Good Use of a Ligature

Date: October 30th, 2009

Time: 3 AM

Place: World Magazine

I found this example of a good ligature in a World Magazine. The letter "i" and "r," in girl and airplane are represented by the "ir" ligature. I like the feel of this ad. The tightly-kerned serif font looks clean and classy. However, the text would never be able to kerned so tightly if the ligature was not used.

Bad Kerning

Date: October 22nd, 2009

Time: Evening

Place: My Room

This isn't really an exciting example of bad kerning, but it works anyway. If I was kerning this poster, I would have moved the A (in Auction) a very tiny bit closer to the U. At an art school, they really should have known better....

"Bad" Typography

Date: October 14th, 2009

Time: 9:30

Location: My room

This is a flyer for the Dixon Creamery that I have in my room. Besides the logo, it is actually well designed. However, the logo is beyond horrible. The word "Dixon" is the worst offender. It is repeated on top of itself four times: red in back, then white, then black, and then the front, which has four different colors. I will give them credit for following through with the unreadability, though. They also made the "o" a thinner weight than all the other letters and stretched the "x" to a ridiculous width. Also, to add to this mess, "creamery" is in a completely different font, with a thin red outline floating over it.

"Good" Typography

Date: October 7th, 2009

Time: 7:00

Location: My dorm room

I've had this poster for more than a year, and I've always been impressed by the Godfather logo. However, I can appreciate it a lot more now. The font (called "Corleone," appropriately) is very unique. It has a very tall x-height, paper-thin serifs, and huge brackets. The long pointy beaks and barbs on the font also give it a Benguiat-esqe gothic feel.

What makes me really love it, though, are the little adjustments: the "T" and "h" are welded together, the bottom of the "e" curves up to rest against the "r," the "G" extends to meet the "d" and give "The" a solid resting place, and the "th" in "Godfather" ramp up towards the hand. I also enjoy how the text and image interact.

Hand Rendered Typography

Date: October 1st, 2009

Time: Noon

Location: Hallway of Dixon

I found this recycling poster on the wall near my dorm room. I thought it was a good example to use: not too simple, but not too flashy. This poster actually isn't too bad, but I think that the creator got excited and tried to use a different font/color for every word.

In the word "recycling," I really have no idea what's going on. About half the letters have serifs, half do not, and every single letter has its own unique stroke weight, width, and height. It is quite a diverse word.