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Introduction
Choosing a font is like choosing a uniform to represent your army of words. You are
commander-in-chief and your army of words is about to do battle in communicating your
ideas to a foreign nation. You are going to show the world what you are made of. But to
do this, you are going to want to select a typeface that is easy to read and appropriate for
your message. It is important to be professional when deciding on a font because your
typeface speaks even when you don’t.
WTF: What is Typography’s Function?
In The Elements of Typographic Style, known as the typographer’s bible, Robert
Bringhurst stated it best at the very beginning of the book, “Typography exists to honor
content” (17). Simple. That is its primary duty. He continued on by saying, “It is a craft by
which the meanings of a text (or its absence of meaning) can be clarified, honored and
shared, or knowingly disguised” (17).
Like all things, typography is best understood when it is broken down into sections.
First off, what is a typeface? Who would know better than a typographer? Zuzana Licko, a
typographer for the Emigre Fonts foundry explained, “A typeface is the ornamental
manifestation of the alphabet. If the alphabet conveys words, a typeface conveys their
tone, style, and attitude” (Emigre Fonts). If you thought that’s what a font was, it is
because “typeface” is commonly used interchangeably with “font”, however there is a
difference. The word “font” (or “fount” depending on which side of the Atlantic you live on)
means “a collection of all the characters of a specific typeface” (Rabinowitz 74). “Typeface”
is defined as “a collection of letterforms that have been especially designed to go together”
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(Rabinowitz 74). Before you reread those definitions, Stephen Coles, editor of the online
journal Typographica, differentiates between the two with a music analogy. He said, “You
don’t say: ‘That’s a great MP3’. You say: ‘That’s a great song’. The MP3 is the delivery
mechanism, not the creative work; just as in type a font is the delivery mechanism and a
typeface is the creative work” (Peters). Just remember the typeface is like the song and the
font is like the MP3. You would say my favorite typeface is Helvetica.
Kickin’ It Old Skool
Before the Gutenberg Press, which was invented during the early fifteenth century,
words were written by hand. That’s exactly what early type was modeled after—
handwritten calligraphy. Ellen Lupton, an expert in typography, has written several books
on type and design and said, “The history of typography reflects a continual tension
between the hand and the machine, the organic and the geometric, the human body and
the abstract system” (13). Movable type was used in China long before Gutenberg’s
revolutionary invention, however with the thousands of different characters in the Chinese
language, it’s use wasn’t as successful as the Latin alphabet which uses sounds to form
words and therefore uses far fewer characters.
However, in the mid-1500s, humanist writers in Italy rejected the dark, dense type
used in the Gutenberg Bible in favor of lettera antica, “a classical mode of handwriting with
wider, more open forms” (Lupton 15). Nicolas Jenson, a Frenchman, created some of the
earliest and best roman typefaces. Many of these early typefaces were known as
“humanist” and were named after their printers such as Garamond, Palatino and Jenson,
which are all still commonly used today. Italic letters also came out of this time period (and
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out of Italy, hence the name) and “were modeled on a more casual style of handwriting”
(Lupton 15).
During the Enlightenment era, English printers William Caslon and John Baskerville
popularized what are known as transitional typefaces. Caslon established a type foundry in
his home country and via English colonialism, spread his typefaces around the globe
(Rabinowitz 14). Baskerville, who like Caslon, rejected the humanist style, explored type
with heavy contrast between vertical and horizontal strokes and pushed it further than his
contemporaries’ typefaces. Fellow printers even accused him of “blinding the Readers of
the Nation” and hurting their eyes with his new typeface (Lupton 17).
However, following in Baskerville’s footsteps were Frenchman Firmin Didot and
Italian Giambattista Bodoni who, toward the turn of the nineteenth century, embraced the
ideas of harsh contrast with letter strokes and very thin serifs, which pushed typography
even further away from the look of calligraphy (Lupton 17). Obviously influenced by the rise
of the machine during the Industrial Revolution, their open-spaced typefaces became the
first to be classified as modern (Rabinowitz 16).
Moving into the nineteenth century, as items were being mass-produced,
advertising experienced a boom leading to the rise of display types. Naturally, advertisers
wanted their ads to stand out from the rest, so they wanted large noticeable type.
However, the problem was that it was difficult to make large metal type because it was
extremely heavy, expensive and hard to set. Then around 1830, wood, which was much
lighter than metal, began to be used in the mass-production of type. This lead to an
abundance of new ridiculous, eccentric typefaces used for advertising (Rabinowitz 19).
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The year 1816 in particular was important for type because both the first sans serif type,
designed by William Caslon, and the first Egyptian typefaces (thick letters with slab-like
serifs) emerged. It would take another century before the use of sans serifs would achieve
wide spread popularity beyond its use as a display typeface (Rabinowitz 19).
Jumping ahead to the twentieth century, what could say modern better than sans
serifs? Fonts such as Gill Sans, Futura, Akzidenz-Grotesk, Helvetica and Univers emerged,
most of which remain popular today (Figure 1). Then in the 1980s digital type foundries
began to appear such as Emigre and Hoefler & Frere-Jones. Keep in mind, just because
sans serifs emerged as more “modern-looking” and became popular in the twentieth
century, older typefaces such as Baskerville, Bodoni, Caslon, and Didot didn’t disappear
and remain widely used today.
I Shot the Serif
The most basic way to characterize it is that serif fonts have “feet” and sans serifs
don’t. The word “sans” means “without,” so without serifs. As mentioned before, serifs
Figure 1: Classifications
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were added to letters to mimic calligraphy. Examples of serif fonts include Times New
Roman, Baskerville, and Palatino. Sans serifs look more modern and machine-like.
Examples of sans serif fonts are Helvetica, Futura, and Gill Sans. Most, if not all, fonts will
fall into one of those two categories. There are a few exceptions, like Optima, which is a
rare hybrid of both.
The Hip Bone Is Connected To The…
Not to get scientific, but there is a basic anatomy of letters that should be understood
(Figure 2). As you have probably noticed when typing your own documents in different
fonts, even with using the same point size, letters appear to increase or decrease in size.
This is no illusion. (i.e. Garamond takes up less room that Century Gothic, despite both
set at 12-point. Therefore you will fit more words on a page with Garamond.) The fact
is point size doesn’t actually determine the height of font, that is based on its x-height. X-
height is the height of the lower case “x”, which determines the heights of other letters in
Figure 2: Anatomy
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the font. Point size actually refers back to the height of the small metal block that would
have been used on a letterpress system (Poole). Letters didn’t have to take up the full
block size, which is why the heights of letters vary depending on the font. Many high
school/college students have figured this out another way though by cycling through fonts
on Word to make their papers appear longer than they actually are.
Other letter anatomy essentials are ascenders and descenders. All text sits on a
baseline. Any stroke that goes below that baseline, like “g” or “y”, is called a descender.
An ascender is any stroke that goes above the x-height, such as “b” or “f”.
BFFs (Type & Design)
I conducted three interviews over the course of this research:
• One with Bill Kerr, professor of graphic design and typography at Dominican
University, as well as the co-founder of Fun Quilts.
• Kate Wolff, a calligrapher/designer/typographer/professor in Basel,
Switzerland, received her MFA at the prestigious Basel School for Design,
and was formerly married to type legend, Wolfgang Weingart.
• Ellen Lupton, author of numerous design and typography books, curator of
contemporary design at the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum in New
York, and art director of the graphic design master of fine arts program at
the Maryland Institute College of Art.
All work with type and design on a daily basis and as Bill Kerr told me, “It’s hard
sometimes to separate graphic design with typography as a whole.” The definition of
graphic design is combining text with image.
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Much More Than Chocolate and Watches (in Switzerland)
Although many of us probably don’t know many (or any) calligraphers, Kate Wolff,
who teaches calligraphy in Switzerland, told me sternly in our conversation that calligraphy
is absolutely not a lost art. In a digital word, the principles of calligraphy are being
forgotten, which is why, she said, we need to bring it back. She told me a thing people
don’t realize is that the fonts we take for granted on our computers and use daily were
originally hand drawn by someone.
That lead me to ask her, with the popularity of type increasing due to the
abundance of new downloadable fonts, create your own font websites, designing you own
MySpace pages and so on, is this going to lead to an increased misuse of type or are we
going to see a better use of typography in the world? She replied that it’s a positive thing
that there is greater awareness of type. Expertise will certainly grow with that interest. Still,
she pointed out, only a few will be masters of the art.
Typography for Dummies
When asked, “What are the essentials for non-designers to know about type?” Bill
Kerr compiled a short list that consisted of legibility, line length, font size in relationship to
leading (space between lines of text), basic hierarchy (organization of the type), and when
to use a particular typeface. Kerr said, “There are all these fonts on your computer that are
really only meant to be used as display type, that are [for] titles, that are not meant to be
the text of Moby Dick.”
People tend to go wrong when trying to achieve hierarchy in one of two ways. One
is that they don’t know how to make something catch a person’s eye. The reverse is that
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people put emphasis on everything and therefore nothing stands out. According to Kerr,
most people go overboard and put something in “bold, all caps, underlined, and in red”
when you should be calling attention to elements subtly. (This is called
BAD TYPOGRAPHY).
Lupton agreed with Kerr in her interview. She said that people recognize when type
is set in an amateur way. She said, “Zero CSS styling will standout even to a child as ‘not
professional.’” (CSS stands for Cascading Style Sheet, which is used to design what
you see on a web page.) She added that common errors that she has noticed as a
professor are inconsistent line spacing and the common mistake of double spacing
between sentences.
There is nothing that annoys me more than orphans and widows. An orphan results
when the first line of a paragraph is the last line of a page. Be a good Samaritan and don’t
leave orphans behind. Please reunite that line with the rest of the paragraph on the next
page. A widow, in typography, is when the last word of a paragraph is the only word sitting
on the last line. Please give this lonely widow company. Add another word to the last line
or knock the second to last word down to the next line.
Lastly, one of the most noticeable cues of bad typography is when letters or words
have been stretched disproportionately, either vertically or horizontally. This act is
disgusting and should never be done. Either increase the point size, change the font, or
change the orientation of the paper. Letters should never be resized with out holding the
“shift” key or resizing them proportionately. That typographer put in countless hours
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designing that font to maintain certain proportions and to stretch a font disproportionately
is a slap in the face. Plus, it looks ugly and unprofessional.
Reading Between the Lines
Leading is the space between lines of text. Believe it or not Word users, leading is
much more than just the “single” or “double spaced” option that Word gives you.
Typographers and graphic designers adjust leading so there will be a comfortable distance
between lines of text. Leading needs to be changed depending on the font’s point size
and what kind of typeface is being used. The point of leading is to make reading easier
and smoother for the reader.
Under the Influence
Type is an extremely powerful tool. In fact, it is a core element of communication.
Unless we are hiding naked in a cave, we can’t escape type. Type is everywhere from
billboards to receipts to canned foods to handbags and everywhere in between. It would
be ignorant to say that we aren’t in someway influenced by the type that surrounds us in
the world. Rick Poyner, a British visual journalist for magazines such as Blueprint, Eye, and
Print, stated in the documentary Helvetica, “All of us… are prompted in subliminal ways.
Maybe the feeling you have when you see a particular typographic choice used on a piece
of packaging is just ‘I like the look of that.’ ‘That feels good.’ ‘That’s my kind of product.’
But that’s the type casting its secret spell” (Helvetica). Typefaces evoke emotions.
Typefaces are deliberately designed that way. Many new typefaces are born because a
company commissions a type foundry to develop a typeface that will subliminally strike a
chord with a particular demographic. Take the diaper company Pampers for example.
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Pampers uses a typeface that looks friendly and cuddly. That is the feeling that they want
conjured up by their image.
However, other typefaces are preferred because of their ubiquity. Let’s take the
typeface Helvetica for example. The following companies all use Helvetica as their brand’s
typeface: Target, Tupperware, Nestle, Verizon, Oral B, Saab, The North Face, JCPenney,
Staples, CVS, Panasonic, and American Apparel. One typeface can go from looking soft
and homey to hygienic and trendy. Typographer Jonathan Hoefler said, “There’s
something about the typeface I think really invites this sort of open interpretation,”
(Helvetica). It’s amazing how all these companies target such different demographics, yet
all use the same typeface. The only thing that changes is the context the type is used in.
When asked what trends are seen in corporate design today, Lupton replied, “Oil
companies are all trying to look more like Starbucks.” What she means is there are warm,
friendly feelings evoked by Starbuck’s typography. Oil companies (and many other
companies as well) want to shake the untouchable, corporate look and move toward a
welcoming, “my home is your home” feel. Another example of this trend is the new logo
Walmart revealed this past summer.
In the Wolff interview, she said, “[Type] communicates everything or nothing.”
According to Wolff, type can command you, mislead you, and even tell you about the
culture, time, and politics. (She also added on that note that she felt the Swiss are twenty
years behind the US in form and aesthetic in advertising and corporate identity. At present
squarish, condensed typefaces are the trend in Swiss corporate design.) Wolff also
introduced me to a great German word, “schrift,” which is commonly used among
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typographers and designers and very appropriate to this topic. There is no equivalent word
for it in English, but it translates to “everything type”, encompassing type, calligraphy,
logos, headlines, and letterforms.
Still, Ellen Lupton, may have summed it up best:
Everything can be judged by its typeface, even a candidate. Although many people
don’t acknowledge it… experiencing good typography is like walking into a well-lit
room. You may not stop to analyze it, but good lighting makes you feel better, and if
it makes a sudden change for the worse, you will know it (Heller).
Type Deciding Elections
Now you may think it’s ridiculous to judge a political candidate based on his/her
campaign’s type treatment on a banner or bumper sticker. It’s preposterous to imagine
someone actually voting for a candidate based on something other than his/her policies
such as who has better design or who is younger or even who is more attractive. Oh,
wait… those things have actually influenced voters in the past.
Earlier this year, New York Times writer Steven Heller asked top designers from
around the country to weigh in on McCain’s official campaign banner in an article called
“McCain’s Optimum Look.” Debbie Millman, president of design of Sterling Brands said,
“Consider typography to be the window into the soul of the candidate’s campaign,”
(Heller). As mentioned before, Optima, which is the typeface the McCain campaign is using
(Figure 3), is what Bill Kerr called, “a wish-washy, I’m not a serif, I’m not a sans serif font.”
Personally, I’m not too surprised by the selection. By not choosing to be a serif or sans
serif, it’s trying to please everyone. Typical of a politician.
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Figure 4: Obama’s Logo
Figure 3: McCain’s Logo
However, there is another way to look at this type, too. In the same article by Heller,
Michael Bierut, partner of Pentagram, a major design firm, observed, “The thicks and thins
we associate with serifs might be said to correspond with the reputation of
bipartisanship that Mr. McCain has demonstrated as a senator” (Heller). Bierut also
pointed out that Optima is also the font used for the Vietnam
Veterans Memorial. Coincidence? One of McCain’s strong
points is that he was a war hero, which ties in well with the
memorial. However, even on a subliminal level, I don’t think
most Americans will automatically recall the Vietnam Memorial the instant they see the
typeface. Thomas Porostocky, art director of I.D. Magazine, said McCain’s typeface
“communicates the qualities seemingly most important to the candidate; honor and
virtue… We judge many things in life based on pure superficialities, and I don’t think
politics is immune… often times, which way one votes is decided by the smallest
detail” (Heller).
Yet another reason the McCain campaign may be using Optima is to hide his age.
Gael Towey, chief creative officer of Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, said, “[He] is trying
to appear modern by using a modern feeling typeface,” (Heller). Just like McCain’s font, it
seems the jury is in the middle, too, as to whether or not it was a
good selection.
Obama’s campaign font choice of the Gotham is a completely
different story. The Hoefler and Frere-Jones type foundry to based
Gotham on old New York City metal cut lettering used at
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transportation centers. It was commissioned by GQ Magazine to be their official font back
in 2000. It also appeared as the font used for the Freedom Tower memorial. This
contemporary, yet elegant looking font was perfect for Barack Obama’s candidacy. Unlike
McCain’s Optima, Obama’s Gotham conveys “gravitas with youthful vigor” (Rawsthorn).
Also unlike McCain’s campaign, or many political figures’ campaigns for that matter,
Obama uses a symbol along with, or as substitute for his name (Figure 4). It’s a blue letter
“O” and within it is a sun rising over the horizon casting warmth over red and white stripes,
which resemble farmland. This really hits the heartland of America and couldn’t look more
patriotic. Typographer and designer Jonathan Hoefler said, “Visually he is on message at
every turn. I can’t think of many corporations that use design so intelligently” (Rawsthorn).
If the candidate’s initial logos didn’t sway voters, their website surely had potential
too. Strictly based on the their websites’ design, McCain doesn’t even look like he’s
running for the same office as Obama. When comparing the candidate’s websites, Bill Kerr
said McCain’s looked like “Joe’s plumbing tools on eBay. It’s generic templated… there’s
no consistent message.” Obama’s donation page had a royal blue border and used the
simplistic “O” symbol as the header (Figure 6). There was a great sense of clarity. Other
than the Obama “O”, there are no other icons on his page. Yet on McCain’s donation
page the icon for every major credit card was depicted (Figure 5). Obama’s site had credit
card options, but they were listed much more subtly using a light gray
sans serif.
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Figure 5: McCain’s Donation Page. Figure 6: Obama’s Donation Page
In all seriousness, with all this hype around logos and websites, did this really
impact voters at all? Well, as we all know, Obama won the presidential election last month
and he also had the better type and design. But to show you I’m not being politically
biased, let’s look back to the 2004 presidential election and take a look at Bush’s and
Kerry’s designs. Needless to say George W. Bush, a Republican candidate, won this
election. Back in October 2004, in an article in The New York Times entitled “What You
See Is What You Get,” writer Scott Dadish examined the type used on each candidate’s
bumper sticker. Dadich, a Democrat, was sad to admit Bush’s victory in the design
category. According to Dadich, the boldness and forward tilt of the letters showed power,
energy, and forward movement in Bush’s campaign. Dadich said, “In contrast to Mr.
Bush’s aggressive sans-serif font, Senator John Kerry’s multitudinous font choices center
on the use of thin, delicate-looking, ‘girlie-man’ type.” As you recall, Kerry was accused of
being “weak” and inconsistent on his stances on topics. This was reflective in his type
decisions. Kerry’s campaign did not consistently use the same font for publicity nor did he
have a clear visual hierarchy like the Bush-Cheney campaign. The Republican’s bumper
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sticker read “Bush-Cheney”, unlike the Democrat’s where John Edward’s last name,
which is the same font size as Kerry’s (and is therefore longer and more noticeable) read
“Kerry Edwards” as if it was one person’s name. Bush-Cheney looks powerful and
strong with the thick weight of the sans serif font, unlike Kerry’s font choice which looks
like a strong gust of wind could blow his name away. There was a sense of vigor and
leadership conveyed in the Bush campaign typeface that looked like he would take the
country in the right direction. (Whether or not you think that happened is a different story.)
Figure 7: Scher's Analysis
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Pentagram designer Paula Scher also weighed in and said that Bush’s simplified
flag conveyed patriotism and militarism and his all caps approached depicted strength.
Compared to Bush’s design, Kerry’s expressed “congenial subservience”. (See Figure 7
for Scher’s typographic.) Debbie Millman may be right on in saying that typography is the
window to a candidate’s soul.
But typography and politics extends past a candidate’s graphic identity. If done
poorly, it can really lead to headaches and frustration among voters on Election Day. An
example of bad typography in voting procedures is the butterfly ballot, which became
infamous during the 2000 election with the hanging chads in Florida. It’s really no surprise
that there was so many screwed up ballots in Florida. A butterfly ballot has candidates’
names on both the right and left pages with a single vertical bar extending down the center
between the two pages with a series of holes which are supposed to line up with the
candidate’s name if you follow the arrow to the hole correctly. If it sounds confusing, it’s
because it is confusing. Keep in mind the large number of senior citizens in Florida with
less than stellar vision. And this is how much of the state voted for president that year.
Hanging chads are a direct result of bad typography creating a major problem.
What the Helvetica?!
It is true that there is a whole movie on the typeface Helvetica. In fact, it sold out at
the select theatres it played in around North America. And in fact, I have watched
Helvetica multiple times (before I even knew I was going to write a research paper on type.)
So why Helvetica? Is there no love for Comic Sans? Well, there isn’t, but that’s not the
reason. The fact is Helvetica is everywhere. Michael Bierut, an interviewee in the
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documentary, compares it to air and gravity. Helvetica is used on store fronts, shopping
bags, street signs, t-shirts, websites; you name it and Helvetica’s probably already hit it.
When asked about his feelings on Helvetica, typographer Jonathan Hoefler said, “It’s hard
to evaluate it. It’s like being asked what you think about off-white paint. It’s just there. It’s
hard to get your head around something that big” (Helvetica).
Helvetica was designed by Max Miedinger at the Haas Type Foundry in Switzerland
in 1957. The goal was to modernize Akzidenz-Grotesk, a very similar sans serif font. Its
original name was Neue Haas Grotesk, however with the intent of selling this new font to
the U.S., Alfred Hoffman, former director of Haas Type Foundry didn’t think that would fly
with a very un-American sounding name like that. “Helvetia,” which means Switzerland in
Latin, was suggested as a new name. However, Hoffman said he didn’t think a typeface
should be named after an entire country. So “Helvetica” was settled on translating to “the
Swiss typeface” (Helvetica).
From that point on, especially with the popularity of the International Swiss Style in
poster design and advertising, Helvetica spread through the Western world like a wildfire.
Many corporate identities were redesigned in the mid-sixties to use Helvetica (Helvetica).
Media writer Leslie Savan said that corporations used Helvetica as their corporate
identity so “they can come off seeming more accessible, transparent, and accountable
which are all the buzzwords for what corporations and governments are supposed to be
today” (Helvetica).
Many people don’t realize that Helvetica is everywhere, which is why it is so
attractive. Designers intentionally use it because of its ubiquitousness. The typeface has
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a great sense of neutrality and a strong figure ground relationship. Hoefler added, “The
fact that it’s been so heavily licensed and made available through these very populist
technologies has kind of furthered the mythology that it’s the ultimate typeface” (Helvetica).
News Flash: You Can’t Copyright the Alphabet
It is very easy these days to visit dafont.com and download a large assortment of
free fonts. However, before you start using these new fonts on every imaginable
document, know that there are some peculiar legal issues involving fonts. These legal
issues concerning fonts can be confusing and bizarre, however in an interview with Bill
Kerr, he broke it down in layman’s terms. According to Kerr, the U.S. government does
not allow typefaces to be copyrighted. The alphabet is considered utilitarian, so the forms
can’t be copyrighted. Basically, this means the font world is free-for-all and anyone can
knock off another’s typeface and call it his/her own. However, it gets bizarre. If you
purchase a font, it is illegal to pirate it because it is property. But copying a font is perfectly
fine. Copying a font is done by outlining an existing font in Adobe Illustrator and then
uploading those outlines to Fontagrapher. Walla! You have created a new font and can
rename it and give it to others without a worry. (Just know that the typography gods will
probably smite you down the road.)
The example Kerr gave was this: “I can take Gotham, repackage it with my name
on it and give that away for free and not be in violation. Hoefler and Frere Jones cannot
sue me. However, if I buy Gotham and give it to you and you don’t pay for it, then they can
sue you.” The knock-off fonts are very easy to find on the web, however Kerr said the
comparison of the cheap knock-off to the original “is not generally apples to apples.” Like
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most knock-offs, the difference is quality. According to Kerr, when you download a free
imitation font, you’ll usually only get the letter forms, not the ligatures, kerning pairs, or
sophistication that makes the typeface beautiful. If you are confused by the logic behind a
font’s legality issues, you’re not alone. Bill Kerr doesn’t understand it either.
Nobody Likes a Poser
Some people prefer knock-offs to the real thing. Well, taste is subjective. I’m sure
these people prefer Madonna’s cover of “American Pie” to Don McLean’s too. Even
though he’s the one who wrote it. Can anything really be better than the original? I don’t
think so. However, the people at Microsoft must think so. I’m talking about the typeface
Arial. It’s Microsoft’s answer to the typeface Helvetica. Microsoft was too cheap to pay for
a license to use Helvetica on their computer, so instead they had Arial designed, which is
practically the exact same typeface, only with a few alterations. Like I mentioned before,
copying and repackaging a font is perfectly legal. German typographer Eric Spiekermann,
a founder of MetaDesign and FontShop, when asked about Helvetica’s knock-off Arial
said, “You cannot go better than perfect. You go worse” (Helvetica). Spiekermann
explained that the width and proportions of both fonts are exactly the same. When it
comes to Microsoft’s Arial, he shows no mercy calling them “big bullies” and “mean
bastards” (Helvetica). He’s not alone. Designer/typographer Mark Simonson called Arial a
“‘shameless imposter’ with a ‘rather dubious history and not much character’” (Blackwell).
In my interview with Ellen Lupton, I had asked her if she thought any fonts could
have the same impact as Helvetica or replace it in its ubiquitousness. She said
disappointedly that Arial is having “a huge impact without having any of the intellectual
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clarity or passion that drove the birth and spread of Helvetica.” She also added that she
wished Arial would just vanish. When asked the same question Kate Wolff sadly agreed. In
fact, she said it has replaced Helvetica and has become more predominant.
Though many designers do frown upon Arial, not all are so enraged like
Spiekermann, Simonson, or Lupton. Bill Kerr agreed Arial is a bastardization, however did
say, “It’s serviceable. It doesn’t elevate the bar of visual literacy for anyone, but I don’t lose
sleep over it.” Whether or not you are an Arial user, just know Helvetica is the pure form.
With that said, if you are going back and forth between using Mac and Windows, Arial
would be the safer font to use because all versions of Microsoft Office have Arial as a font,
so your document would not change at all if you had used a version of Helvetica on a Mac.
This doesn’t mean I approve of Arial. But I am being practical.
The analogy I like to use to compare the stories of Helvetica and Arial is one of two
1990s pop boy bands, Backstreet Boys and *NSYNC. The Backstreet Boys (BSB) was a
group of five young male vocalists that became pop sensations during the mid-90s.
However, a couple years later another five member boy group of singers under the name
of *NSYNC came onto the pop music scene. They were basically the exact same act as
BSB, just repackaged. Of course the die-hard BSB fans (mostly teen girls) stuck with their
band, but *NSYNC songs hit the radio, which lead to huge record sales and they
eventually became more popular than the Backstreet Boys. Unfortunately, we are seeing
this same story unfold with Arial as the *NSYNC in this case.
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Figure 8. Bringhurst’s chart for a large family of type
We Are Family: UltraLight, Bold Condensed and me!
Fonts also have families. But unlike human families, font families work best when
they work together. Just like how
people in your family have different
weights and styles, the same holds
true in a font family. The common
options are SMALL CAPS, italic, and
bold, as well as combinations of
these (Figure 8). Bringhurst said, “The
marriage of type and text requires
courtesy to the in-laws, but it does not
mean that all of them ought to move in,
nor even that all must come to visit” (55). Basically, just because you have all of these
options within a family, doesn’t mean you have to or should use them all.
The crucial thing that you don’t want to do is create a Fannie May assortment box
of fonts. When creating a document, PowerPoint presentation, or even a flyer, you want to
try staying within a font family. There is elegance in using a single font and just changing
the weights to create emphasis.
Wingdings
Wingdings, Webdings, and Zapf Dingbats may look like ridiculous font options to
the average Word user. They are not alternative alphabets. Dingbats are ornaments and
symbols that are meant to break up text. Dingbats, especially fleurons, which are floral
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ornaments, can usually be found between alphabetical sections in an index or as a
transition between two unrelated paragraphs or sections in a book. Many dingbats are
pictograms and are used by the tourist industry (Bringhurst 324).
No, It’s Not Cute
In my interview with Lupton, I asked her what the essentials are for non-designers
to know about concerning type. She responded by saying, “Avoid cute fonts like Comic
Sans.” I have always believed that but now the great Ellen Lupton has reaffirmed my belief.
Earlier this year, my mother was showing me versions of her résumé over the years.
I cringed when I came upon a more recent version that had used Comic Sans as the font. I
cannot stress enough: DO NOT USE COMIC SANS. There is no justified reason to do so.
And definitely do not use it on a résumé. (I’m sorry Mom that I had to use you as an
example.) It is a goofy looking font that is supposed to mimic the lettering used in comic
books. Why would anyone knowingly want his/her professional document to mimic a
comic book or connote the feeling of one? (Unless you were applying to be a comic artist
maybe?) Surely my mother is not the only one to make this mistake in her life, but others
can learn from this mistake. Comic Sans is a destructive virus and the only cure is
awareness. It is important to get it engraved into your psyche that it is unprofessional. At
first you may feel guilt knowing that you have ignorantly used it in the past, but it is
refreshing to know that that dark period in your life is over.
“Get with the Times, New Roman!”
Times New Roman is what I like to call the ultimate default font. True, it is easy to
read, which is actually why its ancestor, Times, was commissioned back in the early 1930s
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for the Times of London newspaper (Butterick, “Times”). But today, I don’t feel like it is so
much of a popular choice as it is a lack of choice. Until the relatively recent release of
Microsoft Office 2007, the default font when you would open a Word document was Times
New Roman. Could it be Microsoft changed it because people were getting sick of it? Of
course, many professors require that papers are to be typed in Times New Roman, but I
think that is done more for readability and consistency issues among the papers than for
any other reason.
Matthew Butterick, an attorney in Los Angeles, created a great website called
Typography for Lawyers. He was a graduate from Harvard with a degree in art focusing on
typography and design. The point of the site is to stress how typography is important to
presentation whether or not you have background in type and design. The popularity of
Times New Roman bothers him as much as it bothers me. (Much like Arial.) Butterick even
goes so far as to list what fonts federal to civil courts allow state by state to give lawyers
alternatives from choosing Times New Roman for legal documents.
Butterick may sound extreme, but he makes some good points about looking
professional when dealing with type. He said,
Did you make your business cards and letterhead on a photocopier at Kinko’s?
No, you didn’t, because you didn’t want them to look shoddy and cheap.
If you cared enough to avoid Kinko’s, then you care enough to stop using
Times (“Times”).
His point is that there are many great accessible fonts. To put is another way, you dress
nicely, talk confidently, and work hard to come across as looking professional at work.
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Don’t blow that image by settling on the default font. Whether it’s fair or not to judge a
person based on how he/she appears doesn’t matter. The fact is that you will be judged
based on appearance. Butterick went on to say, “Good typography makes your written
documents more professional and more persuasive” (“Why”).
Next time you create a Word document, select a font that is a little more original,
yet still appropriate and readable.
(The title of this section, “Get with the Times New Roman” is a quote from a video
called “Font Conference” by College Humor. In it, people personify different fonts such as
Comic Sans, Wingdings, Arial Black, and Times New Roman, in a conference room. It’s
very funny and illustrates the emotion that different fonts evoke.)
More Than Text Messages
As stated before, typefaces evoke feelings and can create hierarchy. These same
concepts apply to cell phones. Creating fonts for mobile devices is a whole field in itself.
You are probably looking at your cell phone right now, particularly at the font used. If you
are, and especially if you have a slightly older cell phone, you are most likely looking at a
bitmap font. Bitmap fonts are very “digital-looking” fonts. The characters are created by
tiny bits or dots. Bitmap fonts were commonly seen on older computers of the 80s and
early 90s. However, Apple and Adobe teamed up in 1985 and created scalable fonts
which have much better resolution and basically changed the face of computers (Haley
30). Naturally, after the first set of scalable fonts was released, computer users wanted
more. Surprise, surprise. However, as computers have moved away from bitmap fonts,
cell phones will as well, but it’s much harder with a cell phone because its screen is much
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smaller and the resolution isn’t as high as computers. But you can tell by looking at the
iPhone how much better the technology and resolution are getting on cell phones. And
you can bet that the resolution and type are just going to get better as cell phones begin to
look more like mini computers than calling devices.
Joe Pemberton, a founder of Punchcut, a San Francisco-based interface design
company said, “The players understand the value of fonts. Whether it’s Qualcomm, Sprint,
Apple or Verizon, they know how potentially important fonts are to their products and
services” (Haley 30). This reiterates an earlier point. When there is a priority on visual
appearance, you are going to come across as looking more professional, and most likely
becoming more successful.
Despite the popularity, even necessity of cell phones, bitmap fonts are not going to
disappear quickly. Mobile type designers and engineers don’t typically work together,
therefore progress with type as interfaces of mobile devices doesn’t happen rapidly.
However, I think companies that are leaders in the industry know that those two divisions
are going to have to work as a team. You also need to keep in mind that not all cell phone
fonts use Latin letters. East Asian characters used in Japanese and script fonts, like Arabic
that read from right to left don’t make the job any easier. The key to great cell phone
typography, is the same that applies to print. Fonts with moderate contrast (unlike
Baskerville that has sharp contrast between its vertical and horizontal strokes) and fonts
with open counters, (the actual white space around the letter forms), make type easier to
read (Haley 32). Common mobile typefaces include Rotis Semisans, Univers, and ITC
Stylus. Also, the Verizon Wireless typeface was released earlier this year, which comes in a
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variety of weights, all in which help to make the mobile experience easier to us and more
visually attractive.
Readability, Legibility, and Transparency, oh my!
How do you know if you are using a typeface correctly? A common belief among
many great typographers is that type should be transparent. As Bringhurst has said,
function is first and foremost. What this means is that a typeface shouldn’t be drawing
attention to itself. Obviously, the reader is going to see the typeface, but the objective is to
not have him/her think about it. The content is what the reader should be focused on.
Think of a typeface as though it was a belt you are wearing to an interview. A good belt will
complete the outfit, but shouldn’t be attracting more attention than you, the actual person
being interviewed.
Another metaphor, made popular in the typography world in a 1930s essay by
typographer Beatrice Ward, is to think of type as a “crystal goblet,” which clearly illustrates
the transparency that type should take. She said, “Type well used is invisible as type,
just as the perfect talking voice is the unnoticed vehicle for the transmission of words,
ideas” (Ward).
Whenever you are using type for a practical function, like a document or
presentation, you should always keep in mind that there is a difference between readability
and legibility. Using 14-pt Futura is optically easier to see than 11-pt Times New Roman.
Futura is larger and therefore more legible. However, reading a novel set in 11-pt Times New
Roman would be much easier to read than 14-pt Futura. Your eye would move much
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more fluently across the page because a small serif font like 11-pt Times New Roman has
better readability than a larger sans serif like 14-pt Futura.
So What’s New?
As long as we continue to communicate with letterforms, there will always be new
typefaces being developed, just like there are new songs, new buildings, or new
companies. Although many new typefaces may be commissioned by a client, inspiration
for new typefaces can come from practically anywhere. For example, the font “Manson”
was designed by Jonathan Barnbrook after mass murderer Charles Manson. It consists of
gothic-looking characters and is commonly used with horror-based design. Graphic
designers are always looking for new typefaces to use, while some older, more traditional
typographers think these new, more expressional typefaces are completely unnecessary.
Although there will surely be a handful or two of bad typefaces in years to come, it will be
exciting to see what new typefaces will be developed and popularized in the future.
Picks to Click
So what are the best fonts to use? This seems like a very subjective question, but I
can give you an answer. Font Shop, a German type company released a list of the best
one hundred fonts. (And you know when the Germans release a “best of” list, they mean
business.) In order, the top five they recommend:
1. Helvetica
2. Garamond
3. Frutiger
4. Bodoni
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5. Futura
In case you were curious, Times finished sixth on the list (“100 Best Writings”). However,
not all of those fonts may be on your computer, so I’ll list some additional elegant, yet
transparent typefaces. The typeface that is used as the body text of this essay is Helvetica
Neue Light and the subheads are in Helvetica Neue, which is a slightly heavier weight.
Other recommendations for text heavy documents, especially as far as readability is
concerned would be Palatino, Georgia, and New Courier for serif fonts, and Gill Sans
and Myriad for sans serifs.
The Lo Down
As Ellen Lupton put it, “Typography is what language looks like” (Lupton 1).
Typography is essential to communication. What determines a great type is its
transparency. If people aren’t thinking about type when they read it is because they are
not supposed to. That means the type is doing its job. But type also has the power to
evoke emotions. That’s how it influences decisions from groceries to elections. It may
sound erroneous to say Obama and Bush won presidential elections because of their
design. I’m sure that their graphic identity wasn’t the only reason or even the leading
reason why they both won. But keep in mind that we only audibly hear a candidate speak
occasionally, while visual messages speak to us all the time.
People judge you based on how you communicate orally. The same applies to how
you communicate on paper or on screen. You work hard. Show it. Don’t let yourself fall
into the default font trap. We all have our favorite color crayon and our favorite typeface.
But there are many other colors in the box. Just like you wouldn’t color the sun green, you
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shouldn’t use a goofy font on a résumé, or any other important document. Use
appropriate fonts that are legible and readable.
You now know the history and anatomy of type and the dos and don’ts. You read
what the professionals had to say. You are ready to use type in a more professional
and persuasive manner. Remember choosing a font is like choosing a uniform for your
army of words. Your typeface speaks even when you don’t. So how are you going to
represent yourself?
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