Class Notes

Digital Typography - visual communication

Symbols (the creation of symbols is where typography starts)
Hieroglyphs - Symbols represent = objects

Pictograph - when a symbol represents and object
we still use pictographs today with many street signs

Ideograph
symbols represent = idea

An example is combine a symbol for pigs and a symbol for house.  Put 2 pigs symbols inside the house and you get a ideograph for the idea prosperity.

Alphabet - 

symbols represent = sounds

     How this came about:
         (Rebus - the Egyptians created this make sounds for the Greek names)

          Phoenicians (phonetics sounds)

          Greeks

          Romans
        (Dark Ages)
          Middle Ages
          Renaissance
                   Johann Gutenberg - movable type
                      The system is called Casting because it is made from cast metal type.


Typographers of the Renaissance:
Garamond
Jenson
  - they were trying to bring things back to the old Roman mindset
  Roman Type 

Aldus Menutius  (inventor/idea man)  - he worked with Griffo (designer)
     Menutius wanted to reflect Humanism he came up with Cancellaresca (Chancery)
         people were copying him so he asked the Pope for exclusive rights to the font 
         and so people came up with a similar style and called it:
      Italic Type

Herb Lubalin   - phototypesetting

        Avant Garde type

 this goes back to the Constructavists, you can warp the text. this leads to kerning

 example:

Agricultural Revolution

Industrial Revolution

Information Revolution - Lubalin can be considered the beginnings of the 3rd major revolution

1970 -Personal Computers

mid-1980 1. Macintosh (first computer that was able to be used to make print docs)

                2.  tiny start up company also came about named :Adobe

                    Adobe creates Postscript (first language that allowed print documents to be created)

                3. Aldus - PageMaker (the og word program) 

  These all lead Desktop Publishing

First time anything like that had ever happened, where people could print stuff out of their garage.

Desktop > Web Type
  .ps postscript font
  .ttf true type font
  .otf open type font - additionally: more robust type of formatting, stuff gets formulated as you are typing