In the past, painters, typographers and then the first “graphic designers” used letterforms as a form of art. Not only giant drop caps but entire words or phrases written using strong characters, most of the times created from scratch.

Then came Futurism and they also tried to free typography, not to make art, but to communicate in a more striking ways ideas that a single serif font could not express. What we see nowadays is a flattened use of typography. Same sans or serifs are used in fashion, food, erotic magazines and music covers. Seems like we lost the ability (or the courage) to use letters in an unconventional way.

At the same time, never like before we see new typefaces made by new foundries. As many of them are childish or nonsense, there are some that are excellent and unique. Inspired by this controversial situation I decided to assemble this little book, and made it available for free.

Here are the main reasons:
To collect the unconventional typefaces I like the most.
To fight the flattened use of typography.
To show that also unconventional typefaces can be used in commercial projects.

The featured typefaces are: Digestive, Brutal, bb-book A, Maelstrom, Clifton, IKANSEEYOUALL, Savate, Trickster, Solid Mirage, and Beatrice Display. The text typeface is Suisse Int’l by Swiss Typefaces. The outlined “2018” on the front cover is in Freight Display by GarageFonts.

Half-title

The book all these open windows, but no fresh air was designed as part of a master thesis project at PBSA Düsseldorf. It deals with the cultural consequences of digitization. In order to give this research project a certain look of neutrality, the superfamily Suisse was chosen. It does a good job: the neo-grotesque typeface follows the Swiss neutral style, but has many subtle differences. Whether using the monospaced, sans-serif or serif style, the three typefaces work together harmoniously and help to structure the book.

Photos: René Schiffer

Table of Contents

Process

Details

Boxout is used in solid and outlined caps as titling typeface for The Growth Handbook. Intercom:

A business that isn’t growing is dying. Growth isn’t a game of silver bullets or one size fits all solutions. It’s about connecting more people to the value of your product, so they become loyal, long-term, paying customers, who share it with others. The Growth Handbook features industry-tested advice for doing just that.

Boxout is also used on the landing page, together with Akkurat. The text typefaces used in the book are Leitura News and Neue Haas Unica, with Bureau Grot Wide used for headings. Art Direction: Justin Pervorse. Book Design: Judson Collier and Kelly Carpenter.

How do images of the future shape the city in the present? What competing futures are emerging in the urban fabric? Dwell in Other Futures is a two-day festival of art and ideas exploring the collisions of race, urbanism, and futurism, providing a platform for alternate visions of the St. Louis to come.

The identity, with its bold red and blue color scheme is primarily built on two typefaces and a single familiar image of St. Louis, distorted and recombined beyond recognition. Sharp Type’s Beatrice Display, to be released soon by Sharp Type, is a bold display font that started out as an exploration of ‘internal contrast’. Diatype by Dinamo is used for body copy and page navigation.

The festival website, which takes the distorted imagery and makes it interactive, is the primary application. Other materials produced for individual exhibits and performances include but are not limited to a booklet, bookmarks, exhibition posters, and signage.

More documentation on the designer’s website.

Source: www.flickr.com Photo by Windell Oskay of Evil Mad Scientist. License: All Rights Reserved.

Source: www.flickr.com Photo by Windell Oskay of Evil Mad Scientist. License: All Rights Reserved.

Blip was a portable Pong-style game made in 1977, the year handheld video games were just catching on. Although it was branded “The Digital Game”, the action was purely mechanical, powered by a wind-up timer. According to the Handheld Games Museum, “The batteries are only there to light up the single red LED light that represents the ball. (You can actually play the game with no batteries in a bright enough setting).”

But that didn’t hold Tomy back from playing up the “digital” aspect. The late 1970s were all about video games, so the company did their best to hide Blip’s true analog nature, branding the product so it looked and felt high-tech and electronic. The name itself is an obvious reference to the sound a computer might make, and they pounded that into the heads of consumers in this television spot.

Source: www.handheldmuseum.com License: All Rights Reserved.

Source: www.handheldmuseum.com License: All Rights Reserved.

Besides the name, type played a major part in Tomy’s futuristic aims: what could be more computerized than Computer? The typeface was used for “The Digital Game” on the box, and the Blip logo was likely derived from Computer as well, but it needed some creative modification as the font had no lowercase. A cap ‘L’ works fine for the lowercase ‘l’, and a squashed cap ‘P’ can fake a minuscule if it descends below the baseline. Meanwhile, the logo on the unit itself appears to be set in Orbit-B, a design similar to Computer, but lighter and more square, with larger counters.

License: All Rights Reserved.

Japanese and German editions of Blip, courtesy sellers swow and Los Reyes Magos.

The Japanese version (left) was labeled “World Tennis”, set in Data 70, another simplified take on the MICR aesthetic. The same font was also used on the packaging for the German “Blip-o-mat” (right).

If you add it all up, this odd little game managed to utilize all three of the MICR-style fonts that were frequently found in futuristic films, entertainment, and other products throughout the 1970s and ’80s. Read more about the relationship between this type genre and video gaming in an extensive article by Zach Whalen.