A Typeface Designer’s Perspective on the recent PM Modi’s certificate.
A Design issue with AAP’s argument against PM’s degree Certificate.
Note:
This post is not politically motivated. Let’s look at the matter from the perspective of a typeface designer.
The argument made here is that the certificate given has a typing mistake, which reads “Gujarat Unibersity” instead of “Gujarat University,” and therefore is not an original one. The letter that helped them make this lame argument is “v,” appearing as “b.” Design practitioners who are familiar with the topic of type design would instantly recognize that this font belongs to the Gothic style, which probably emerged during the mid-century.
You can use Google Lens (lens.google.com) to recognize the disputed word as printed on the certificate. Google clearly recognized the word correctly as “Gujarat University” and not as “Unibersity.”
There is another way to double-check this. Open the link below, which will help you recognize the font directly from the certificate.
https://www.myfonts.com/pages/whatthefont/result . This list includes several fonts that were designed at different times, all of which are based on the mid-century German type family known as Black Letters.
Now that the disputed word has been recognized, you can type ‘Gujarat University’ or any other word from the certificate title in the link below and see for yourself.
https://www.myfonts.com/.../regular-lincoln-text-pro-171263
Regarding the argument that the font used in the certificate was not available at the time when the PM received it, it’s important to note that fonts and type families are two different things. The Black Letter type family has been in existence since the 11th or 12th century, and many fonts in varying styles have been based on this type family over the years. Therefore, this argument doesn’t hold any ground at all. A font can be created at any time based on a type family that has been around for centuries.
Trivia: Some of the first books (including the Holy book Bible) ever printed by Gutenberg in Germany were using the same type family called Black Letters. The logo of The New York Times is a variant font from this type family as well. It’s important to take typeface seriously because it can have a significant impact on how a text is perceived. Neglecting the importance of typeface could lead to unfavorable consequences.
