Typography: Task 2 - Type Formatting & Expression

4.5.2021 - 18.5.2021  (Week 6 - Week 8)
Wendy Seto / 0348805
GCD60104 Typography / Bachelor of Design (Hons) in Creative Media / Taylor's University
Task 2: Type Formatting & Expression

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LECTURES

Week 6: Today is the submission date for our task 1 e-portofolio so Mr. Shamsul went through our blog and left some feedback on the feedback sheet for us to pay attention at. 

Later on, we were given some time to start working on task 2. I used the time to watch the task 2 pre-recorded lecture in the Typography YouTube Playlist.

Week 7: It was the chillest class ever, we spent the first hour of class talking about song recommendations. Kinda wish that there will be more "before-a-serious-4-hours-of-lecture" ice breaker like this in the future since it really helped to lighten up our mind. I was very sleepy and unaware when the class started but once Mr. Vinod and Mr. Shamsul played some music I quickly became fully awake. 

Fast forward to the actual class, the lecturers were looking at our task 2 progressions on the Typography Facebook group post. They gave out some feedback and advices to pretty much all students. I did receive a lot of useful feedback directly from them this time so I can reflect and improve my own work. 

Week 8: Mid-Sem Independent Learning Week

Week 9: It was the submission day for task 2 e-portofolio so today both lecturers went through our blog post and left some comment on the feedback sheet if there is something lacking on our e-portofolio. Luckily, I did not receive any which probably means my submission is good to go.

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INSTRUCTIONS 

Module Information Booklet

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TASK 2

Type Formatting and Expression

We were assigned another task, this time I think it is a combination between our exercises in task 1. There were 3 editorial text options given by the lecturers; 

1. The Impact of Bauhaus in Modern Culture

2. Be Good, Do Good, Follow the Code.

3. Visual Communications, Unite! Manifesto 2000

and I have decided to use the second one, Be Good, Do Good, Follow the Code.

2.1 Type Expression

Here are some of my rough sketches to express the headline:

fig 2.1.1 rough headline's expression sketches 04/05/21

I continued visualizing them in Adobe Illustrator using the 10 typefaces provided and made some improvements on the sketches.

fig 2.1.2 digitalizing my sketches in Adobe Illustrator 04/05/21

2.2 Type Formatting

Moving on to InDesign, I started creating the layout. These are what I came up with:

fig 2.2.1 first layout 10/05/21

fig 2.2.2 second layout 10/05/21

I uploaded both of my layouts to the Facebook post and received some feedback from my lecturers. However, they only talked about my first layout because it was the first one that I uploaded. Mr. Vinod said it was a good layout, yet very neat and clean. The body texts were stacked really well and the  whiteness of the layout does gave the expression of something good. Unfortunately, I should have highlighted the sub-headline from each paragraph. He also gave me some suggestions on how to make it even better. 

fig 2.2.3 the lecturers suggestions for my final task 2 layout 11/05/21

Mr. Vinod suggested me to reduce the letter spacing in the text "be good, do good," and try to run a line following the body texts layout to express the "follow the code." even stronger.

I got back to my InDesign file and tried to apply what Mr. Vinod has advised. It was quite challenging using the pen tool in Adobe InDesign since it is a bit different from Photoshop and Illustrator, even until now I am still struggling on figuring out how to adjust the lines I have created.

fig 2.2.4 first attempt after receiving feedback from the lecturers 17/05/21

fig 2.2.5 second attempt 17/05/21

fig 2.2.6 third attempt (using another headline expression I designed previously) 17/05/21

I am highly indecisive, which one should I use as my final submission? I personally like the third layout the most but the lecturers have not seen this headline expression yet, so I am not sure if they think I did express it well or no. The first one is also interesting, but I do not think the lines did express "follow the code" strong enough. Therefore, I will just go with the second layout, it is the closest one to what Mr. Vinod tried to convey after all. 

fig 2.2.7 final task 2 submission in pdf

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FEEDBACK

Week 6:

Specific Feedback
The lecturers went through our task 1 e-portofolio today. They told me that my submission for Task 1.2: Text Formatting should be visible in PDF format and screen grabs are not acceptable as final submission. Other than that, my reflection was too brief and the further reading should have been summarized.

Week 7:

General Feedback
The lecturer only gave feedback to my first layout since it was the first one that I uploaded to the Facebook post. He said it was a good layout, very neat and clean.

Specific Feedback
Mr. Vinod said that the body texts were stacked really well, and the whiteness of the layout does gave the expression of something good. Unfortunately, the sub-headlines were not highlighted. He also suggested to reduce the letter spacing in the text "be good, do good," and make it normal. Lastly, try to run a line following the layout to express the "follow the code" more.

Week 8:

No feedback received during Independent Learning Week.

Week 9:

Did not receive any feedback regarding my task 2 e-portofolio on the google feedback sheet so I think everything is good to go.

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REFLECTION

This exercise was quite challenging to me since we have to create type expressions for an actual headline and not only a single word. Besides expressing each word, I need to make sure it will combine well together in one sentence. Other than that, I have to design a neat layout following the knowledges I have received from the lectures. Furthermore, I struggled trying to add lines to the final layout starting from fig 2.2.4 to fig 2.2.6. The pen tool in InDesign does not work like Illustrator, I am still very confused on how to control it to create my desired paths. A lot of practice is needed in order to be used to using the tool. Overall, I do not feel unsatisfied with the final result but I know that it can be better.

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FURTHER READING

I did not do any reading on anything related to this exercise. However, I have been thinking of buying a book on Typography since I personally prefer to read a physical book rather than digital. I searched for a review on which book should I grab and found this page:

https://www.typewolf.com/typography-books

It was written by Jeremiah Shoaf on April 2021, so it was pretty new. He has been pursuing the designer career for over than 20 years and has been reading a bunch of Typography books so he listed all of them in the post as well with the honest review on each. He also listed some books that he is planning to read in the future that he finds interesting. I think the article is comprehensive enough with all the books brief important information written down that can help to guide me on deciding which book contains what I am searching for.