Don't take type for granted
People take typography for granted. It’s used so ubiquitously that we often don’t give it a second thought and yet, if you stop to think for just a little about its central role in so much of our communication, it’s just amazing.
In my design workshop, Communication by Design, I like to take a look at some of the history of typography so that people may develop a little more appreciation for its use.
The letter forms we use today are based on forms created centuries ago.
Greek inscriptions acted as the model for formal lettering in imperial Rome as seen in the following image:
Roman Inscriptions
Notice how much these letter forms look like the words you are reading on this screen.
The first “movable type” letter forms that Gutenberg invented with the printing press were modeled after the hand-written type of the day. Imagine a script pen and how the ink flows on the page. The pen creates thick and thin lines within each letter. Mechanical type copied this even with the “serif” where the pen would first start the letter and end it.
These typefaces have changed little in the hundreds of years since 1450 and are used today in almost every book and newspaper we read. They are more readable than sans serif faces which came along later, but that’s for another blog post.
So, when you’re reading a book that uses a serif face (most of them do) think about the history of the letter forms themselves.
Do you mean to suggest that there’s something other than Times New Roman?
Tonya, that’s very funny, though sometimes I feel sorry for Times New Roman. It’s actually such a great typeface, but we’ve seen it so much. Still, if you were stuck on an island and could only bring one serif and one sans serif face with you, you’d be ok with Times New Roman and Helvetica.
Interesting that serif faces are more readable. In educational kinesiology, I’ve learned that cursive writing is more integrating for the brain than printing, and printing in all capital letters is less integrating than using small letters. Perhaps the serifs help create a “flow”.