Design Definitions

01 - absolute measurement – measurements of fixed values. Ex. A millimeter is a precisely defined increment of a centimeter. They are expressed in terms that can not be altered.
02 - relative measurement – measurement that is relative to the size of type that is being set. Leading is another measurement that is used here.
03 – point – the basic typographic measurement along with pica’s. It is used to measure the type size of a font.
04 – pica – the basic typographic measurement along with points. One pica is equal to 12 points and it is commonly used for measuring lines of type.
05 - em (and em dash) - a linear unit (1/6 inch) used in printing. It is used in typesetting to define basic spacing functions. It is used to define elements such as paragraph indents and spacing.
06 - en (and en dash – is half the width of an em
07 – legibility – typographic clarity comes in two forms, legibility and readability. It’s distinctness that makes perception easy.. the analysis of legibility involves a range of factors, perspectives, and methodologies.
08 – rag – occur when highly noticeable shapes form by the line ends of text blocks that distract from simple, uninterrupted reading.
09 - type alignments: flush left, flush right, centered, justified. list advantages and/or disadvantages
10 - word spacing: what is the ideal – adjusts the space between words.
11 – rivers – typically occur in justified text blocks when the separation of the words leaves gaps of white space in several lines.
12 – indent – first line indent, the text is indented from the left margin in the fist line. There are running, hanging, and on a point indents.
13 – leading – refers to the space between the lines of text in a text block.
14 – kerning – the design of text faces incorporates inbuilt automatic adjustments to the spacing of particular letter pairs.
15 – tracking – adjusting the overall space between letters, also known as letter spacing.
16 – weight – include single bold variant, which is common. There are intermediate weights, such as book, medium, and demi, or extremes such as black or ultra bold.
17 – scale – designers use scale to differentiate the content by increasing the size.
18 - typographic variation – differing typefaces, weights, and sizes, the intro of bold, italic or small-cap fonts.
19 – orphan – is the final one or two lines of a paragraph separated from the main paragraph to form a new column, and should be avoided at all costs.
20 – widow – a lone word at the end of a paragraph.

Josef Muller Brockmann

Graphic designer, Josef Muller Brockmann, was born on May 9, 1914 in Rapperswil, Switzerland. He began finished secondary school in Rapperswil before he went off to start his career as an apprentice to the designer and advertising consultant Walter Diggelman, after his apprenticeship he worked as a freelance designer and also joined the Swiss army where he was a lieutenant. After the war, he began to work for various theatres as a set designer. It did not take long before Brockmann was known as the leading practitioner and theorist of the Swiss Style. He was the first to create typographical posters for the Tonhalle.

In 1958 he became a founding editor of New Graphic Design and eight years later he was appointed European design consultant to IBM. Müller-Brockman was author of the 1961 publications The Graphic Artist and his Design Problems, Grid Systems in Graphic Design. He influenced the spread of the grid and was known for his use of typography in his clean simple designs. The grid is used today in graphic media and is an essential part of teaching students studying Graphic Art. On August 30, 1996, Brockmann died in Zurich.

Jan Tschichold

Jan Tschichold was born on April 2, 1902 to a script write named Franz Tschichold. He grew up with his father’s job influencing what he would become. Jan wanted to be a painter but his parents did not believe that would be a stable job so they steered him towards a profession as a drawing teacher. During his seminar in Grimma, he began to become interested in old typefaces and it was after three years he broke away from studying teaching and went to the Academy for Graphic Arts in Leipzig to be a typeface designer.

Tschichold was very important and influenced the change and use of font. While he was at school he became more and more irritated by the typography of the times. Tschichold was influenced by painters such as, László Moholy-Nagy and El Lissitzky, whose work interested him because they used contrasting forms to display balance and conflict. Tschichold thought that the cure for typography lay in discarding rules, accepting symmetrical setting, and the sole use of sans serif typefaces. One of the most important books of the time for fonts was his, Die neue Typographie (The New Typography) of 1928 and also Typographische Gestaltung (Typographic Design) of 1935. The outlook embraced by his, The New Typography, and its emphasis on sans serif typefaces and the vision that embraced 20th-century technologies, was very influential but led to his arrest by the Nazis in March 1933. His other major text was published in 1935, Typographische Gestaltung.

Tschichold designed the following typefaces; Classical Garamond, Sabon, Transit, Saskia and Zeus.

The Tschichold grid system was what Jan created for what he felt to be proper layout proportion. The Futurist would place text as graphic elements and it would make the page look chaotic. He authorized the grid as a guideline for designers to create clear, crisp compositions every time.

Typography Definitions

Grids

A grid is made up of lines that break the space into equal units. They are used to control what is placed where while still giving the designer leeway to do what they want.

Why use Grids?

Designers use grids to help organize the space that they have to work with. It helps create an overall unity on the page.

Modular Grids

A modular grid is made of four columns and four rows that are each separated by a gutter. There are 16 modules that help the designer to choose where to position the text and pictures. The text and pictures can fill up more then one module as long as it occupies one or more whole modules.

Parts of a Grid

The margins of modular grid are the outside space that surrounds the modules. Usually the designer will not place anything inside the margins. There are four vertical columns that make up the modular grid. The 16 grid modules are used to help organize the information on the page. Images or text can occupy one or more modules which allows the designer to have more freedom. Flowlines are the lines between the characters. The gutter is the space used to divide the modules or it is the space in the middle of a two-page spread where the binding of the book will be. Nothing is to be placed in the gutter.

The Use of Hierarchy and How to Create a Clear Hierarchy

When designing, there are words that pop out at the viewer due to their size, color, leading, point size, line length, and kerning. When hierarchy is used correctly, the viewer is drawn to the words that the designer believes are the most important.

A clear hierarchy is achieved by creating a clear difference between what the designer believes are the most important words and then the description or less important details that follow. The designer can choose how they would like to make the main word pop, whether it is by making it larger then the other words, the placement on the page, the color difference, and the leading. Words that are placed to the left topside of the page stand out the most since we read from left to right, top to bottom.

Font Family/Type Styles

A type family is a group of related typefaces that have the same characteristics but may defer due to different weights, proportions, kerning and so on. There are some typefaces such as Universe that have many different options while others just have a few.