Idea Generation: Fonts

To begin with, I will give a small description of what a font actually is. A font is a general term for different types of text, whether that be different in size, style or weight. There are thousands of fonts in the digital world, and some fonts have more than one style. This is especially true when browsing through fonts from applications such as Adobe Photoshop or Microsoft Word. For example, the font style ‘Franklin Gothic’ has a total of 6 different styles (taken from Word). This is due to the various sizes and weights in which they come. The weight of a font usually refers to the thickness of the font, whilst the size refers to how small or large it is. Using the same print screen, there is a font style named ‘Gadugi’. This particular font only has one style, unlike the ‘Franklin Gothic’ style. Since fonts come in various styles and types, it is natural that some fonts are better suited for some applications and purposes than others. Taking a look at the font type ‘Impact’, this font would be better suited for a bold, eye catching heading, whereas ‘Times New Roman’ would be better suited for document text. Depending on the work being carried out, some styles fit better than others. For a magazine, there are many different styles of font that can be used. This is because not every magazine has the same contents. A fashion magazine will have a very different font style on their front cover to that of a rock/punk music magazine.

When looking into possible font styles for my front cover, I had to consider a number of aspects. First of all, how do I want my magazine to be portrayed? As with the examples above, a font style can help aid the rest of the front cover, in showing the reader what theme the magazine will follow. Secondly, does the font style fit the image and content of the magazine? If I were to select an image and font style, which seems to have conflicting or contrasting appearances, then I should re-think the type of font. And thirdly, will the style make readers want to pick up the magazine? If the magazine was to be published and distributed in stores, the style would have to be noticeable and unique to the magazine so that readers remember and chose the magazine.With those considerations in mind, I began looking at fonts that were already available to me in Word and Photoshop. With hundreds of easily available styles

‘Fashion’ magazine has a relitavly simple font style. It is classed as a serif font. A serif font is one where letters have small dashes, which help to link letters and words together. For the type of magazine that ‘Fashion’ is, the font style suits its purpose as being a stylish and not over the top title, as the main eye-catching tool tends to be close ups of models faces.

‘Kerrang!’ is a music magazine, focusing mostly on the rock and metal genre. It has a more detailed font style, with detail made out to look like cracks or shatters in the letters. The title is bold and the letters link together one after the other, without the use of serifs. The title has been given a similar style to that of the contents of the magazine, and readers recognise this style.

to choose from, the pre-set styles would allow me several options to select. Along with the fact that they are very easy to obtain, they are all very easy to edit; in terms of colour, size and design. Word also has a function called ‘Word Art’. This function introduces new ways of editing and creating a suitable heading. On top of colour, size and design changes, ‘Word Art’ gives advanced editing tools to add glows, 3-D aspects, shadows and reflections to the text. Here are some examples of ‘Word Art’ font:

As I quickly found out with looking through pre-set styles that weren’t ‘Word’ Art’, there wasn’t enough detail to the fonts. Despite the fact that there were hundreds to choose from, using those styles simply would not give me the edge that I was looking for in a title of a magazine. The ‘Word Art’ titles were better in the sense that they were suited for more of a creative piece of work, but there was only so much editing that could be done to the style. This is mainly due to the application, Microsoft Word, being intended for writing document’s rather than creating an aesthetic heading for a magazine. I haven’t ruled out the use of ‘Word Art’ fonts, however if I were to create and use a particular style from here, it would only be as a last resort to not finding any other method.After looking through Word and Photoshop’s possibilities of font styles, I decided to look online for options. The website called Dafont is home to over a thousand fonts with choice of intricate designs and unique styles submitted by their owners. The fonts are categorised in multiple ways from cartoon styles to retro, from calligraphy to graffiti. Dafont works on the basis of downloading a particular font that you like, and then the font will appear in your desired application. I explored through the different categories of fonts and found 6 diverse fonts that I believe will work well as a font style for my front cover. The text is the name of the font style:

Your text hereYour text here

YOUR TEXT HEREYour text here

The reason for choosing these fonts is that I think they will stand out against the main image, but that they will also work well against the image as well. In order to use the font styles, Dafont asks that you download the fonts, and then you are free to use them freely. However, despite the wide variety of useful designs, using Dafont has its flaws as well. Since the fonts are user uploaded, some are slightly harder to obtain than just downloading them. Some need to be bought and given royalties to the creator. This meant that I had to find fonts that were free to download (of which these ones were). But the editing possibilities for such bold and intricate fonts far surpass that of Words pre-set ones, and even ‘Word Art’ fonts. Being able to use the Photoshop tools on texts such as this will greatly enhance the final look of the texts against the main image.

The above screen prints are tests using the 6 Dafont styles that I downloaded and placed in relatively the same position over the front image. After looking at each one I tried to analyse at least one feature that I liked and disliked for each:

‘Nervous’ was a nice stylish font because of the distorted look it has. I hoped that it would work well with the strobe light effect. Upon positioning it over the image I feel that the text would be best implemented in a slightly different positioning. Compared to some of the others, it isn’t as bold and seems quite difficult to read with its own effect and that of the pictures. If I was to find a new way of placing the text so that I could make it bigger in size, and therefore bolder, I believe that ‘Nervous’ would be a good font style to use.

‘Urbana’ was a little like ‘Nervous’ in the sense that only so much could be done to its size before the words were automatically shifted to another line. I would need to use a different placement of the text in order to use this style. The fuzzy outline around the text seems to have been lost when placed over the image which is a little disappointing. Despite this, it is easy to read over the image, but some shifting of the text would need to be done in order for me to use it in my final piece.

Out of all of the styles I was hoping that ‘Felix’ would be a good choice for the front image, as I personally enjoyed the look of the font very much. I have, however, mixed views on the text after testing it. First and foremost, it fills the upper half of the page very well and uses the space very well (which is a plus). A negative point is that, due to the nature of the font imitating “swirly” writing, it is a little hard to read. If I was to choose this style, and play around with it a bit more, I believe ‘Felix’ could be the right style to choose.

I felt that ‘Plane Crash’ was the font style that I liked the least out of the 6. The effect of the cracked and fractured text didn’t show in Photoshop against the image, which is what I was hoping for. The result is that it looks like a bland, bold all capitals text. Overall I am disappointed the most in this test. The only positive statement to be made is that it is easy

to read against the image and that it fills the space at the top of the page; but its aesthetic look lets the font down.

‘Hopeless Place’ was a similar style to ‘Felix’ but looks a little more “cartoony” and easier to read than ‘Felix’. It fills the upper portion of the page successfully and stands out greatly against the image. My only concern is that it doesn’t fit the image like some of the other fonts. If I was to edit the font slightly and perhaps position it differently, then it could a potential font to use for the front cover. Like ‘Felix’ I have mixed feelings about this font style, but it won’t be completely ruled out.

Lastly ‘Final Fantasy’ is an interesting style to use. The style is taken from the title of a game franchise (coincidentally called “Final Fantasy”). I like how the position of the text is as it fills up a good amount of the top of the page with the height of the font. However I do feel as though I would need to edit the font to stretch the title a little bit. This would make the characters a little wider and hence be easier to read. My only concern is using a font that is already associated with a very popular, and unrelated, franchise.