Design Exploration

TYPOGRAPHY: PROJECT 2

9.10.2019 - 30.10.2019 (Week 7 - Week 10)
Maisarah bt Muhd Zamri (0335576)
Typography
Project 2

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LECTURES

9.10.2019 (Week 7)
Lecture - Basics/Describing letterforms, The font, Describing typefaces, Comparing typefaces
K, a lotta information was given  during this lecture. Not sure if I even got half of them. There are just so many terms used to describe letterforms.
Baseline: Where the letters rest
Median: The top of an x-height
X-height: The height of the lowercase 'x' of any typeface.(Basically the average height of lowercase letters)
Stroke: Any line that defines the basic letterforms
Stem: The significant vertical or oblique stroke (The body, basically)
Spine: The curved stem of the letter 'S'
Ascender: The portion of the stem of a lowercase that projects above the median
Descender: The portion of the stem of a lowercase that projects below the baseline
Apex/Vertex: The point created by joining two diagonal stems of a letter. (Apex=above, Vertex=below)
Cross bar: The horizontal stroke in a uppercase letter
Cross stroke: The horizontal stroke in a lowercase letter
Arm: Short strokes off the stem, be it horizontal or inclined
Ear: The stroke extending out from the main stem or body of a letterform
Leg: Short stroke off the stem of a letterform, either at the bottom of inclined downward
Shoulder: The curved stroke that is not part of a bowl
Tail: The curved diagonal stroke at the finish of certain letterforms
Crotch lol: The interior space where two stroke meet
Serif: The right-angled or oblique foot at the end of the stroke
Barb: The half-serif finish on some curved stroke
Beak: The half-serif finish on some horizontal arms
Bracket: The transition between the serif and the stem
Finial: The rounded non-serif terminal to a stroke
Em space: The distance equal to the size of a typeface
En space: Half of Em
Ligature: When two or more letters are too close to each other and they kinda merge together
Bowl: The rounded form that describes a counter. It can be opened or closed
Loop: The bowl created in the descender of the lowercase 'g' (only in some typefaces)
Link: The stroke that connects the bowl and the loop of a lowercase 'g'
Spur: The extension that articulates the junction of the curved and rectilinear stroke (i don tknow what this means ;;;;)
Stress: the thing i'm experiencing in this class The orientation of the letterform, indicated by the thin stroke in round forms
Swash: The flourish that extends the stroke of the letterform (The fancy touches on an uppercase)
Terminal: The self-contained finish of a stroke without a serif
OHMYGODITSFINALLYOVER
Now, onto more stuff. K so y'all know what uppercase and lowercase letter right? Aight. But there are also these things called small capitals. They're basically uppercase letters that are the same height as lowercase letters.
There are also uppercase/lowercase numerals. (O_o) Wow, right? So uppercase numbers are the same height as upppercase letters and has a set kerning width. Meanwhile, lowercase numbers, you guessed it, are set to x-height with ascenders and descenders.
Oke, so did y'all know Italics used to be its own typefamily, but now it's Incorporated into a lot of other families, that it's become a typeface instead.

16.10.2019 (Week 8)
Lecture - Letters/Understanding letterforms, Maintaining x-height, Form/Counterform, Contrast
Phrase of the day: Elegant Solution
Most uppercase seem symmetrical, but they in fact aren't. The placement of the letter depends on the thickness of it's stem. If one is thicker than the other, than it shouldn't be placed right in the middle, because it wouldn't achieve balance that way. The thickness of the stems also affects how the serifs are constructed.
Something that my lecturers said they already told us and apparently I was in another dimension was that the curved strokes of lowercases must raise slightly above the median or sink slightly below the baseline. ( So yes. I messed up my font sketches. )

23.10.2019 (Week 9)
Lecture - None

30.10.2019 (Week 10)
Lecture - None

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INSTRUCTIONS

Project 2 - Font Designs

For this project, we are going to design our own type family. Before that, though, we were told to study an existing type family (out of the given 9). Specifically, the letters "h, d, i, n, t, g, r, s, k, o, e," and punctuation ", . !" were given to us for us to study. We were given the chance to dissect some(? i hope it's some and not all) of the given letters and punctuation to dissect and further understand how the type family was constructed.

I have chosen Caslon as the type family that I want to study.

Fig 1.1 (Adobe Caslon Pro typefamily - Regular typeface)

Fig 1.2 (letter dissections - progress)

Fig 1.3 (dissection of the letter d)

Fig 1.4 (dissection of the letter i)

Fig 1.5 (dissection of the letter t)

Fig 1.6 (dissection of the letter n)

Haha I only dissected the easy letters. "g" and "s"? lol screw that I dont have the willpower. it's torture enough trying to use Illustrator

Fig 2.1 (Font design rough sketches)

Fig 2.2 (more defined font designs) 

I chose to digitize the second one, because while I do like the fourth one, I notice that the thickness of the straight strokes and curved strokes are different. It could've been it's unique trait, but "o" and "e" somehow have thin strokes like the straight ones. The second one is more consistent in it's stroke thickness. 

Fig 3.1 (construction of n, i, t)

Fig 3.2 (construction of r, k)

Fig 3.3 (construction of d, g)

Fig 3.4 (construction of g)

Fig 3.5 (construction of h, o, e)

Fig 3.6 (construction of s)

Fig 3.7 (overall letter construction)

Fig 3.8 (r, s)

Fig 3.9 (o,e)

Fig 3.10 (g, h)

Fig 3.11 (complete letter set with grids)

Fig 3.12 (complete letter set)

There are a few faults in some of my letters. My 'n' and 'h'apparently aren't that easy on the eyes so i have to fix them, more specifically the arch in the design. I have to apply the same contrast in thickness of the stroke in my 't' as I did with the rest of my letters and the crossbar in the letter should be the same size as the serifs (am I using this term right? I'm so confused about 'serifs'). The beak of my 'r' seemed too pointy so I have to make it smoother. Lastly, the spine of my 's' is too straight and tick. 

Fig 3.13 (s correction)

Fig 3.14 (r correction)

Fig 3.15 (t correction)

Fig 3.16 (n correction)

The letters with black outline and the ones with red outline are the reconstructed (Fig 3.13-Fig 3.16). I didn't record the reconstruction of my 'h' because I just copy-pasted 'n' and elongated it's stem. 

Fig 4.1 (MaiFont - d)

Fig 4.2 (MaiFont - e)

Fig 4.3 (MaiFont - g)

Fig 4.4 (MaiFont - h)

Fig 4.5 (MaiFont - i)

Fig 4.6 (MaiFont - k)

Fig 4.7 (MaiFont - n)

Fig 4.8 (MaiFont - o)

Fig 4.9 (MaiFont - r)

Fig 4.10 (MaiFont - s)

Fig 4.11 (MaiFont - t)

Fig 4.12 (MaiFont - punctuation)

Fig 4.13 (MaiFont - letters and punctuation set)

After finish digitizing the our fonts, we have to put them into FontLab to go through the process of making it into an actual typefamily. There, we would have to set the kerning of the letters ourselves. 

Fig 5.1 (MaiFont - 'h' in FontLab)

Fig 5.2 (MaiFont - 'i' in FontLab)

Fig 5.3 (MaiFont - 'k' in FontLab)

Fig 5.4 (MaiFont - 'n' in FontLab)

Fig 5.5 (MaiFont - 'o' in FontLab)

Fig 5.6 (MaiFont - 'r' in FontLab)

Fig 5.7 (MaiFont - 's' in FontLab)

Fig 5.8 (Mai Font - 't' in FontLab)

Fig 5.9 (MaiFont - kerning process)

Fig 5.10 (MaiFont - still with faulty leters)

HAHAHAHAHHAHAH after the 'ok' last week suddenly my 'h,' 'n,' and 's' are still NOT ok. Wow I got played. the arch for my 'h' and 'n' aren't smooth so I have to fix that. As for my 's', the stress of the letterform isn't the same as the others?? or something like that?? What I am sure about my 's' is that it's thicker than the other letters so I have to slim her down. Time to go on a diet, 's'. My 'd' is also actually kind of faulty, but lects said it's still acceptable so I'm keeping it that way because nothing is perfect (  ◡ ‿ ◡ ✿)

Fig 6.1 (smoothened h)

Fig 6.2 (smoothened n)

Fig 6.3 (thinner s)

Fig 6.4 (MaiFont set - final work)

Fig 6.5 (MaiFont - final work)

Fig 6.5 (MaiFont final work - PDF file)

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FEEDBACKS

9.10.2019 (Week 7)

• Specific feedback: I have to add the Lecture section (and every other sections I'm missing) in my Project 1 blog. Those sections have to be in every Typography posts. As for Project 2, Mr Vinod looked at my font designs and asked me which one I liked most. He told me to explore some more, but if I still liked the one I pointed out, I can proceed with digitizing that. Guess what, I'm sticking with that because I practically got the green-light to digitize it and I'm not gonna bother designing more hahahhhhahhah this is how i live.
• General feedback: I was talking to Mr Shamsul when Mr Vinod was giving out the feedback to everyone so I didn't hear it :') But from what I saw other student's wrote, it's that we should put captions and explanation on every image we uploaded into our blog.

16.10.2019 (Week 8)

• Specific feedback: Mr vinod and Mr Shamsul said that my work is alright and that I should keep going. They also pointed out that I'm very technical about the construction of my font design (which isn't a bad thing [i hope])
• General feedback: None?

23.10.2019 (Week 9)

• Specific feedback: My design needs work. The spine of my 's' is too thick and too straight. My 'n' and 'h' looks kind of awkward so I have to fix them too. And I have to apply the same contrast of stroke thickness on my 't' like the other letters. Finally,the beak of  my 'r' seems too pointy. But after I fixed them all, Mr Shamsul said they look much better. 
• General feedback: I didn't hear any?

30.10.2019 (Week 10)

• Specific feedback: My 's's spine is still too thick and the arch of my 'n' and 'h' aren't smooth so I have to fix those and then print again and show the finished product next week.
• General feedback: For the printed matter, "FontName by Name, Year" should be only 7 points and either in Helvetica or Arial. 

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REFLECTIONS

Experience: For the first time ever, I felt like an actual, albeit amateur, designer. Everything else I do before is irrelevant. This is one thing I've designed that can actually be used by other people too.

Observations: People in this class really do work hard to complete their work while I do mine half-assedly and somehow still manage to get an 'ok'. (I'm not bragging i just have nothing else i can say about what i observed during this project pls dont make me redo everything)

Findings: I find the letter 's' to be the hardest to design. Damn spine just rEFUSES to cooperate.

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FURTHER READINGS

just deduct my marks i give up