Typography
Typography is the art and technique of arranging type to make written language legible, readable and appealing when displayed. The arrangement of type involves selecting typefaces, point sizes, line lengths, line spacing, letter spacing, and spaces between pairs of letters. The term typography is also applied to the style, arrangement, and appearance of the letters, numbers, and symbols created by the process. Type design is a closely related craft, sometimes considered part of typography; most typographers do not design typefaces, and some type designers do not consider themselves typographers. Typography also may be used as an ornamental and decorative device, unrelated to the communication of information.
Typography is also the work of graphic designers, art directors, manga artists, comic book artists, and, now, anyone who arranges words, letters, numbers, and symbols for publication, display, or distribution, from clerical workers and newsletter writers to anyone self-publishing materials. Until the Digital Age, typography was a specialized occupation. Personal computers opened up typography to new generations of previously unrelated designers and lay users. As the capability to create typography has become ubiquitous, the application of principles and best practices developed over generations of skilled workers and professionals has diminished.
Etymology
The word typography in English derives from the Greek roots 'type' + 'writing'.History
Although typically applied to printed, published, broadcast, and reproduced materials in contemporary times, all words, letters, symbols, and numbers written alongside the earliest naturalistic drawings by humans may be called typography. The word typography is derived from the Greek words τύπος typos 'form' or "impression" and γράφειν graphein 'to write', and traces its origins to the first punches and dies used to make seals and currency in ancient times, which ties the concept to printing. The uneven spacing of the impressions on brick stamps found in the Mesopotamian cities of Uruk and Larsa, dating from the second millennium BC, may be evidence of type, wherein the reuse of identical characters was applied to create cuneiform text. Babylonian cylinder seals were used to create an impression on a surface by rolling the seal on wet clay. Typography was also implemented in the Phaistos Disc, an enigmatic Minoan printed item from Crete, which dates to between 1850 and 1600 BC. It has been proposed that Roman lead pipe inscriptions were created with movable type printing, but German typographer Herbert Brekle recently dismissed this view.The essential criterion of type identity was met by medieval print artifacts such as the Latin Pruefening Abbey inscription of 1119 that was created by the same technique as the Phaistos Disc. The silver altarpiece of patriarch Pellegrinus II in the cathedral of Cividale was printed with individual letter punches. Apparently, the same printing technique may be found in tenth- to twelfth-century Byzantine reliquaries. Other early examples include individual letter tiles where the words are formed by assembling single letter tiles in the desired order, which were reasonably widespread in medieval Northern Europe.
Typography with movable type was invented during the eleventh-century Song dynasty in China by Bi Sheng. His movable type system was manufactured from ceramic materials, and clay type printing continued to be practiced in China until the Qing dynasty.
Wang Zhen was one of the pioneers of wooden movable type. Although the wooden type was more durable under the mechanical rigors of handling, repeated printing wore the character faces down and the types could be replaced only by carving new pieces.
Metal movable type was first invented in Korea during the Goryeo, c. 1230. Hua Sui introduced bronze type printing to China in 1490. The diffusion of both movable-type systems was limited and the technology did not spread beyond East and Central Asia, however.
Modern lead-based movable type, along with the mechanical printing press, is most often attributed to the goldsmith Johannes Gutenberg in 1439. His type pieces, made from a lead-based alloy, suited printing purposes so well that the alloy is still used today. Gutenberg developed specialized techniques for casting and combining cheap copies of letter punches in the vast quantities required to print multiple copies of texts. This technical breakthrough was instrumental in starting the Printing Revolution and the first book printed with lead-based movable type was the Gutenberg Bible.
Rapidly advancing technology revolutionized typography in the latter twentieth century. During the 1960s some camera-ready typesetting could be produced in any office or workshop with stand-alone machines such as those introduced by IBM, such as its Selectric typewriter. During the same period Letraset introduced dry transfer technology that allowed designers to transfer types instantly. The famous Lorem Ipsum gained popularity due to its usage in Letraset. During the mid-1980s personal computers allowed type designers to create typefaces digitally using commercial graphic design software such as Fontographer. Digital technology also enabled designers to create more experimental typefaces as well as the practical typefaces of traditional typography. Designs for typefaces could be created faster with the new technology, and for more specific functions. The cost for developing typefaces was drastically lowered, becoming widely available to the masses. The change has been called the "democratization of type" and has given new designers more opportunities to enter the field.
Evolution
The design of typefaces has developed alongside the development of typesetting systems. Although typography has evolved significantly from its origins, it is a largely conservative art that tends to cleave closely to tradition. This is because legibility is paramount, and so the typefaces that are the most readable usually are retained. In addition, the evolution of typography is inextricably intertwined with lettering by hand and related art forms, especially formal styles, which thrived for centuries preceding typography, and so the evolution of typography must be discussed with reference to this relationship.In the nascent stages of European printing, the typeface was designed in imitation of the popular hand-lettering styles of scribes. Initially, this typeface was difficult to read, because each letter was set in place individually and made to fit tightly into the allocated space. The art of manuscript writing, the origin of which was during Hellenistic and Roman bookmaking, reached its zenith in the illuminated manuscripts of the Middle Ages. Metal typefaces notably altered the style, making it "crisp and uncompromising", and also brought about "new standards of composition".
During the Renaissance period in France, Claude Garamond was partially responsible for the adoption of Roman typeface that eventually supplanted the more commonly used Gothic. Roman typeface also was based on hand-lettering styles.
The development of Roman typeface can be traced back to Greek lapidary letters. Greek lapidary letters were carved into stone and "one of the first formal uses of Western letterforms"; after that, Roman lapidary letterforms evolved into the monumental capitals, which laid the foundation for Western typographical design, especially serif typefaces. There are two styles of Roman typefaces: the old style, and the modern. The former is characterized by its similarly weighted lines, while the latter is distinguished by its contrast of light and heavy lines. Often, these styles are combined.
In relation to the international graphics of the 1920s - 1930s, the term "International Typographic Style" is used. In the 1950s - 1960s, such a phenomenon as "Swiss style" was formed in typography.
By the twentieth century, computers turned typeface design into a rather simplified process. This has allowed the number of typefaces and styles to proliferate exponentially, as there now are thousands available. Confusion between typeface and font occurred in 1984 when Steve Jobs mislabeled typefaces as fonts for Apple computers and his error has been perpetuated throughout the computer industry, leading to common misuse by the public of the term font when typeface is the proper term.