Look for an “O” that’s a near-perfect circle and an “a” that’s a simple circle-plus-stroke combo. Just like the name suggests, these sans-serif fonts are modeled closely on standard geometric shapes. Some find them uniform others feel they’re too plain when compared to Grotesque fonts. Iterating upon early sans-serif fonts, this category features more refinement in shape and size compared to their Grotesque cousins. You won’t find a lot of variation in stroke width, either. The glyphs of these typefaces look a lot like serif fonts, just without the serifs. Not an ideal way to enter the world of design. The earliest sans-serif fonts were dubbed Grotesque because that’s how they were viewed-misshapen, incomplete, ugly. Like serif fonts, sans-serif fonts can be categorized into subtypes: As sans-serif typefaces became more common, the ebb and flow of style trends and social movements took hold, creating competing schools of thought surrounding the virtues of these modern typefaces versus the tried-and-true serif typeface. While one could find examples of writing without serifs before the discovery of the Rosetta Stone, that’s when sans-serif fonts rocketed into the public’s and printers’ consciousness. Serifs that are as thick (or almost as thick) as the glyph’s primary strokes are slab serifs-think about the typefaces you might find on early 20th-century typewriters. Bye, stroke contrast, hello standardized widths. Modern serif fonts have the largest differences between stroke widths-a striking look but taxing to read for too long and non-ideal for print applications. Possibly the most common kind of serif font, you’ll recognize it’s very pervasive member, Times New Roman. This transitional phase of serif typefaces features more size contrast between thick and thin strokes and are less evocative of handwritten text. These fonts have their thinnest portions on the part of the glyphs that would be a diagonal stroke. These fonts are exactly what they sound like: Exemplary of the earliest attempts at standardized typefaces, specifically designed to mimic handwritten text. Serif fonts can be organized into subtypes: And that’s how typefaces stayed for quite a while. To endear the new technology to the masses, typefaces were designed with serifs. Their size and shape were largely dependent on where the letter was in a word and their writing momentum.įast forward to Guttenberg’s printing press. When early (early, early, early) writing was done with angled or other sharp-tipped implements, small marks-almost like feet-were left behind be the writer. Powerpoint empowers you to develop well-designed content across all your devices Learn More 2014.Tell your story with captivating presentations "Making Sense Of Type Classification (Part 1)." Smashing Magazine. In fact, Janson, named after Dutch punchcutter Anton Janson, is now thought to be the work of Miklós Kis, a Hungarian, produced during an apprenticeship in Amsterdam. Common examples of the Garalde faces include Caslon, Sabon, Palatino, Galliard and Janson - not to be confused with Jenson, the Humanist typeface. Also, the difference between heavy and light stroke weights increased, and everything became more precise, perhaps due to the progress in technical aspects of making type.Ī huge amount of type was created in this era, and much of it is commonly used today, either digitized versions or new revivals. One of the most obvious differences is the crossbar of the lowercase “e,” which, while remaining angled in the Humanist typefaces, drops to a horizontal position in the Garaldes. The serifs become more carefully formed, and characters are designed more proportionately. The axis of the stress straightens, and while it still has an angle, it is subtler. You can see the type designers treating type as different from the written word, losing some of the idiosyncrasies of handwriting that the Humanist designers retained, while carrying over others. There are many similarities to the Humanist faces, but things are moving in a particular direction, as we’ll see with the consecutive categories of Transitional and Didone. The category is occasionally called “Aldine” after Manutius. “Garalde” itself is a hybrid term borrowed from the names of two notable type designers of the era, French punchcutter Claude Garamont and the Venetian Aldus Manutius. This period in type history lasts from the late-15th century all the way until the early 1700s, and the type created in this period has shown remarkable longevity. I call them Garaldes here because the term “Old Style” is at times used to include Humanist, Garalde and Transitional typefaces simply calling this group “Garalde” helps to retain its identity. In the Old-Style faces, often called Garaldes, we see type really beginning to come into its own.
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