Losurdo Chapter 1 & 2 Reading Response

Chapter 1 The History of Font

            When mankind fist started writing the alphabet it didn’t exist as we know it today. The first written language used 5000 years ago were symbols impressed into clay tablets used for record keeping. The Egyptians used hieroglyphics to record their history. When the Greeks started writing their alphabet, it was closer to ours, using marks that represented letters. Soon the rest of the world followed in suit and alphabets started popping up around the world. From 400-1400 AD the world expanded its use of the written language creating manuscripts. In 1034 Pi Sheng invents moveable type in China. In the eleventh and twelfth centuries early gothic lettering started to pop up. In the thirteenth to the fifteenth centuries a more rounded version of gothic text was used in Europe. Also during the fifteenth century typographic books created by block-books started circulating.

            During the Renaissance type flourished. With the creation of the printing press styles increased. Books became more common and borders are created using woodblocks. In 1720 Old Style type was used in the British Empire. The industrial revolution started a new improvement of typography in both printing and design. Steam powered printing presses, fat font typefaces, photographic printing plates, outlined type were just some of the creations to surface during this time. In 1876 the frist typewriter was created Advertisements started having intergraded type.  

            Come the 1900’s to today advancements in writing created a whole new industry. Artists started using type for their art. Computers created a new way to digitally create and alter fonts. As technology improves we can only image where we can take the artistic study. 

Chapter 2 The Anatomy of Typography

Type, just like the human body, has an anatomy that creates harmony and functionality. Since type is a visual representation of our language we take great care in the preservation and presentation of the letters. Since early letters were cut into stone they were made up of short simple stokes. Early letters lacked the expressive design that our modern type allows us to have. Modern type is created of many different components.

Letters:

 Each letter many contain many of the following aspects in their anatomy.

Apex- the peak at the top of the capitol letter A
Arm- a projecting horizontal stroke that is unattached at one or both ends
Ascender-  a stoke on a lowercase letter that rises above the meanline
Bowl/loop- a curved stroke enclosing the counterform of a letter
Counter- the negative space that is fully or partially enclosed by a letterform
Crossbar- the horizontal stoke connecting two sides of a letterform or bisecting the main stroke
Descender- a stoke on a lowercase letterform that falls below the baseline
Ear- a small stroke that projects fromt eh right side of the bowl of the lowercase roman g
Eye- the enclosed part of the lowercase e
Fillet- the coutoured edge that connects the serif and stem in bracketed serifs
Hairline- the thinnest stroke withing a typeface that has stokes of varying weights
Leg- the lower diagonal stroke on the letter k
Link- the stroke that connects the bowl and the loop of a lowercase roman g
Serifs-  short stokes that extend from and at an angle to the upper and lower ends of the major strokes of a letterform
Shoulder- a curved stoek projecting from a stem
Spine- the central curved stroke of the letter S
Spur- a small projection the reinforces the point at the end of a curved stroke
Stem- a major vertical or diagonal stroke in the letterform
Stroke- any of the linear elements withing a letterform
Tail- a diagonal stroke or loop at the end of a letter
Terminal- the end of any stroke that does not terminate with a serif

Line:
            The line is an important part of typogryphy. It creates an imaginary space for the letters to exist. It creates harmony and brings order to writing.

Baseline- imaginary line which the letters sit upon
Capline- imaginary line that sits ontop of the capital letters
Mealine- imaginary line that creates the height of the lowercase letters
x-height- distance between the baseline and the meanline, measured by the lowercase x

The letter also has proportions and different  stroke weights.

The font is a series of letters, numbers and symbols that share a common structure.