LET’S TALK ABOUT TYPOGRAPHY Typography can really enhance or kill a design PEOPLE STILL READ People may not participate in sustained reading the way they used to but people read. they text, tweet and post on Facebook. they search for things they need or want to know. People read what is important to them. Truth is there are different ways to read and they are all valid and important. As typographers, or designers working with type, we can support them all. Our first responsibility is to help readers find, understand and connect with the word, ideas and information. Our second responsibility is to honor the content! This is true for both print and web. TYPE ON THE WEB The web is really just weird paper. The way we design is the same. We give content form. When it comes to website typography, it’s hard to nail down what works best because typographical preference is both subjective and relative to the individual website. The deciding factor for any major web-based typographical decisions in the end, come down to the client and what they want to see happen. In working with the client, any talented web designer understands that good typography accomplishes the goal of readability. USING FONTS OTHER THAN WEB-SAFE FONTS FONT SQUIRREL has a converter that takes your font and converts it into the 3 types of file extension necessary for all major browsers and mobile devices. [ You upload the font and it will spit out the file you need. Then you upload those files to the host server.] FONT FACE gives you the command that you put in your css file that tells the browser what the font is and where it can find it. [ This is incase the users doe NOT have the font on their computer.] And even this cannot guarantee that the font will show up properly... this is a process that is still under development WATCH THIS brilliant interview with Erik Spiekermann COMMON STUDENT MISTAKES Lenghty lines of text Too much centered text Not enough tracking Not enough leading Not knowing the difference between tracking and kerning Learn to kern Leam to kem Confusing typeface and font A typeface is not a font. A font is not a typeface. A typeface is designed by a typographer. TYPEFACE Arial, Georgia, Cochin as well as Serf typeface, sans serif typeface, monospaced typeface etc. FONT Font=one member of a type family. Georgia bold, Cochin italic. FIRST THINGS FIRST... Whether we are teaching InDesign, Photoshop, Illustrator or Dreamweaver students must learn the principles of good design and typography. It is not enough that they earn to use these powerful and complicated programs... that is just our first hurtle of teaching. If they hope to be designers in a competitive landscape, our students must master the concept of SMALL, MEDUIUM, and LARGE elements to establish a basic hierarchy and proper use of Typography. Amen. FUN WITH TYPOGRAPHY! http://cheeseorfont.com/ http://ilovetypography.com/ifontgame/ http://www.typeconnection.com/.