A Typographic Addiction.

The other day I was reading an article on Yahoo! News about the campaign against Comic Sans. It went into great detail as to the origins of the font, the creator and the discontent and disgust that most modern and schooled designers have for the poor font. It was interesting that the disdain for Comic Sans has turned into a world-wide movement to ban the use of this type-face. There are two primary schools of though on Comic Sans. One describes it as a typeface that does have a place and can be used correctly, the other scrolls through the font list and never even pauses at Comic Sans to give it a chance. I subscribe to the latter school of thought for the most part. The ban, although significantly less serious than our current embargo with Cuba, is something that keeps type interesting!

It's funny how much I am actually fascinated with typography. I usually loose interest in things that I get inundated with very quickly. Type is a different story, it is probably the one thing that can make or break a design, so my obsession is founded on good sound principle! I catch myself continually analyzing letterforms, font faces, leading(space between lines of type) and kerning(space between individual letters of type). And every critique whether in the design world, or on my personal time becomes a game of Identify That Type. My partner listens to my rants and raves on type, and although he is a good listener, sometimes he looks at me weird, and wonders how is it even that interesting. I guess it's a Graphic Design thing.

Before art school, type was two things: Times and Arial. One you used for papers, the other you used to try to mimic modern headlines. For a major portion of my first two years in school, I ditched what we termed "pedestrian" typefaces. Mainly called that because everyone uses it. They are for the most part the default of every word processing program known to man. Both Times and Arial are great, but because they are ubiquitous they seem to have lost their luster. So I found myself on the ongoing adventure of every graphic designer. The constant battle to find that perfect typeface.

If I was a word processor my default would probably be Helvetica Neue. I fell into a serious love affair with this font early in my schooling, and it is quite obvious in my portfolio. The typeface seems to mimic me as a designer. It's clean and organized. Sometimes it can be bold, sometimes extra bold, and at other times it's light, even ultra-light. If all else fails use it. Most times for me, all else failed. So Helvetica has become my Times, in respect to serifs("feet" on letterforms) it has become my Arial. Dare I even say it, it has become my Comic Sans.

So in an effort to save Helvetica from myself, I have established a personal ban on the typeface. I need more variety. I want my portfolio to be a showcase of my work, not a manual on the use of Helvetica Neue. Today is the end of week one. On Monday I declared that I will not even touch the typeface. I have to admit, it was hard. I wanted to use it so bad, and I noticed I just saved myself from the brink of addiction. Tuesday through Wednesday got a little easier, and Today I am giving my personal testimony. Sounds like great progress to me, aside from the minor symptoms of withdrawal, most notably the chills. Ok, the chills might have been caused by the rain.

So currently I am captivated with the following typefaces.

Seriffed:

Palatino

Georgia

Didot

Bodoni

Sans-Serifed:

Myriad

Avenir

Avant Garde

Frutiger

Futura(Sparingly!)