123 Fundamental Research Methods and Form Innovations in Type Design Compared to Technological Developments in Type Production Andre Gurtler and Christian Menge It If we ask different professionals in the area of type and typography what the expression Letterform Research means, we will be given very different answers. The historian generally interprets it in a different way from the technician, and the typeface designer differently from the manufacturer or the typographic designer. In this paper, we would like to investigate a specific aspect of Letterform Research, namely the design of the typeforms of our typographical past, present and future, in comparison and in contrast with the technical development of type production. Gutenberg's type-case for the printing of his 42- line Bible contained 299 signs. The hand compositor's technique of assembling lines, letter by letter from a store of cast type, into the composing stick, remained unchanged in principle for nearly 500 years. It was the invention and development of hot-metal composing machines that first brought a substantial increase in setting speed, from about 4, 000 characters per hour to start with, up to 30,000 with linecasters controlled by punched paper-tape in the nineteen-fifties. The first phototypesetting machines were still related to the hot-metal machines in their principles of construction. The typecasting matrices were replaced by film matrices, that is to say, a film negative, and an exposure device took the place of the casting device. Phototypesetting machines of conventional design allow exposure speeds of 50,000 to 250,000 characters per hour. Visible Language, XIX 1 Winter 1985 Authors' Address: Im Muehleboden 72, CH-4106 Therwil, Switzerland ©Visible Language, Box 1972 CMA, Cleveland, OH 44106 124 Visible Language XIX 1 Winter 1985 ~~£~tfm~ij ~~~~~~~~ PI 1!1 I! i) tE Jf 113 i!J 1l 1!i I J11t lfl l!l 19 10 l!t ~ i!~UXJ>Z! i!~tl~}'Z a a a a a a a a b b ti mm mm ~ ~ ~ lDlDinb3l' c c t {i if d db Q titi lllillflitiilrlr lili tililntor r r i r r i i r"r" f f ffffgqlfggijtfb~6 IJliJlbibiiJIJbltni i ill iii i i ; bl 1 r fmmm~mnnnfinnfi o o o o P P p P pp PJl JBIBJlllPlPl w~~~~wwqqij~~qq~~~~ rvljjljjr r r' llll r r r f f fnfnffff ftlleo f t t; fi if rttpuuii ii it u o u iJ m a w ~ ~ p P ~ ~ 1 J 9 ~ From Gutenberg's type case for his 42-line Bible to today's digital letterform reproduction for high-speed composition. 125 Gurtler & Mengelt I Design Research vs Type Production With the development of CRT and laser typesetting units, the technique of type image production has undergone such a rapid and revolutionary development within a few years that its effects on the whole situation of typography are still hard to grasp in their full implications. At the same time, the advent of digital­ electronic typesetting computers has made exposure speeds from one million to several million characters per hour into a daily, but still astonishing, reality. Parallel to this technical revolution, there has developed a design industry specific to the production of typefaces. The first manufacturers of phototypesetting machines mainly used their new technique to copy the proven typefaces of the past as faithfully as possible, to convert them for photosetting and to supplement the traditional basic styles with many variations of weight and width. Whether it is still meaningful today to interpret a distinguished old book-face of the sixteenth century by means of present-day technology is a question that we would like to discuss. The fact that the liberation of typography from the restraints of metal opened up undreamed of new creative possibilities, is a statement from the pioneer days of phototype which is still often and gladly quoted today. If we now consider the typography of every day with a critical eye, more than 30 years after the introduction of phototypesetting, we must ask ourselves to what extent these possibilities have been used for a new creativity in typeface design as well. A type specimen book of a photosetting firm in Switzerland shows how the revival of the most ridiculous typefaces of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries has come into fashion today. Can the abundance of these revivals from the lumber-room of the nineteenth century count among the creative possibilities which have been opened up by the new technology? Considering the entire production of typefaces during the past few decades, only a few genuine innovations in type design have been able to establish themselves in the phototype market. The job of researching and designing typefaces and typeface programs which not only take into account the system-oriented technical characteristics of new setting and printing processes such as so called optical corrections, but also place these technical conditions as the very basis of the whole design process- this job has comparatively seldom been undertaken. 126 Visible Language XIX 1 Winter 1985 In these critical remarks, we do not in any way wish to overlook the genuine achievements of individual typeface designers and individual companies - from Adrian Frutiger's Univers to Bram de Does' Trinite­ to mention only one of the first and one of the latest typeface creations for photosetting. Our judgment applies only to the total amount of effort that has been made in our times in the design area of type and in the research and creative sense, as being relatively inadequate in comparison with the enormous technical development which has been based on correspondingly intensive research and major financial investments by the manufacturing business. As typeface designers with teaching experience in this field, we must make a critical comparison of these developments. We are well aware of the social and commercial interdependencies of the highly­ developed information industry, but we also know about the cultural values that are specific to our area of activity. Typefaces and typography, as an expression of the human spirit, are closely linked with the development of our society, and they comprise values whose preservation and further development seem all the more urgently important to us when the technical development of the means of production has practically no limits. In this complex situation it must be our aim to make use of our professional abilities and knowledge, and our experience as designers and teachers, so as to return to a position in which we can further develop a sense of quality and creative research and design in the field of letterforms. It is doubtful whether the present mass-production of all kinds of typefaces and the continued over-saturation of the market for type can continue to be meaningful, either from an artistic or a commercial point of view, even if such production may appear to be more practical with the use of computers and computer-controlled drawing. On the other hand, the technical development of type and print production and the new electronic media present us with a whole range of tasks to which we have certainly not yet found answers, and which have to a large extent scarcely been formulated. These many-sided and complex undertakings within the comprehensive area of typeface design cannot be approached or resolved except in close and intensive collaboration between scientist and designer, technician 12 7 Gurtler & Mengelt I Design Research vs Type Production and businessman. The following are only a few examples of the kinds of tasks concerned: • Typefaces for typewriters and word-processors, which in combination with the development of new copying and duplicating techniques will certainly not be limited to the revolutionizing of office information. • Typefaces on the video screen. Beyond the use of screen typefaces in typesetting and computer stations, everyone will very soon be confronted with the type-forms of these new media through Teletext and Videotext. • Digitised printing type and its electronic processing, in association with the development of new printing techniques, necessitates a coordinated re-thinking of the entire typographic situation of the present and the future. It is our considered opinion that increased and intensive efforts are necessary today, especially within industry, in order to reorganize the technical development of type production equipment, not only in accordance with the criteria of technical rationalization and commercial profitability, but in association with wide-ranging basic research and development of the qualities of the product, of the artistic form and the readability function of type. As a stimulus, and as only one example of the present urgent need for a program of basic research, we would like to consider, in the next part of this paper, an area of printing type which is today influenced to an exceptional degree by technical change in the production of type and print: The Typeface for Newspapers. In the present contribution we cannot and should not be concerned with presenting a suggested design for a new newspaper typeface, but only with a catalogue of the criteria and factors which, in our opinion, must be borne in mind in the search for the qualities of design and readability of a present-day newspaper typeface. It is only on the basis of the evaluation and judgment of all these factors and criteria, in collaboration with scientific research, with technicians, designers and industry, that the contours of a project, for example a new newspaper face, may be sketched out. The oldest way of conveying news, still in use today in remote parts of Mexico and Africa, is by word of mouth. Regular written communication of news by correspondence is first known to us from the early Middle Ages.