The History of Typefaces

Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Description of the Research Process for the Fourth Post

Identified existing research appropriate for this post

Undertook further research where necessary

Looked for and posted a number of concrete examples and explanations to balance historical data

Wrote the text for this post

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Humanist Typefaces

The main characteristics of Humanist typefaces are:
1 Sloping cross-bar on the lowercase 'e'
2 Relatively small x-height
3 Low contrast between 'thick' and 'thin' strokes (i.e.there is little variation in the stroke width);
4 Dark colour (i.e.the overall lightness or darkness of the page, not a reference to colour in the traditional sense). Look at the page through half-closed eyes to get a better impression of it’s 'colour'.
Despite a brief revival during the early 20th century, the relatively dark colour and small x-heights of Humanist typefaces are no longer fashionable.

Bodoni typeface-Facsimile of sample with genuine Bodoni types (1925).

Category	Serif
Classification	Vox-ATypI: Didone British: Didone Bringhurstian: Romantic
Designer(s)	Giambattista Bodoni
Variations	Berthold Bodoni Antiqua LTC Bodoni 175 Linotype Bodoni Bauer Bodoni Filosofia
Shown here	ITC Bodoni Seventy Two

(Wikipedia)

Facsimile of lines from Dante's
"La Vita Nuova" first published
with Bodoni types by the
Officina Bodoni in 1925.
Actual font is the digital
Bodoni Monotype
published in 1999.

Bodoni was a prolific type designer
and completed hundreds of
typefaces. The Museo Bodoniano
in Parma houses more than 25,000
of his punches. Bodoni’s 'Manuale Tipografico' (1818) contains 142
roman typefaces and their corresponding italics in the
first volume. The second
volume includes numerous
ornaments, Arabic, Greek,
Russian, and Tibetan types.

The Baskerville typeface designed by John Baskerville in 1757


Category	Serif
Classification	Transitional serif
Designer(s)	John Baskerville
Foundry	Deberny & Peignot Linotype
Variations	John Baskerville Mrs Eaves
Shown here	Baskerville Ten by František Štorm

Caslon English roman, from a sample issued by the Caslon foundry.


Category	Serif
Classification	Transitional^[1]
Designer(s)	William Caslon I
Foundry	Caslon Type Foundry
Variations	Adobe Caslon Big Caslon LTC Caslon Founders Caslon ITC Founders Caslon Wyld Caslon 3 Caslon 224 Caslon 471 Caslon 540 Caslon 641 Caslon Old Face

William Caslon's 1734
Specimen sheet, some of
which is set in the Caslon
typeface.

The ligatures of Adobe Caslon Pro

Caslon refers to a number of serif typefaces designed by William Caslon I (1692–1766), and various revivals thereof.

(Wikipedia)

Type Terminology

There is a subtle but important difference in meaning between a grapheme, character or letter and a glyph, letterform or sort. A letter, character or grapheme refers to a fundamental conceptual mark that represents a spoken sound. (A phoneme refers directly to the sound.)
A sort, letterform or glyph refers to a particular manifestation of a letter or character, one created by a type designer.

The word Sphinx, set in
Adobe Caslon Pro
to illustrate the concepts of
baseline, x-height, body size,
descent and ascent.

Common Terminology

Typeface: An alphabet designed with consistent visual characteristics.
Font: A set of characters in the same size comprising all the letters of the alphabet in both upper- and lowercase including all the figures and symbols of punctuation.
Points and Picas: The standard measurements used for type specifications are the Point (approx. 1/72 of an inch) and the Pica (which is equivalent to 12 points). (A point is roughly equivalent to a screen pixel, or 72 "dots" per inch.)

PRINTING PRESS

This woodcut from 1568 shows the left printer removing a page from the press while the one at right inks the text-blocks. Such a duo could reach 14,000 hand movements per working day, printing around 3,600 pages in the process.

The History of Typefaces

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Wednesday, September 29, 2010

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