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1. The Making of a Type Sample
3 months ago
Every couple of weeks the FontShop staff meets to learn a little something from each department. Here’s a bit from my presentation on how we go about making type samples. I thought I’d share it with you, the blog readers ( fontshop.com/blog/?p=819 ), so you can get a peek behind the process of creating all these images.
The typeface is Miller ( fontshop.com/fontlist/families/miller/ ) by Matthew Carter. Miller is Carter’s take on “Scotch Roman” faces. Scotch Roman faces were widely used in American design in the early 1900s. As such the theme of the sample is “2000 Leagues Under the Sea”, which chronologically, if not geographically matches the time period. Some key characteristics featured are true fractions, and italic small caps. Personal favorites are the italic ligs, and ampersand. However, in creation of this sample I accidentally used fake small caps, oops, don’t do that.
There are a couple (more) inexcusable typographic errors in the sample, if you spot them, please leave a comment.
— Chris Hamamoto, FontShop.com
fontshop.com/blog/?p=819
The typeface is Miller ( fontshop.com/fontlist/families/miller/ ) by Matthew Carter. Miller is Carter’s take on “Scotch Roman” faces. Scotch Roman faces were widely used in American design in the early 1900s. As such the theme of the sample is “2000 Leagues Under the Sea”, which chronologically, if not geographically matches the time period. Some key characteristics featured are true fractions, and italic small caps. Personal favorites are the italic ligs, and ampersand. However, in creation of this sample I accidentally used fake small caps, oops, don’t do that.
There are a couple (more) inexcusable typographic errors in the sample, if you spot them, please leave a comment.
— Chris Hamamoto, FontShop.com
fontshop.com/blog/?p=819
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It moves fast and you have to imagine Mr. Hamamoto’s soft, witty voice narrating, but even without verbal explanation I think this little vid illustrates nicely the decisions that are made when we make these samples. Decisions that involve everything from selecting key glyphs and demonstrating a typeface’s range of weights, to telling a story using words from an underlying theme.
With several months of newsletters ( fontshop.com/blog/newsletters ) and hundreds of samples under their belt, Chris and Michelle ( fontshop.com/about/staff.php ) are aces at this stuff.
I must say the FS type samples are always exceptional.
> ‘… I think this little vid illustrates nicely the decisions that are made when we make these samples. Decisions that involve everything from selecting key glyphs and demonstrating a typeface’s range of weights, to telling a story using words from an underlying theme.’
Interesting — I hadn’t really thought about it from that perspective much, but you’re right. Thanks for sharing. (: