Front panel of dust jacket

From Wikipedia:

The Shining is a 1977 horror novel by American author Stephen King. It is King's third published novel and first hardback bestseller; its success firmly established King as a preeminent author in the horror genre. The setting and characters are influenced by King's personal experiences, including both his visit to The Stanley Hotel in 1974 and his struggle with alcoholism. The novel was adapted into a 1980 film and a 1997 miniseries. The book was followed by a sequel, Doctor Sleep, published in 2013, which in turn was adapted into a film of the same name in 2019.

The Shining centers on Jack Torrance, a struggling writer and recovering alcoholic who accepts a position as the off-season caretaker of the historic Overlook Hotel in the Colorado Rockies. His family accompanies him on this job, including his young son Danny, who possesses "the shining", an array of psychic abilities that allow the child to glimpse the hotel's horrific true nature. Soon, after a winter storm leaves the family snowbound, the supernatural forces inhabiting the hotel influence Jack's sanity, leaving his wife and son in grave danger.

Cover for the first UK edition published by New English Library in 1977. The novel’s title on the jacket, spine of the hardcover and title page are set in Process, which is also used on the inner flaps with Univers. The title is in a metallic foil on the front panel of the jacket and in gilt on the spine of the hardcover. The author's name and additional text is set in Futura.

Jacket design by Roger Judd.

Detail of metallic foil title on front panel of jacket

Full view of dust jacket

Detail from front flap of jacket

Spine of the black cloth hardcover

Front side. Notice the incorrect spacing with large gaps around some letters and punctuation marks.

Promotional flyer for the 1995 edition of Blessings (est. in 1992), a Thanksgiving Eve event by Incredibeets and Mushgroove, the two electronic music promotion companies situated in the heart of Chicago’s underground rave scene. Chances are that the history of these two promoters of this event is virtually unknown or not seen on the internet.

This flyer was printed in two spot colours (medium blue and silver). The graphic design is credited to GCG. Inc./Nadisco and design studio Third Eye Innovations on the back side.

On the front, Vellvé (a Neufville typeface by Tomás Mengual named after the designer's middle name, first released in 1971 and digitized in 1996, a year after this flyer was printed, and expanded into ITC Vellvé with additional styles) is used in two weights behind the Incredibeets mascot – on the top is a bold weight, shown curved with a shiny metallic 3D effect; on the bottom is the light (as a feather) weight for the text information.

The copy and guest names on the rear side are set in what appears to be FontBank’s Brandish (1990–1993, with the curved h), an unauthorized digitization of Blippo Bold, for all aspects except Handel Gothic for the credits. Other fonts include Univers 58 Condensed Italic for the Incredibeets logo (before 1997) and Enigma (see glyph set below) for the Mushgroove logo (before 1996).

Rear side

Full set of Enigma from a 1976 VGC Alphabet Library specimen, with alternate glyphs that were never digitized. These alts include the lowercase (f, double-story g, i, and j with some ink trap corners, x, and z), uppercase (I, straight J, L with curly end, N, T, X, and Z), and numerals (3, 5 and 7 [in which the first and fourth variations shows a middle bar as in z/Z). The design of this typeface has a round and smooth feel and is distinguished by the internal decoration (A, B, H, K, M, N, R, U, V, W, alternate g, h, i, j, k, m, n, u, v, w, y, 8, and also the exclamation and question marks).

Since this came up again recently, here’s a golden oldie. Art Dystopia is a freebie font that emulates the look of black and death metal logos (see Mike Rampton’s article for Kerrang! and also the Black Metal Logo Database). It was made in February 2015 by artist and amateur font maker Art Dystopia. Someone thought it was a good choice for a stand of Mexican food – possibly to indicate that their dishes come flaming hot?

In June 2018, a photo was posted on Don Mamastroso’s Tumblr, captioned “No sé si pedir mi gordita con salsa verde o con la sangre de mis enemigos” (Dunno whether to order my gordita with green salsa or with the blood of my enemies.”). It was further popularized in September 2021 by Twitter user @buddy_ferrara, here with the comment “what if we kissed at the death metal gorditas y quesadillas stand”. The rest is internet history, and now one can buy T-shirts, throw pillows (see below) and other merch exploiting this meme.

The Terminator is a 1984 American science-fiction action thriller directed by James Cameron. It stars Arnold Schwarzenegger as the Terminator, a robotic killing machine from the future that is sent back in time to terminate Sarah Connor (Linda Hamilton). A human resistance soldier from the battlegrounds of the future war against the machines, Kyle Reese (Michael Biehn), is tasked with finding and protecting Sarah from the Terminator before it can complete its deadly mission.

The opening title sequence is typeset in Bessellen, with the shiny metallic “The Terminator” logo based on Earth. Various infrared shots depicting Terminator vision and its heads-up-display, sometimes referred to as termovision, also feature text typeset in Bessellen. The bitmap type used in these visuals is not yet identified [see comments]. The closing titles are typeset in Eurostile.

Graphic animation effects and main title are designed by Ernest D. Farino.

Communication directed by Dune Lunel Studio for the legendary Parisian electro concert hall Rex Club. The numerous flyers and banners pair illustrations by Capucine Mattiussi with typography set in Pimpit by Benoît Bodhuin and Gopher by Adam Ladd.

Album cover for the 1970 album Pitchin Can from saxophonist Archie Shepp, released on the French label America Records. Poster was added to Mecanorma’s catalog of rubdown type shortly before, in 1969.

[More info on Discogs]

The Pleaser II Kodamatic is an instant camera by Kodak, introduced in 1982 as a successor to the Pleaser. It’s operated with HS144 film and was produced until 1985. The Pleaser II logo is based on the “Love” weight of True Critt, a Headliners original designed by Critt Graham in 1970.

The Pleaser Trimprint (1984–1986) is a related model that also uses True Critt for the logo.

Spotted at Zaborski Emporium

The Pleaser is an instant camera by Kodak, launched in 1977 as a premium version of the Handle (also known as EK2), with electronic exposure. It’s fed PR10 (PR144) film and stayed on the market until 1982 when it was superseded by the Pleaser II.

The logo uses Burko Super Duper, the second heaviest weight from David L. Burke’s geometric sans distributed by Headliners. The rainbow-colored version on the box and the manual cover is a match in all letterform details. On the camera itself, the silver logo features a more compact form for s, which might have been an alternate included in the film font, or a customization.

German sleeve for the EMI Electrola release of “Last Time I Saw Him”, the first single from Diana Ross’s 1973 album of the same name.

The uncredited designer used tightly spaced Neo Prisma and gave its lines two different colors: with the outer ones accentuated in white, the letterforms take on a radiant look.

[More info on Discogs]

A twitter post from Poster House celebrating Jean-Michel Basquiat’s birthday featured an exhibition poster of the collaborative work of Warhol and Basquiat. After a little digging, I was able to identify who designed this poster. It was designed by Hannah Alderfer—the initials HHA are visible near Warhols’s name. The studio’s website shows this poster. It combines Helvetica Compressed with Futura Extra Bold in mimicking the traditional boxing posters of earlier in the 20th century. The stars, the colors, the image cropping, all reference that genre of poster. The photos of Basquiat and Warhol were taken by Michael Halsband.

Interestingly there are two other versions of the poster (see below) that use other, more famous, photos from this shoot by Halsband. The typography is slightly different on the Palladium poster. It is completely different on the black and white poster which surprisingly uses Radiant Extra Condensed for the main text. Radiant works well with that photography, which is reminiscent of the style of Mapplethorpe (who was originally slated to shoot the two artists) and Avedon. The other two posters are uncredited and look different from the style of Hannah Alderfer’s work.

Logo for the 2006 Olympic Games in Turin, Italy

The logos for the Torino 2006 Winter Olympics and Paralympics were designed by Husmann-Benincasa Brand Design in 2000, using Neuropol from Typodermic Fonts Inc. Some glyphs including the 2 and 6 were slightly modified. This was the 1996 version of Neuropol which predates Neuropol X and contained only one style. A “remastered” version of Neuropol was released in July 2015 and can be found at Typodermic Fonts.

Learn more about the corporate identity in Antonino Benincasa’s post on Behance.

A sign from the 2006 Olympic Games in Turin, Italy

Logo for the 2006 Paralympic Games in Turin, Italy

A monochrome and a multicolored flag

Circular trademark

Brand architecture: the logo of the Paralympics and the sub-brand logos, for Art & Culture, Volunteers, TOBO (Torino Olympic Broadcasting Organisation), and Environment

What is a mushroom? What do mushrooms mean? What do mushrooms do? What do we want from mushrooms? What do the mushrooms want? These are the questions the makers of Broccoli ask and answer in Mushroom People, a special edition, single-issue magazine for mycophiles. Artists, writers, and fungi enthusiasts from around the world explore mushroom fact and fantasy, collecting specimens of all kinds: the strange and familiar, beautiful and ugly, toxic and healing, ephemeral and enduring.

Book jacket

Via Mushroom People. From the book’s colophon:

Filmset in England by Keyspools Limited, Golborne, Lancastershire. Set in 12p Optima

There’s no designer credit, and no mention of the title typeface (did they want to keep this secret to themselves?). It’s Milton Extrabold, the heaviest member of a typeface family that originated at Face Photosetting, London, and is credited to Tony Geddes, 1968. It’s a good option for situations when Windsor just isn’t wacky enough. Here it’s used with one of its alternate M’s, a right-leaning form with a sprawling, cyma-like swash extension. Milton is also known under the names Musketeer and Melbourne. Mecanorma’s digital Milton has a single light weight only. A digitization of the Extrabold is included in Musketeer by Compugraphics, now available from Monotype, as well as in Melbourne, but both lack the original alternates.

Title page

The City Sightseeing logo, which is splashed across all their tour buses, is set in Holstein Bold, tightly tracked, with omitted wordspace (“CitySightseeing”) and a yellow stroke around the letters.

From Wikipedia:

City Sightseeing is an open-top, sightseeing tour bus operator. It provides tour bus services in more than 130 cities around the world. As City Sightseeing has grown and expanded, the company now also provides boat tours, sightseeing train tours, and guided walking tours.

The City Sightseeing name was first used in 1972 after Peter Newman used it for his City Coach Lines company, which ran tours of London four times a day.

In 1998, Ensignbus revived the name and developed the red livery in the Spanish city of Seville. There it helped an established sightseeing operator relaunch itself with double-deckers, using the experience and expertise developed with London Pride Sightseeing, through Ensignbus' vehicle business. With the sale of the London Pride Sightseeing, Peter Newman stated his intention to introduce a global brand of sightseeing buses. It also set up operations in Sydney, Australia, not as a franchise, but directly owned, during this year.

Holstein was designed by Ethan Paul Dunham and released by Fonthead Design in 1995.

The City Sightseeing website, as it looked in 2005. Holstein is additionally used for the headlines.

City Sightseeing logo from 2005

Horizontally stretched Holstein for the City Sightseeing Official Tour seal

A photo of the first sightseeing operations, which was launched in Sevilla Spain in 1998. Notice that the original name affixed to the bus was ‘Sevilla Tour’ – the ‘City Sightseeing’ name was launched later.

City Sightseeing Manchester, 2008

City Sightseeing Liverpool, 2009

City Sightseeing Windsor, 2010

City Sightseeing Belfast, 2011

City Sightseeing Milano, 2014

City Sightseeing Moscow, 2018

Source: www.violaobrasileiro.com.br Violão Brasileiro. License: All Rights Reserved.

Front cover of the Som Livre pressing.

Jacarandá is an album by prolific Brazilian guitarist and composer Luiz Floriano Bonfá (1922–2001). It was released in 1973, with two different cover designs. Ranwood’s version features a photograph showing a peculiar detail of a tree (a Jacarandá?), taken by Bonfá himself. Domestic label Som Livre apparently didn’t trust the commercial appeal of this find. They relegated the bark to the back, and rather went with a photograph of the artist and his guitar for the front cover. This picture was taken by his wife, singer and songwriter Maria Toledo (1937–2010).

Source: wfmu.org License: All Rights Reserved.

Front cover of the Ranwood Records pressing.

The typography of both versions features two rare and spectacular typefaces. Bonfá’s name is set in Aztec. This wide all-caps sans with rounded corners was shown by Californian phototype service Lettergraphics in their 1969 catalog. Its unknown designer aimed for a three-dimensional look by adding a gradient of dots. The letterforms hence resemble worked stones as found in meso-American monuments. On the album cover, the gradient isn’t smooth: the inner parts are printed in a light green, the edges in a dark green, separated by a jagged inline in white. The acute accent on the A probably wasn’t included in the font, and added ad hoc.

Source: www.flickr.com Photo: Florian Hardwig. License: CC BY-NC-SA.

Aztec as shown in a Lettergraphics catalog fom 1969.

License: All Rights Reserved.

“Design & Poster” – alphabet by Ross F. George as shown in the 13th edition of his Speedball Text Book (1938).

The typeface used for the title is an interesting one, too. It’s shown by Lettergraphics as Split Ends in their 1970 catalog. The same face is reproduced under the name Split Caps in Castcraft’s Enyclopedia of Phototype Styles (1978) as well as in Special Effects and Topical Alphabets, a source book compiled by by Dan X. Solo and published by Dover in 1978. The design goes back to an (incomplete) alphabet by lettering artist Ross F. George, presented on a page labeled “Design & Poster” in the 13th edition of his Speedball Text Book from 1938, with less detailing than the phototype adaptation(s). There are various digital interpretations.

The Brazilian pressing additionally has a line in Windsor, proudly announcing that the record was “gravado em Los Angeles–USA”. The Som Livre logo is in Riverside Drive (ca. 1970), and “Estereo” in Stop (1971). The yellow sticker-like addition combines a wide sans and a serif, both in all-caps. These could be Trade Gothic Extended and Bodoni Bold.

Source: www.acervocult.com.br Acervo Cult. License: All Rights Reserved.

Front cover of the Som Livre pressing.

Source: www.acervocult.com.br Acervo Cult. License: All Rights Reserved.

Back cover of the Som Livre pressing.

Source: aucfan.com License: All Rights Reserved.

Front cover of a promotional copy of the Ranwood Records pressing.

[More info on Discogs]

Cover art, flyers, and merchandise for As puras do funk, a playlist with Brazilian funk music made for Acerca.cc. This independent creative project produces printed matter, fanzines, costumes, accessories, and animated content.

This gig poster is a contemporary take on the classic psychedelic poster of the 1960s, designed by Alex Coven for musician Carl Baldassarre’s full live performance of the album Led Zeppelin II.

The primary typeface used is Libido, a new variable font based on the hand lettering of psychedelic poster artist Wes Wilson. Much like Wilson’s work, the type has been warped across the page in organic curves, using a stylized photo of Baldassarre himself as a backdrop.

Accompanying Libido is PhontPhreak’s Handwriting and Harmonia Sans, an interesting contrast to the hard-to-decipher psychedelic type above.

Identity for the web series Falta de Noção (“lack of notion”) by Portuguese comedian Ricardo Couto, pairing the horizontal-contrast caps from Zoo with illustration and graphic patterns.

“Communications” from the Paste Pot & Scissors subseries, ft. Mike Hinge’s Hinge Computer. Illustartion by Tom Sawyer.

Covers for various clip books of line art issued in 1970 by Harry Volk Jr. Art Studio, Pleasantville, New Jersey. The series provides a glimpse into the topics that were in demand by the press – and by the media in general – in the United States at the time. The covers paint a slightly more progressive image than those from a decade before, e.g. with a women in the driver’s seat (for “Transportation”, see below). The vast majority of the portrayed people still is white and male. The cover for “Communications” (above) with three protesting women is an exception.

The series is also a snapshot of what was in fashion in display typography. The chosen faces – almost each cover features a different one – are diverse in style. Many were issued only shortly before. There are several exclusive designs by the NYC-based typesetting studio Photo-Lettering (Hinge Computer, Brave and Free, Calendar, Microcircus, Benguiat Indian, Bauhaus Prisma, Bordonaro Black Magic, West Kangaroo) and also a few recent releases by VGC (Giorgio, Antikva Margaret).

See also the dedicated post about the subseries titled Grafika which was introduced in 1970. For more information on Harry Volk Jr. Art Studio, see the post about the clip books issued in 1955.

“Happy Birthday” (No. 190) ft. Davison Dimensional (1969). The small text is in Helvetica.

“Holidays” (No. 191) ft. Brave and Free with stretched letterforms.

“Travel” (No. 195). While the title is set in caps from Georg Trump’s City fett, rasterized and repeated at varying angles like stamps in a passport, the names of the destinations are hand-lettered. Some are probably based on existing faces, e.g. “Orient” appears to emulate Benguiat Newlock. “Greece” might be patterend after Copeland Trillium.

“Religion” (No. 196) ft. Solemnis. “18th Anniversary Issue” uses tightly spaced Futura Light.

“Winter” (No. 197) ft. Giorgio (Giorgio Giaiotto, 1966).

“Men” (No. 198) ft. Profil. Illustration by Tom Sawyer.

“Women” (No. 199). Illustration by Tom Sawyer. The constructivist stencil caps are from Futura Black.

“Holidays” (No. 200) shows tightly spaced lowercase Clarendon.

“Crowds” (No. 201) ft. Filmotype Vigus. The portrait format and the use of ITC Avant Garde Gothic Light as secondary typeface suggest that this was a late edition, already in the style used in subsequent years.

“Groups” (No. 526) ft. Calendar (1969).

“Transportation” (No. 527). Illustration by Tom Sawyer. The typeface is PLINC’s Microcircus, a squooshed variation of Microgramma/Eurostile.

“Insurance” (No. 529) again features Microcircus.

“Western” (No. 533) ft. a depiction of a Native American with feathered headdress. The type was apparently chosen for its name – it’s Benguiat Indian.

“Food” No. 539 ft. Prisma Graphic.

“Human Relations” (No. 541) in Cartier (Carl Dair, 1967), with slightly stretched letterforms.

“Education” (No. 542) ft. caps from Antikva Margaret (Zoltán Nagy, 1966).

“Handyman” (No. 543) ft. Goudy Oldstyle Bold, with a shortened ascender for d.

“The Golden Years” (No. 544) ft. Augustea Open. Illustration by Tom Sawyer.

“Teens” (No. 545) ft. Bauhaus Prisma K (1970).

“Family” (No. 546) ft. Jana (1965). Illustration by Tom Sawyer.

“Sales” (No. 547) ft. Eurostile stretto. Illustration by Tom Sawyer.

“Spring & Summer Sports” (No. 548) ft. Permanent Headline in solid and open styles.

“Worry-Fear” from the Paste Pot & Scissors subseries (No. PP132) ft. Black Magic by Lewell Bordonaro.

“Son of Little Guy” (No. PP136) ft. West Kangaroo Demibold, an informal face with horizontal stress by Dave West.

Contribution by Dorothy E. Hayes to “Black and White: A Portfolio of 40 Statements on a Single Theme”, a special issue of Print magazine, July/August 1969:

The “problem” posed to all the artists who participated was this: Make a statement on the theme “Black and White,” interpreting it in any way you choose. Your statement can be literal or symbolic, abstract or representational. Use whatever graphic techniques you wish. Your only restriction is that you must work in black and white—no color.

We naturally expected that most of the statements would deal directly and urgently with the racial question—and the majority of them do. It is interesting, however, that even those pieces which do not relate specifically to this issue seem to comment on it. Partly this is due to the context they are in; but partly also to the fact that even the “purest,” least socially conscious design statement, if its theme is “Black and White,” must deal with relationships between opposing elements, must deal with polarization—hence must deal, however unwittingly, with the precise question of black man vs. white man, U.S.A., circa 1969.

The typeface that Hayes used is Impacta, a counterless all-caps face drawn by Dave Davison and added to Photo-Lettering’s library just shortly before. Everybodywiki has a bio of Hayes:

Dorothy Hayes (December 1, 1935 – July 31, 2015) was an American graphic designer and educator from Mobile, Alabama, and the owner of Dorothy's Door, a commercial design agency in New York. She attended Alabama State College and then moved to New York in 1958 to continue her education at Pratt Institute, New York Institute of Advertising, and Cooper Union School of Art, where she received a design degree in 1967. On Hayes’ early employment in the design field, she said, “I was employed by a well-known broadcasting company and led to believe that I would hold a design position, yet I was never allowed to do anything but non-creative work. I was frankly told that my employment was simply a form of tokenism.” In an effort to support and advocate for other black designers like herself, Hayes teamed with book designer Joyce Hopkins in 1970 to curate 49 black designers into an exhibition entitled Black Artist in Graphic Communication at the Rhode Island School of Design's Woods-Gerry Mansion.

This bio submission was declined by Wikipedia as it’s “about a person not yet shown to meet notability guidelines.” SMH. You can learn more about Hayes on 28 Days of Black Designers.