DVB201 Typographic Zine | Arial
Week 11: Zine Research
AYC Riso Summer Zine by Hendrick and Julian Klien
This 16-page zine was created for the Darmstadt located concert collective by Hendrick and Julian Klien from Germany. This two-toned magazine is a sophisticated example of how to effectively use a limited colour palette. They have combined a serif and sans-serif font to implement a text hierarchy. The serif font is used decoratively as their headers and headlines and is consistently manipulated throughout the spread, whereas the sans-serif font is used in the body copy, captions, and folio. I think this was an effective way to present the text as they were able to experiment with the larger, bold font without impacting readability and contrast this with the smaller sans-serif font thus establishing a textual hierarchy throughout.
Each page presents a new layout with some pages being image-dominant and others being more text heavy. The change in the orientation of their heading throughout the zine and their layout is dynamic and captivating. Visual assets will continue over to the next page and will overlap the rules on the page. I think this zine is not only a good example of using limited colours but is also great for experimenting with type and layout in a visually cohesive way.
Klien, H & Klien, J. (2019, August 14). AYC Riso Summer Zine. Behance. https://www.behance.net/gallery/84129133/AYC-Riso-Summer-Zine
Queercionario by Naia Ferrer
Queercionario is a dictionary to help people learn about and understand LGBTQ+ terminology. This zine is more simplistic in terms of composition compared to the one above, however, it is consistent and provides space for the script typeface to take centre stage. The designer has combined 3 separate typefaces which include a sans-serif font, a serif font, and a script-style font. The sans-serif is applied to the body copy where the font is sized down and, therefore, needs to remain legible. Both the script and serif font are used as decorative assets and are used in both the headers and subheaders. The designer has overlayed all three types of fonts to create eye-catching headers on each page. The ample white space on the page allows these overlayed letters to capture the attention of readers.
The designer uses colour sparingly as each spread is assigned a single colour which fades out into white. It's a softer and less overwhelming design that puts the type at the forefront of the zine. The stripped-back and simple composition suits the content of the zine as it covers a complex and sensitive topic.
Ferrer, N. (2023, February 08). Queercionario. Behance. https://www.behance.net/gallery/163149397/Queercionario-Book-design-Kuir
I Didn't Know We Hated Comic Sans by Felicia Melawi
This monochromatic zine is a manifestation of the designer's feelings towards typography in which they experimented with types to seek closure towards the complex world of typography. This is another more simplistic design that has an effective use of negative space which allows the experimental type to be the prominent focus. The monochromatic colour scheme creates a distinct contrast that doesn't take away from the more complex use of type.
The designer uses multiple different fonts including comic sans, however, each page only utilises one font. Textual hierarchy is created through font size and weight. This zine is a series of personal typographical artworks and the simple, single-column composition allows more room for creativity.
Melawi, F. (2022, February 09). I Didn't Know We Hate Comic Sans. Behance. https://www.behance.net/gallery/136988207/I-Didnt-Know-We-Hate-Comic-Sans-Zine
Week 11: Concept Overview and Layout Thumbnails
For the subject of my typographic zine, I have chosen to explore the typeface Arial designed by Patricia Saunders and Robin Nicholas. Arial has been a staple font for my design work first due to convenience which then grew to into a fondess for the versatile and simplistic nature of the font. For the aesthetic design of my zine, I want to create a contemporary and modern feel with the use of clean lines, bold colours and geometric inspired layouts in order to replicate the design of Arial. I aim to experiment with the layout on each page through the application of the rule of thirds and the golden ratio. Overall, I want the zine to feel dynamic, playful and bold and will therefore be implementing a lot of bold and large lettering.
Week 12: Zine Content
Page 3:
Arial: An Introduction
If you’re searching for a contemporary, minimalistic font with endless applications, then look no further than Arial. This sleek and modern sans serif typeface was designed for Monotype Foundry in 1982 by Patricia Sounders and Robin Nicholas (Monotype, n.d.). Arial was designed for the IBM 3800-3 lazerxerographic printer and has also been packaged with every Microsoft computer since 1992 (Monotype, n.d.). This neo-grotesque typeface was designed for the digital age with rounder and fuller curves and sleek diagonal cuts on the terminal strokes (Coale, 2013).
Although unassuming, this font is surrounded by controversy due to its similarity to Helvetica, and is, therefore, considered a ‘knock-off’ typeface despite being officially based on Monotype Grotesque (Coale, 2013). Due to this scandal, Arial faced great disdain and criticism from designers and type enthusiasts upon release (Coale, 2013).
However, despite its scandalous history, Arial has become a staple font for screens (Monotype, n.d.).
Release Date: 1982
Page 4 and 5:
Form & Function
Arial was specifically designed for digital use and, therefore, its form reflects that. This sans serif typeface takes a humanist form meaning there is little contrast between thick and thin strokes, loose spacing between lettering, and wide counters (MasterClass, 2021). This makes the typeface legible in a variety of sizes. Terminal strokes at cut off at a diagonal to appear more natural and its curves are both fuller and softer than its competitor (Microsoft, 2022).
Arial’s has a larger x-height with both its descender and ascender being smaller in comparison. The regular Arial font also features sharp corners and is overall a very consistent and uniform font. Arial comes in a variety of forms including, narrow, narrow bold, narrow italic, regular, bold, and many more. It has also since branched out into Arial Rounded and Arial Monospaced.
Arial is an extremely versatile font that is beneficial for both on-screen and off-screen applications (Monotype, n.d.). It’s great for professional spaces including PowerPoint presentations, reports, and emails (Microsoft, 2022).
Off the screen, Arial has been used in book designs, diagram annotations, and advertising (Monotype, n.d.). Its easy-to-read nature also makes it perfect for pamphlets, brochures, and educational material (Monotype, n.a).
Page 6:
Critique
‘It was designed as a generic sans serif; almost a bland sans serif.’ - Robin Nicholas (Twenty20, 2005).
Arial is a font that can wear many hats. It can be formal and professional or bold and exciting depending on how the designer uses it. Its simplicity provides it with the ability to become anything. Although generic, Arial is extremely versatile. The humanist typeface has endless uses due to its incredible ability to be both legible and readable in different contexts from billboards to your mobile phone.
In my opinion, despite being an industrial typeface, Arial is less mechanical and more approachable and inviting than other fonts. I think it achieves this through its soft and full curves and its humanist design. At first glance, the font can be perceived as bland and unassuming but upon closer inspection, it’s evident that it was meticulously designed with its core purpose in mind. Arial, as a font, takes no risk and presents itself as a safe choice for designers.
Arial is a timeless font and serves as a reminder that there is beauty in simplicity.
Page 7:
Legibility and readability are one of the most important criteria to consider when designing a typeface. The ability to be identifiable at different sizes and distances makes the font more versatile and practical for designers.
Arial excels in legibility which can be attributed to the designers’ use of wide counters. Counters refer to the white space inside letters like ‘c’, ‘d’, etc (Haley, n.d.).
Larger and more open counters are believed to improve letter recognition, however, it does impact the proportions of the x-height which is seen in the Arial typeface (Haley, n.d.).
A larger x-height, however, can also improve the legibility of a typeface as long as it remains proportional to the ascender and descender height.
Page 8 & 9:
Patricia Saunders
Patricia Mullett, born in 1993, was hired by the Monotype Drawing Office in 1951 where she was trained as a drawing clerk.
During her employment at Monotype, Patricia contributed to numerous typefaces including Castellar and Spectrum. Her work involved developing the optical sizes, weight and width of existing fonts. She left the foundry after marriage to start a family but returned in 1982 and began developing a series of typefaces for the first digital laser phototypesetter.
In the same year, she worked alongside Robin Nicholas to design Arial which was swiftly adopted by Microsoft.
Patricia then went on to produce other typefaces including Monotype Corsiva and Columbus.
(Savoie, 2019).
Page 10 & 11:
Robin Nicholas
Robin Nicholas was born in 1947 and began working with type from a young age. He was hired by Monotype in his teen years and spent time redrawing master artwork for typefaces and then trained in punch cutting and preparing metal fonts for design proofing.
During his time at the foundry, Nicholas helped develop fonts such as Nimrod, Arial, Felbridge, and Ysobel and has directed and supervised many more projects during his employment.
Nicholas is currently the head of typography at Monotype Imaging in the UK where he continues to make contributions to the world of typography.
(Fonts.com, n.d.)
Page 12 & 13:
Officially Trending
Super Sober
Super Sober is described as a soft and solemn approach to type design (Sanchez, 2023). It involves using a proportionately large amount of negative space with a minimal amount of type; topped off with a neutral colour palette (Sanchez, 2023).
This softer design approach stands out against the more intricate and busy type trends of 2023 as typography becomes more experimental with the progression of technology.
This type trend aligns with the minimalistic design trend which arose in the 50s and 60s. It includes clean lines and white space and puts function before aesthetics (Reid, 2018).
It’s clean, sleek, and timeless and when used correctly can create beautifully simplistic and grounded designs (Sanchez, 2023).
"An empty bench in a crowded airport." (Sanchez, 2023).
Page 14 & 15:
About this Zine
An Ode to Arial
This zine was designed to explore and appreciate the (kind of) scandalous typeface, Arial designed by Patricia Saunders and Robin Nicholas. It applies a contemporary and modern design aesthetic to showcase the typographic characteristics of the font.
Throughout this zine I apply several different structural guides, including both the rule of thirds and the golden ratio, to make every page different and dynamic. The zine should feel bold and irregular, almost in contrast to the uniform shape of Arial.
During this design process, I found it difficult to both apply and follow a grid-based guide. However, I have come to realise its importance in compositional design as setting up rules and boundaries allows you to break them more effectively to create interesting and engaging designs.
I really enjoyed experimenting with the positioning of the text. I spent a large amount of time editing the orientation of the type and combining different font styles to create a distinctive visual hierarchy. However, another challenge I faced whilst creating this zine was balancing the ratio of content and negative space on each page. It was important to make sure the composition was not overwhelming and left room for the text to breathe.
Week 12: First Draft
I am pleased with the progress made in the first draft. Once I had the base structure laid out on the page, I was then able to manipulate the letters to create fun and irregular structures to reflect the contemporary design. For example, multiple letter (like the 'L' in Arial on pg 3) are rotated and then slightly unaligned with the other letters. I think this creates an effective contrast with the more structured paragraphs included in the zine.
Working with a column layout was a challenge and, therefore, I opted to use the margins, rule of thirds, and the golden ratio to guide the majority of my layout. I also aligned large chunks of text along the irregular shapes of the letter forms. I think bending the rules regarding layout gave it a retro 90s feel as it almost crossed over into anti-design. This is seen on pages where the text spans across the entire width of the page or sit beyond the page. The digital theme was emphasised through the repetitve use of the '*' symbol which almost replicated the halftone pattern seen on screens.
The rule of thirds is used to work with how viewer's scan the page, starting with the top left first following a 'F' shape (Domingo, 2021). Therefore, when designing my pages I put more emphasis on the top third and less visual weight in the bottom right to create an effective visual hierachy (Domingo, 2021).
The contents page was something that I struggled with in both the ideation process and in the first draft. After experimenting with a few different layouts, I decided to apply the three coloumn guide inside the margins. Applying structure to the page allowed me take advantage of the vertical space.
Week 13: Final Zine Design
References
Boyd, A. (n.d.). Magazine Set Mockup. Anthony Boyd Graphics. https://www.anthonyboyd.graphics/mockups/magazine-set-mockup/
Coale, B. (2013, September 13). Arial, The Controversial Sans Serif. Casey Printing. https://www.caseyprinting.com/blog/2013/typography/arial-the-controversial-sans-serif
Domingo, G, M. (2021). The Rule of Thirds: Know your layout sweet spots. Interaction Design Foundation. https://www.interaction-design.org/literature/article/the-rule-of-thirds-know-your-layout-sweet-spots
Fonts.com. (n.d.). Robin Nicholas. Fonts.com. https://www.fonts.com/browse/designers/robin-nicholas
Haley, A. (n.d.). It's About Legibility. Fonts.com. https://www.fonts.com/content/learning/fontology/level-4/fine-typography/legibility
IS graphics. (n.d.). Free Floating Magazine PSD Mockup. IS Graphics. https://www.ls.graphics/free/free-floating-magazine-psd-mockup?via=mw
Lupton, E. (2004). Thinking with Type (1st ed.). Princeton Architectural Press.
MasterClass. (2021, June 08). Humanist Typeface Guide: 7 Popular Humanist Fonts. MasterClass. https://www.masterclass.com/articles/humanist-typeface-guide
Microsoft. (2022, March 31). Arial Font Family. Microsoft. https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/typography/font-list/arial
Monotype, (n.d.). Arial. Fonts.com. https://www.fonts.com/font/monotype/arial/story#:~:text=Overview%20Arial%20was%20designed%20for,decades%20of%20the%20twentieth%20century.
Reid, M. (2018). Minimalist design: tips and inspiration to master the trend. 99designs. https://99designs.com/blog/creative-inspiration/minimalist-design-trend-tips-and-inspiration/
Sanchez, R. (2023, January 27). Monotype Unveils Their 2023 Type Trends Report. Dieline. https://thedieline.com/blog/2023/1/27/monotype-unveils-their-2023-type-trends-report
Savoie, A. (2019, June 29). Patricia Saunders 1933–2019. University of Reading. https://research.reading.ac.uk/women-in-type/patricia-saunders-1933-2019/
Twenty20. (2005). MacUser. WayBackMachine. https://web.archive.org/web/20090304143518/http://www.monotypefonts.com/PDFs/Twenty20_080705.pdf
