Type & Hierarchy
Project 3
Project Description
In this project we were all assigned a specific typeface that we would research. We researched it’s history, the period in which it was made and it’s characteristics as a typeface. We would then create a poster for this typeface using all of the principles of Design we had learned. Not only incorporating the Gestalt principles and the elements and principles of Design, we also used elements such as kerning, tracking, and leading. This led this project to be based around Hierarchy and how we can create that with typography though style, placement, line spacing and scale. The required elements in the poster that we had to have were the name of the typeface, the year it was created and the creator of the typeface.
Research
I received Baskerville for my typeface. Baskerville was created in 1750 by a man named John Baskerville. Baskerville was created in an attempt to improve readability and create a higher standard of quality in books. Today Baskerville is still a very popular typeface that is used commonly in book design. John Baskerville was a businessman, a teacher of calligraphy and a grave carver. I think these jobs define the typeface very well. The type is efficient and readable (business-like), however elegant in it’s contrasts between thin and thick strokes (calligraphy), and a little boring (graves). The typeface received some backlash for being straining on the eyes to read, but I think we have all moved past that and don’t believe that anymore due to it’s popularity.
Process
In my sketches, elements I focused on were the fact that Baskerville was prominently used in book design, the letters as a form and some unique characteristics I had found in the typeface — specifically with the comma and the asterisk. A problem that I had translating my sketches to my digital iterations were that in my sketches I typically imagined the artboard space with different dimensions/spacing so a lot of the sketches I came up with were difficult to translate to the digital iterations.
Digital Iterations
My final iteration stemmed from this one. Changes I made were I changed the directions and scale of the “ille” of Baskerville in order to continue the flow of the letters before it. I also included a darker value of a character set in the background. I also changed the orientation of the name and date to ground the poster more as well as match the size of the character set in the background in the final interation. I also adjusted some values there to make the name “Baskerville” become more prominent. I also shifted the large letter “A” so that it was touching the “B” in order to reflect how many of the other letters in the poster were acting.
These 3 iterations played off the same theme of Baskerville being criticized for being hard to read, but ironically today is it very popular in book design. The first iteration was the first one I did where I used the Baskerville commas to create forms that looked like eyes. I then did the other two after that, playing with more forms and shapes to create different faces that expressed differing emotions. In these iterations I tried to match the copy with the expression of the face. In the end I chose not to use these because I was unsure about the use of creating a face.
This was another iteration of the project that I created to try to emphasize the use of Baskerville in book texts, using the white space and curvature of the copy to attempt to make a form that resembled a book spread open. I re-emphasized this “book” theme through writing “by: John Baskerville” at the bottom of it, similar to a book.
This was an iteration where I played with changing the weight of the typeface name, as well as the size and scale of the body copy.
In the end, this was my final iteration for the project. Critiques from the class about this poster were that I should lighten the value of the character set in the background in order for clearer visibility. It was also mentioned that the space where the “ille” of Baskerville is is difficult to read in that area due to the character set in the background, as well as the turning of the characters. The turning of the characters was also brought up due to the fact that since the L’s revolve around the dot in the i, they all resemble i’s. Something else that was brought up was the size of the date — I attempted aligning the serifs of the date to the character set but I should have made sure that the actual size of the date was the same size as the character set.
Something I learned from this project is that I should do a test print of whatever I am working on because values can be deceiving on the artboards in Illustrator, and it’s also important to see what you’re poster will look like in real life — factoring in distance in which it is seen at. I think after the crit I would have liked to try using more simple shapes in my iterations, because I think that really contributed to some great visuals that were created by my classmates.
