Category: Project One

Modernism

Jasmine Pointer / / Lectures, Project One, Research, Typography

International Typographical Style: Modernism Lecture

Todays lecture talked a lot about Helvetica and the varied views different designers have on it. I’ve always looked at Helvetica to be a plain, simple and dull typeface. However, after seeing the work of Josef Muller Brockmann, I changed my mind.

  • beethovenHis design is so simple yet effective by the way he has used Helvetica. He uses no uppercase lettering which creates a certain style and image. The way that ‘beethoven’ has not been made a big deal for example, by blowing it up, it has drawn more attention to it. The background design also draws attention to it by the way it is shaped. I love the clarity of this poster and it’s minimalism is refreshing.

Josef Mullar Brockmann, 1955, ‘Beethoven’

We also watched an extract from ‘Massimo Viginelli: Film Helvetica’. Viginelli explains how he disagrees that type should be expressive and this is why he likes Helvetica. However, I disagree with him as I feel that, especially with the range of type there is these days, all type is expressive and has a certain effect on a design.

However I do like what Brockmann has done with his design and I think I will try to incorporate my own typeface into a minimalist design like this to see if I can create a similar effect.

 

 

Typography Research

Jasmine Pointer / / Project One, Research, Typography

I decided to look at a typography timeline to get a good idea of the history of typography before taking on this project. All of the information I found for this typography timeline was taken from home.moravian.edu.

Renaissance, 15th-16th centuries:

1470: Nicolas Jenson creates first old style Roman typeface. Roman type was modelled from a European scribal manuscript style.

1523: Garamond typeface invented. Garamond’s letterforms convey a sense of fluidity and consistency.

Baroque, 17th century:

1692: Romain du Roi Typeface created by Robert Grajun (first cursive typeface)

1757: Baskerville Typeface designed. The Baskerville typeface is the result of John Baskerville’s intent to improve upon the types of William Caslon.

1722: William Caslon. Caslon’s typefaces were inspired by the Dutch Baroque types.

Neoclassical, 18th century:

1780: Bodoni typeface designed. Bodoni had a long career and his designs evolved and differed, ending with a typeface of narrower underlying structure with flat, unbracketed serifs, extreme contrast between thick and thin strokes, and an overall geometric construction.

1784: Didot typeface designed. The Didot family’s development of a high contrast typeface with an increased stress is contemporary

Romantic, 18th-19th centuries:

1816: Caslon IV produced the first sans-serif printing type in England for Latin. Caslon’s Sans Serif and the Grotesques, which followed on from this pattern in the 19th century.

1896: Cheltenham Designed. Cheltenham is not based on a single historical model, and shows influences of the Arts and Crafts Movement. Originally intended as a text face, “Chelt” became hugely successful as the “king of the display faces.”

Industrialisation, 19th-20th centuries

1904: Franklin Gothic and its related faces, are realist sans-serif typefaces originated by Morris Fuller Benton. Franklin Gothic has been used in many advertisements and headlines in newspapers. The typeface continues to maintain a high profile, appearing in a variety of media from books to billboards.

1927: Futura typeface designed. It is based on geometric shapes that became representative of visual elements of the Bauhaus design style.

1932: Times New Roman is a serif typeface commissioned by the British newspaper The Times in 1931, created by Victor Lardent at the English branch of Monotype

1957: Haas Grotesque (Helvetica) Designed Helvetica was developed in 1957 by Max Miedinger with Eduard Hoffmann at the Haas’sche Schriftgiesserei (Haas type foundry) of Münchenstein, Switzerland.