Research into typefaces

Bodoni

Bodoni is a Serif typeface, was first designed in the late eighteenth century by Giambattista Bodoni. Bodoni typeface is identified as Didone or contemporary. Bodoni took inspiration from the Baskerville font. During Bodoni’s long career, his designs varied resulting with a typeface which was slightly condensed underlying structure with flat serifs, with juxtaposed thick and thin strokes, and an overall geometric construction.

When the first release came of the Bodoni and Didone fonts, they were identified as classical designs due to their rational structure. However, these fonts were not updated versions of Roman or Renaissance letter styles, but new, contemporary designs. The Fonts came to be called ‘modern’ serif font, until the mid 20^th century, they were known as Didone designs. Bodoni later designs are identified as ‘modern’ however Bodoni’s earlier designs are called ‘transitional’.

Some digital versions of Bodoni are hard to read caused by the alternating densities strokes. Versions of Bodoni that are intended to be used at text size are ‘Bodoni Old Face’.

Massimo Vignelli described the font as, ‘the most elegant typefaces ever designed.’ Serif designs like Bodoni are most commonly used in headings ad display uses and in upmarket magazine printing, which is often done on high gloss paper. In Europe, they are used in body text.

Garamond

In the early 16^th century, Claude Garamond cut types for the Parisian scholar-printer Robert Estienne. Garamond based his cut types on the historical type of Romans. In later versions of Garamond’s work, Garamond refined his Roman type cuts adding his own concepts as he developed his skills as a punch cutter. Garamond passed in 1561, after his death the Garamond punches made their way to the printing office of Christoph Plantin in Antwerp, these still exist in the Plantin-Moretus museum. Other Garamond punches went to the Frankfurt foundry of Egenolff-Berner. In 1592, that became an important source about Garamond types for later designers.

Futura

The geometric sans-serif typeface designed in 1927 by Paul Renner. It was designed for the New Frankfurt-project; the designs were based on geometric shapes. It was commissioned by Bauer Type Foundry. Futura appearance of efficiency and forwardness. The purpose of the typeface was to express a more contemporary approach rather than a revival or a previous design. Renner’s designs rejected the approach of previous sans-serif designs, which were based on model of sign painting, condensed lettering and nineteenth- century serif typefaces. The typeface includes a simple geometric form, as well as the lowercase has a tall ascender. The typeface was previously used more commonly in writing rather than printed text. The uppercase acts similar to classical Roman capitals.

Times New Roman

The serif typeface was commissioned by ‘The Times’ in 1931, created by Victor Lardent. Although the font is no longer used in ‘The Times’, the typeface has become the most widely used in history. Times New Roman creation took place through influence of Stanley Morison of Monotype. Morison was an informal adviser to ‘The Times’, who recommended that they change the typeface.

The new design made debut on the 3 October 1932. After the release of the font, the design stayed with ‘The Times’ for 40 years. Due to new production techniques, by 2004 the newspaper has switched typefaces five times since 1972. However, the new releases of fonts have been variants of the New Roman typeface. In commercial sale, Times New Roman became extremely successful, becoming Monotype’s bests selling typeface of all in metal type.

Helvetica

The widely used sans-serif typeface was developed in 1957 by Swiss typeface designer Max Miedinger with collaboration from Eduard Hoffman. The Design was influenced by the 19^th century typeface Akzidenz- Grotesk and other German and Swiss designs. Consequently, this became the one the most popular typefaces of the 20^th century. Developed by the Haas’sche Schriftgiesserei of Munchensteint, Switzerland, the type was originally names Neue Haas Grotesk, it was rapidly licensed by the Linotype ad renamed Helvetica in 1960.

Century

Century is intended for body text and is a family of serif typefaces. The first design of the family was Century Roman cut, created by designer Linn Boyd Benton in 1894 for his Century magazine. The company which Benton worked for, American Type Founders, expanded the Century type family. Century is based on the Scotch Roman and Scotch Modern genres, two styles of type of British origin which was highly popular in the nineteenth century. Today, the typefaces are used for textbooks and literature.

Caslon is a serif typeface designed by William Caslon. William Caslon worked as an engraver, where he used moulds to cast metal type. He created old-style serif letter designs, which was created by hand. Caslon designed type around London, influenced by the Dutch Baroque typeface. Caslon was known for his typefaces having an aesthetic appearance. In the early nineteenth century remain common, particularly for setting printed body text and books.

Univers is a sans-serif typeface designed by Drian Frutiger in 1954. The typeface is a classic neo-grotesque typeface. It was released in 1957, the same year of the release of Folio and Helvetica. The design of Univers is similar to Helvetica as they were both based on typeface Akzidenz grotesk (1896). The typeface has much more flexible type family compared to Helvetica. The typeface family contained a form of consistence and similarity towards the designs.  Univers contained a range of styles and weights, which allowed documents to be created in one consistent typeface.

Clarendon was created by Robert Besley for a London company called Thorowgood and Company. Clarendon is a slab-serif typeface, which was named after the Clarendon Press in Oxford. The typeface was published in 1845. The typeface was very popular and was considered to be the first registered typeface. The typeface was popular worldwide and was used for wanted posters, used with wood type.

Berthold

The Berthold type foundry was founded in 1858 by Hermann Berthold in Berlin. The company came international and was the largest foundry in 1918. The company developed typesetting equipment for World War ll. In the 1950s, Berthold created its first phototypesetting machine, called the Diatype. In 1960, Berthold introduced the Diatroni,

its first keyboard-controlled phototypesetter for volume production.