Graphics: Type

Following my new brief I had a morning session focusing on typography looking at the different forms of type and font. Using different techniques to change these types such as the leading, tracking, kerning.
Leading - Being the line space between words.
Tracking - The space between letters / characters.
Kerning - The space in-between an individual letter or character.

As well as looking at these I went back to the very basics and looked at type families and what makes up different types. Such as Serif, San-Serif and Script. This is something I didn't previously know and found it very interesting. I learnt that Serif is the part of text/type which is the little line or stroke that comes off the lettering. Along with this San-Serif  (San in french meaning without) so A san-serif  being a type without these little extra flicks and detail to the type. The most simple of all being script which is very much what you would expect. Hand drawn or script style type/text.

After going over all this I was set the task of working on 4 different types for fictional companies, businesses or people. As seen below:

The first of which being 'Williams & Oakes Solicitors' For this I wanted to use a more formal type of type and went with a Serif since they give of that more regal finish which fits the subject given. I chose the font 'Century School Book' and changed the tracking to bring the lettering a little closer together to give it a more rounded finish and a formal finish I was looking for.
The next subject was 'FreeBird Trainers for Girls' Since this was given the pretext of being aimed at teen girls. I wanted something that was less formal and more modern so I went with San-Serif and using a two tone colour palette to gives off a more targeted feel. I also changed up the font size and tracking to help make the name more eye catching.
Next was CoCo the Clown with this one the font doesn't matter to much as its more about drawing attention as its aimed at younger kids. As of this I went for a simple easy to read script but focused on using a wide colour range. The colour range isn't the best but the eye catching aspect is there.
Lastly is Voodoo Tattoo Parlour. For this I went with the traditional tattoo route of script as most tattoos relating to text are done in this manner and so its very fitting. Unlike CoCo the clown I went for something which was abit more fancy to help distinguish the two apart.

Expressive Typography

At the start of one of my last introduction lessons to Graphics, as a warm up exercise I was tasked with producing an A2 sized sheet of Expressive Typography. Expressive typography in this sense was to express the meaning of the words given to me by only using the letters of said words. Such as the word 'Crash' could be represented by having the letters falling down or two words of 'Crash' almost crashing into one another.

As seen above I used such words as:
Space
Repetition
Elimination
Compression
Expansion
Popcorn
Imperfect
Addition
Echo
Separate
Mutation

As such I tried to use the meanings of these words to create some unique expressive typography. Some words were easier then others. Such as Expansion and Compression were pretty simple in the fact you could make the letters expand or be wrote closer to one another.
Mutation and Elimination were a lot trickier. Trying to find a way to show the meaning but also still allowing the word to be read. In mutations case I ended up writing the word twice but slightly ajared to the side almost giving it an imperfect shadow. Like it had grew extra letters from itself, which worked really well I thought. With Elimination, as I got closer to the end of the word I started not writing part of the letters, as if they had be removed through some sort of 'elimination'.
Over all I really enjoyed this exercise as it made me think and got my mind set to thinking straight away.

3D Object Light Photography

Having created a 3D letter at home, in graphics we experimented with lighting effects and how they're cast on objects. My 3D piece as seen below and in my previous piece is of a letter 'H' as I wanted to relate it back to my previous work around the phrase 'Honesty is the Best Policy'. Because of that I made my letter in such a way that it was rough and loose to give the impression of a hidden meaning such as the same with my phrase. As not all things are true and lies are everywhere.

With this I used two different set ups both with 1 lamp each on full brightness. One with a white background the other with a black. The goal was to take up to 20 shots or more of different angles, shadows and focal points.

First here are two shots both with something wrong about them, the first is overexposed and the second a miss focus on my point. All shots were taken under manual focus and settings. The main problem I had was the yellow tint on the bulb and going back I would sort out my white balance after every other shot.

One of the main problems shooting in manual is without a doubt reading the situation wrong and getting an over or under exposed photo or rushing the shot and miss placing the focal point.

All 3 of these shots have zero editing on them for now and i will later do an edit to clean up the backdrop and such but first lets me explain why out of all 20+ shots these are the 3 I feel have the best composition for what i was aiming for.
First up with this angle i made the main focus on the back part of the letter to allow the depth of field to blur out the front portion and allow the shadow to really take form. I really enjoy this photo as its really captures the shape of the shadow and the object.

Next up in this almost central shot, This is a great shot in my eyes as as of the placement of the letter on the backdrop [very near the back] you can see the way the shadow bends its way around and up the white sheet and I really like the way its almost creeping out form behind the letter. The only problem with this shot is the white balance is a little off but i feel even despite that it really works well.

My 3rd favourite shot is this poorly framed but elegantly focused shot. A little off with the framing but can easily crop out the white wall in photoshop. What really shines in this photo is the focus of the letter and how faintly the shadows lay on the letter and escape from underneath it because of the black backdrop. 

I really enjoy photography and consider myself a keen hobbyist and love experimenting with new ideas and concepts such as lamp lights in these shot and playing around with shadows. I really look forward to advancing this shadow play with a live model sometime soon. 

Creative Typography [Final A-Z Pieces]

Following on from my previous creative typography post, After a lot of editing and correcting a few minor images i wanted to tweak i have complied all A-Z images. This includes my original photos, my threshold [black & white] edits and my 'Cutout / Stencil styled' edits.

Original Photos - A - Z [No edit - Straight out of camera]

Threshold Edits - A - Z

Cutout Filter / Stencil Styled Edit - A - Z

I really enjoyed the whole process of manipulations my originals photos to get to a point of having my own alphabet in photoshop. The threshold edits were nice to do but overall i feel they don't have the same sort of impact as the cutout filter edits. I think this may be because i prefer the way you can change the colour to very vibrant and eye catching colours where as the threshold just gives a very flat feeling to the photos.
What I enjoy most about the Cutout edits, is the way the original letter shapes are completely warped and simplified. Making some letters such as C, E, L lose all form and give the use of the alphabet to create a word or phrase a really interesting aspect, which is something that will be explored at a later date using cliches phrases and sayings.