FontCast from fontshop offers some bite-sized video interviews with eminent typographers and designers of the day.
Monthly Archive for December, 2009
When reflecting on identity and design (as I often do, in a quiet moment), I think its always useful to ask whether any scheme you’re working on is opening things up, or closing things down. Is it facilitating creative possibilities and unforseen expansions, or reducing visual language to a tick-box formula, favouring visual consistency over coherence, context and creativity. (For a good introduction to this area, try this article by Nick Bell, or this one by Jason Grant).
The branding of cultural or educational institutions is an area that I take a personal, bordering on obsessive, interest in, and this work from Cobbenhagen Hendriksen for the Netherlands Media Art Institute is (I think) an example of cultural/educational identity work that is awkward, sticky, and interesting.
Thanks to Oskar Kron for the link.
Following Brian’s earlier mac-tablet post, more on interactive publishing from BERG. Thanks to Tom Jenkins for the link.
If your granny really wants a copy of the 1987 D&AD annual for her christmas present, Counter-Print.co.uk would be a good place to start. A lovely site selling some interesting art, design and architecture books and periodicals.
Following friday’s typo talks (again), thought these might be worth a look, for the inquisitive amateur and seasoned fun-loving typographer alike.
Hot off the press, comes news that Wikipedia Neil’s brain is full of incomplete information, contradictions, and errors. Use with caution.
Following on from friday’s typo discussion, thought the point about women in type (or in design in general) was an interesting one, as was the “loads of fonts are a bit like helvetica, does it really matter, do we need any more?” one. Got me thinking about some of the most ubiquitous typefaces in the UK — road and rail signs — and how they were designed by a woman, Margaret Calvert, (in conjunction with one of her former tutors, Jock Kinneir — note: anyone mad about Scottish-ness and with a view that Scots are the smartest, most innovative people on the planet will probably be disappointed to find out that Kinneir was South African English [see comments for more info], though with a name like that, suspect a bit of Scottish-ness existed somewhere in the recent past).
The transport typeface has been released as URW Transport, and the Rail Alphabet has had a recent revival in conjuction with Henrik Kubel and (the excellent) A2/SW/HK.
Another interesting conversation from the afternoon, generated by Korinna, was about the use of old and, some (but not me) would say, ugly or cumbersome typefaces in art and design publications of a certain type. One of the most interesting of these is the use of the mitim typeface in DOT DOT DOT magazine (for graphic designers who don’t like graphic design), designed by Radim Pesko and which is not an old typeface but a recent aggregation of three other faces, which is still evolving. Stuart Bailey, editor of dot dot dot, explains a little more here, a visual example can be found below, at the bottom of this post.
Linking this all together, because you may have been distressed by the brazen lack of continuity between those two sections and ‘issues’, is the attention dot dot dot has paid to Muriel Cooper, a most amazing designer, technologist, theorist and visual communicator.
Addendum: More great links, and a correction: Jock Kinneir was born in Aldershot, Hampshire, not South Africa. Thanks to the Kinneir family for links and corrections.
Time Inc recently posted a demo of an upcoming version of Sports Illustrated. This supports rumours that a mac tablet will be due early in 2010 to compete with netbooks and Kindle. Also promotes touch screen technology in main stream technologies beyond the iPhone.
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