Nicolle Rezwin- Chapter 2 reading response

Chapter 2, The Anatomy of Typography, starts with giving a brief history of the evolution of typography. Typography evolved from handwriting, which was created by making marks by hand. The chapter then goes on to talk about influences of the early alphabet. These influences include the marking properties of brush, reed pen and lastly stone engraver’s chisel. Some things that I found  that were interesting was  since ancient Greek times, capital letter forms have consisted of simple geometric shapes such  as circles, squares, and triangles. When I looked at capital letters before, I did not realize they were based off  of anything. Now when I look at capital letters I can see the geometric shapes such as the triangle in the letter A and rectangles in the letter T. Another thing that I found interesting was the making of uppercase letters and lowercase letters. In ancient Greece,  uppercase letters were cut into stone, these letters have minimum number of curved lines. Lowercase letters evolved as reed-pen writing. This means that there are more curved lines and  lowercase letters can be written quickly. Now that I look at letters I now notice that lowercase letters have more curves than uppercase letters.  

The next part of the chapter covers imaginary guidelines and the parts of letterforms. Before reading this chapter, I had no idea that there were actual parts of to a letter. I learned that the baseline is the line where the letters align optically, the x- height is where lowercase characters align, and the capline is the tops of capitals align optically. I also never knew that different letterforms contain arms, legs, eyes, ears, and spines. It shows that each letterform is unique in its own way.

While reading this chapter, I did not realize that letter forms consist of mathematics as well as being very technical. This includes measuring proportions, stroke-to-height ratio, height, posture, and weight. Along with some of the terms I mentioned above such as baseline, capline, and x-height. 

Letterforms also consist of relationships and the unity of a type font. Each font has to be similar to each other. I like how the chapter talks about the history of some of the type faces. I found it interesting that people actually created these typefaces that are still being used today.

Before reading this chapter, I had no idea that type had many components. I just thought type was just a design. After reading this chapter, I am looking at type in a whole new way.

The image above shows the first alphabet . The first alphabet was credited to the Phoenicians and later developed by the Ancient Greeks as discussed in the chapter.