I am going to be posting a Graphic discussion 2 times a month to discuss different aspects of art, from styles, mediums, and various things that you should look for. I hope to get people involved in these, giving their own thoughts and opinions, and possible try something new. On a side note, any flaming, bashing or negativity towards members is going to be dealt with fast, this is a discussion about art, not someones opinions just because you think they are wrong.

To begin, I would like to start with Typography. Why? Well, typography is a good starting block, anyone on here that makes a signature, and puts their name, and a quote, or word uses it. You see it in your daily life on buildings, magazines, newspapers, tools, it is unavoidable. Lets start with the definition, and some examples of both good, and bad typography.

ty·pog·ra·phy   [tahy-pog-ruh-fee]
–noun
1. the art or process of printing* with type.
2. the work of setting and arranging types and of printing* from them.
3. the general character or appearance of printed* matter.
*It mentions printed matter, but it also relates to digital.



Inspire by ~Famous

This is an example of good typography. The message is easy to read, and he used the speech bubble background instead of using quotations. He kept it left align, so we have a nice clean edge, but the back is a little jumbled, that isn't a problem, some people would clean it up though letter spacing (newspapers especially to keep nice clean columns). He used Helvetica font, a very common type face (font), but for good reason. Instead of searching for a unique (which often leads to legibility issues) he use a bold, common font that is modern, to suit his desire. The statement is modern, and his type face is too. The only things I would have suggested to the artist is to increase the letter spacings, and line spacings, but it looks good


Milk by ~Erouc

This one is very well done, he made the word into the word. This is the kind of typography that could easily be used in magazines (which he has), or even use as an ad for milk. Again, he used a very bold, legible font, but witht he splash effects, it started to contort to letters themselves, but would he have gotten the same effect with a serif font (fonts with the feet aka times new roman)? No, and does the distortion of the words make it harder to read? A little but the effect he added makes up for it.


misery by Twigglet

Now, I don't want to be mean, but I needed an example of bad typography to show things that you shouldn't do. In this piece I asked a few people on the shout box if they understood what it meant, and after a little bit, Apathy suggested "misery is win." I am still unsure exactly what it says, but I will go with the guess. Now, why is this one bad and the others good? For starters, it is hard to read, it is missing a "Y" if it is in fact supposed to read "misery is win," and the colouring of the letters needs a lot of work. First thing I would have done, is type out what they want it to say, and pick a font for it to stand out, after that, well, you could do an align on it, with each word on a different line, play with the line space, and letter space, even apply a gradient over the whole thing. The number 1 thing is to keep it legible, whats the point of type, of no one can understand what you mean with it?

Now for the discussion. Why not try to analyze the above examples, or any of the many examples you see day to day. Is it legible? Is the words, and the type itself cohesive? If it is an ad, does it stand out, and look attractive? What are some ideas to make them better, or for your own. If you want, bounce some ideas off of each other on a type design to make yourself, or maybe you want to ask a question to understand something a little better. Feel free to ask anything here (related to this topic)