Living It Up

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I can't help but every time I see this commercial admire how they did this logo.  It's so simple and get's the point across.  It's a very simple, yet bubbly and lively font, which makes you feel the need to get on this website and be very social.  LivingSocial (from how far I could see because I didn't want to sign up) is a place where you can get discounts in your local city or town.  Though they take away the dots from the top of the i's, I think that in this case it adds to the logo because of the colorful ovals on top of the last i that are floating away.  It's indeed living up to be a very social logo!

Is It Type?!

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I always find it interesting to look at different posters, book covers, etc.  I ran into this poster, which was created by Lennart Wolfert Grafisch.  You can check out the poster on his website here.  I think it's so creative because it uses different letters, punctuation, etc. to create the regular letterforms.  Trying to determine what typeface they used for the punctuation in order to create this piece is very hard, since they warped many of the numbers to fit the letterform (ex. the 7 creating the question mark).  If it were me, I would say the because it's readable, has the same x-height and is consistent, it's a typeface.  One could argue differently.  It's a very clever design, but my only complaint is the e's should've been more cleverly written.  Definitely a typeface!

Is It The Last Day?!

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I always like to look at Smashing Magazine for inspirations and came upon this book cover.  It's a very intriguing use of the Courier New type, incorporating the old-fashioned way of correcting papers into the theme that publishing may no longer exist (since everything has been going to eBooks or PDFs).  The reason why it's so effective is because how the type is cropped, some handwritten to make it feel like the teacher correcting a paper.  Though it's somewhat confusing because of all the lines in it, it still gets the point across and highlights the most important points (the title and author).  Now to steer off the subject, I don't think publishing will ever go out of style because some (like myself) that likes to not look at the computer screen all day.  Let's not underestimate the power of holding a book in your hand.

Limb Design

Source:  Letterhead & Logo Design by Sussner Design Co.

This is a company wordmark/logo design in which works really well.  I think what draws the viewer in is not only the little branch looking out of the window, but the great font choice.  It makes the person feel like they're going to get a design in which is authentic, contemporary, and will bring out creativity (especially if you look at the letterhead, business card and envelope design.  It's simple, effective, and gets the point across.  I want to thank Johnathon for letting me borrow this book.  It's been a great source of inspiration!  =]

Source:  Letterhead & Logo Design by Sussner Design Co.

It's Definitely Extraterrestrial

I was trying to find the official version of Katy Perry's new single, E.T. and I came upon this user created lyric video.  All of the lyrics are typed in different futuristic, modern, and innovative type that goes along with the song.  The user also not only combines different type together, but has great motion effects without feeling disruptive.

My favorite type used in the video would be in the "Extraterrestrial", "Kiss Me, Ki-Ki-Kiss Me", and "Take Me, Ta-Ta-Take Me" parts.  Especially when it comes to the motion in the "Kiss Me, Ki-Ki-Kiss Me" part.

Taking Old and Making it New

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This is a new movie that is coming out called Jane Eyre.  I'm sure many have heard of the book (which I really didn't until I had seen the movie trailer on television).  So I went online to look up what the movie/book was about and had seen the poster.  Not only is the artwork fantastic on it, I think the type (though very simple) brings out a contemporary and dynamic effect.  The font they used I believe is Helvetica Neue Ultra Light from what WhatTheFont.com had said, but if it were any other font, it wouldn't have worked.  The first suggestion WhatTheFont.com gave was Prelo Hairline, which had overall a very thin stroke.  Though the other font is thinly stroked, the bigger the font, the thicker the stroke (vs. Prelo Hairline).  I believe this movie will be just as good as the movie poster and trailer portray it to be!

It's a Jungle In Here

This is another "clipping" that I found in a Victoria's Secret catalog that was sent to my home about a few days ago.  As I've said before, they always have some very creative uses of type and pictures that I've seen.  This type of emphasis on parts of the phrases were used throughout the catalog, taking nouns (ex. jungle) and making them a san-serif font, using a different color (ex. pink), and uppercase; while the rest of the phrase would be in a serif font.  I believe it's the small design tricks that make it memorable and stand out from the rest.

Definitely In the Daylight

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This is a single's cover to a duo called Matt and Kim's song "Daylight".  I found this one very fascinating to look at, because of not only the variety of colors, but some of the typography choices they made and the placement of each of the pieces.  For me, the viewer can tell very easily what the name of the duo and song are still (even though some of the content is repeating and hierarchy may be tested).  I think my favorite "pieces" would be the monogram version of their name and the Matt and Kim that's golden and is the most prominent; then the Daylight that is scripted and green (near where the Green Label Sound is - though it's very cool as well).  I believe that each of these stand out on their own, but yet feel like the cover would be missing without one of the them.

Feminine/Masculine Cliche

Source: Typeforce / The Annual Chicago Show of Emerging Typographic Allstars Feb/March 2010 issue

This is a customized screenprint poster called Feminine/Masculine, created by Delicious Design League's Billy Baumann and Jason Teegarden-Downs.  What Billy and Jason wanted to do was try and take away the social conventions and norms of what it means to be feminine and masculine, possibly changing the ideal of what it means to be male and female.  I think that this definitely succeeds because we normally wouldn't associate femininity with words like strong and bold and masculine with elegance and gentleness (both typefaces  showcased just that).  It's definitely on a different take and makes me wonder about what the definition of femininity and masculinity does exactly mean (especially in today's society).

Victoria Has Many Secrets

Even though catalogs come in the mail all the time, from the stores you've never heard of to Lands 'End, I always look forward to the Victoria's Secret catalogs.  Not just because of looking at the clothes, but I love seeing their design work.  I can't identify this type, so I assume it's handmade just for this particular catalog.  I love how it's chic in it's own way, portraying the essence of their brand and the catalog mailed to me at my house.  Though it's not the most perfectly written font without a baseline, this is a reason why I like it; because it looks someone's handwriting and people don't normally have a baseline for it.  Keep an eye out for Victoria's Secret because they definitely have great designs (and clothes!).

The King of Social Networking Sites

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This is the Facebook logo/wordmark, which I believe definitely creates an impact.  You know what it is from just looking at the wordmark with it's cleanliness and simplicity.  I would definitely aspire to create a logo/wordmark like this for our next project.  The font they use has been hard to identify, but many are saying that Klavika is the font of their choice (modifying the font a bit).

Research - Project 2

Source - LogoLounge: 2000 International Identities by Leading Designers by Catharine Fisher and Bill Gardner

For this particular logo, it was designed for Feed Magazine, which is very well-executed in the logo!  The idea of having the two e's connect in that way represents the idea of the two e's feeding off of each other.  It's also a very simple san-serif font and nothing else needs to be incorporated into it.

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This logo is for the word Wacky, in which is actually very cool!  I love how it's another very simple san-serif logo and it has the W and the A together!  It's so clever, yet very readable as to the meaning.

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This is a really cool design that I found that would be great for anything!  The one item that stuck out to me was how the smart quotes look like two hands giving the thumbs up.  It would be great especially for movie ratings!

Walk This Way!

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It seems like all of the good font inspirations for me come from CD covers.  I believe that a lot of the CD covers actually bring a lot of the music to life (usually better than a book cover).  But this is a CD of The White Tie Affair's called Walk This Way.  I think it brings together the name of the group (especially when taking the T and making it look like a tie).  It sort of brings the idea of Project 2, in which we're only supposed to use type which made me think of this CD.  The font they use is Pontif, which I had never heard of until I looked it up.  Though it's a serif font, I feel that if they would've gone with a san-serif or a different font, it wouldn't feel the same.  So keep exercisin' and rockin' out in those Converse shoes to this CD!

Strong but Sweet

This is Stacie Orrico's self-titled "debut" CD (and I put debut in quotes because it's the only CD she had ever produced).  She is a very good singer, and I believe the type choice on the CD conveyed her tough, but sweet side that came out in her songs.  The main typeface was custom-made, which also makes it extra special.  What also drew me was how there was a different 's' in a lighter pink (which hopefully you can see -- it's lighter in the picture).  I think the overall concept would be also great for a logo design, bringing both names together.  Simple is always better than complicated designs.

Definitely Not My Type

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This is a website that I found from Smashing Magazine, which is one of my favorite resources for everything.  It had this website, which is entitled It's Not My Type.  This website is all about inspirations and uses of different typefaces in different designs.  I think the website is really cool, the content in the awning only being movable.  But it's not about the functionality of the website like I did for last semester.  I think the heading font, Clarendon Black, fits perfectly with the web safe text font, Palatino.

Splash Page 2

Also, the Atomic font in the first blog looks very digital and is custom created by Slovakian designer.  Click here to the link to the blog article.

Inside Page

The only bad part about the Palatino font on this website is, especially on this page, the text isn't easily readable since it looks pixelated.

It's Pure Bliss!

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This I actually saw when I first woke up this morning on the Early Show.  It's a company called Serendepity 3, which makes a lot of dessert products.  They were creating the Frrrozen Hot Chocolate, as seen on the story here.  Not only did the hot chocolate look good on the table, what caught my attention was the packaging itself.  Not just because of the clever use of the pun between the cold and hot by using the ice queen and the Devil.  It also had to do with the mixture between the different type.  I'm sure that all except the bottom text was custom made.  I can't really determine what font the bottom text is, but it looks like it's Georgia.  I especially like the company's type because it brings this sort of sweet and sensitive feeling (especially since the name sounds so sincere).  I would love to try out all of Serendipity 3's dessert mixes, but unfortunately it's too expensive for me right now.  Maybe one of these days though!

Oh Twilight!

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Alright, I know this may be an "oh no... not Twilight?"  I say, the combination of the different font faces not only allows the artwork to stand out alone, but bring together the elegance of what the series is all about.  I only show one of the book covers because pretty much the rest of the book covers have the same typeface combination.  What makes it great is for the title, Zephyr (which I believe was custom created just for the series), it brings in the mystical feeling with the use of curves (ex. in the loop of the g and the link in the w).  I don't know how to feel about the tallness of the ascender in the middle l.  The other typefaces for the author and "The #1 New York Times Bestseller" line are of the Trade Gothic typeface (the first line being Trade Gothic LtStd - Light and the second Trade Gothic Bold Ext.).  They're subtle but noticeable enough to not ruin the overall vibe of the book cover.  Overall, even though Zephyr is definitely a trend font, this may be used in other future projects of graphic designers thanks to this book cover.

There's Something to Get Excited About!

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I had one of this group's songs on my CD.  The group is TV/TV and their CD is called "Something To Get Excited About!"  I think that it's a not only interesting color, but type combination because it makes the titles stand out in their own way, using FF Good (the black text) as their "background".  While they used Rosewood Std. Regular for the group's title type and Courier font as the title for their album.  This sort of reminds me of Paramore's Riot! album with the usage of words and type to get the message across.  I think that this is a very clever way to use fonts and will use this as (somewhat) of a guideline for mixing fonts.

Chickflick Jeans

This I found in a logo book on my way to trying to design a logo earlier from the book "Logolounge: 2,000 International Identities by Leading Designers" by Catharine Fishel and Bill Gardner.  The logo design was created for Lee's line of jeans called Chick Flick by a design firm, Willoughby.  They custom designed this font because I couldn't find a font close to it on WhatTheFont.  I believe that customized fonts are the best because it gives the logo/brand/etc. a uniqueness that no one else can steal.  But also, it fit perfectly into the line because jeans have to fit ones body well, which is shown off through the choice of script font.  Also, it also distinctly says it's woman's line because of not only name choice and script font, but the color.  It's also nice they added the bracket on the sides.  I think without them, the whole logo wouldn't work.  Over all, if this line still existed, I would consider buying them!  =]

Project 1 Research - Lubalin Graph

In 1974, ITC Lubalin Graph® was designed by Herb Lubalin and drawn by Tony Dispigna and Joe Sundwall.  The basic geometric skeletons of the typeface were based on Lubalin’s ITC Avant Garde.  Lubalin took the basic shape of Avant Garde and added big square or rectangular serifs, making the style of this typeface slab serif or Egyptian (based on the popularity of the Egyptian culture during its creation in the early 1800’s).  Helga Jörgenson and Sigrid Engelmann introduced condensed weights (which include small caps and Old style Figures) to the typeface in 1992.  ITC Lubalin Graph is a good choice for display or headline type, conveying strength, practicality, and stable friendliness due to its open look with solid serifs, open counters, and a tall x-height.