colored pencils or colored markers or colored crayons
– an issue of your favorite magazine (if you don’t have a favorite magazine, you can check out magazines from the public library or I can let you borrow one from the variety of magazines we have on hand at school.)
Recommended Grid Books:
1. Grid Systems in Graphic Design: A Visual Communication Manual for Graphic Designers, Typographers and Three Dimensional Designers by Josef Müller-Brockmann
2. Layout Workbook A Real-World Guide To Building Pages In Graphic Design Layouat Workbook by Kristen Cullen
3. Making and Breaking the Grid: A Graphic Design Layout Workshop by Timothy Samara
4. Layout Essentials: 100 Design Principles for Using Grids (Design Essentials) by Beth Tondreau
5. Best Practices for Graphic Designers, Grids and Page Layouts: An Essential Guide for Understanding and Applying Page Design Principles by Amy Graver
Project 3 is due.
You will be presenting your folding dummy, your 30 second song sound byte and your PDF file on the over head projector to the class.
Hand in your folding dummy and drop your PDF file into my drop folder.