Visualizing Data

Couple of amazing things here. I feel like he should credit his printer though.

http://jeremychristopherdesign.co.uk/

http://www.visualizingeconomics.com/2010/07/23/ftse-100/

300&65 Ampersands

I knew there were a lot of ampersands in this world, but one for every day of the year? 300&65 Ampersands

via Daring Fireball

No, no! Not more posts about Helvetica!!!

It's happened. The movie about the ubiquitous typeface is now approaching ubiquitousness. See the latest addition to the iTunes movie store. Since we Design Alliancers have so sadly not been able to wrangle a date for a screening, we can now huddle alone over our iPods and watch the thing. (I'd much prefer to banter about it afterwards with you all!)

But is it Garawood, or Zebramond?

Not terribly hot off the presses (April), but this is a funny entry on an interesting blog I just found from a type designer/manager at Adobe... Typblography.

"Garamond and Zebrawood walk into a bar, they have a few drinks and one thing leads to another… (yes they were hanging out at the same bar, believe it or not)."

"Create from scratch, the typographic love child of:
Garamond and Zebrawood"

See what Christian Robertson and other type designers came up with, on Typophile.

&

Personally, I don’t care for ampersands. Too fanciful, maybe? Regardless, Hoefler & Frere-Jones (there’s that ampersand again) have an ampersand-history-riddled post on their site, typography.com. You can read about (and see) the different typographic properties of ampersands in different fonts at “Our Middle Name.”

via Daring Fireball

Helvetica Soundtrack iMix

For your listening pleasure.

Reminder: Helvetica this weekend at YBCA

More information:
• This weekend's showings
• Helvetica web site
• Clips and trailers
• AIGA interview with director Gary Hustwit
• Previous DA post

Dr. Copperplate and Mr. Gothic

via Daring Fireball

Like many of us (I hope), I look back on much of my early graphic design—or, to tell the truth, desktop publishing (gasp!)—career with varying degrees of sheepishness and downright embarrassment. My greatest regrets: bad layouts and bad typography.

I used to chalk up my clunky typography to the clunky fonts at my disposal when a Macintosh IIfx, LaserWriter II, and PageMaker 3 were the high-end tools of the DTP trade: Avant Garde, Bookman, Courier, Helvetica, New Century Schoolbook, Palatino, Symbol, Times, Zapf Dingbats and Zapf Chancery. Later, I blamed my failure with Lithos on MTV’s beating of that typeface into the ground. Then, a long stint with what is now the US’s largest commercial bank left me irrationally angry at Futura Bold.

But, after reading through Armin Vit’s “Dr. Copperplate and Mr. Gothic”—a considerate view of Copperplate (another one of my font nemeses)—I’ve had to rethink the issues I’ve had with all the fonts in the past.

Maybe I just suck at setting type.

Free! Fonts!

via Smashing Magazine via popurls

Smashing Magazine is linking to six free (!) fonts and we’re linking to Smashing Magazine. I don’t know if you’d want to change the body copy of your entire newsletter-brochure-what-have-you to any of these free (!) typefaces, but any of them would work as a display face. Remember, “If it’s free, take one. If it’s free and not so good, take two.”

Helvetica comes to you

via Daring Fireball

If you haven’t seen Helvetica (the movie), the next geographically-convenient showing will be at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts from October 5–7. Design Alliance movie night, anyone? Barring that, you can get the Helvetica (the movie) DVD in your hot little hands after November 6th (Pre-order here).

I haven’t heard any firsthand reviews, but Helvetica has been getting some good press online. All I know is that the movie posters are cool.

Favorite fonts of… 2006?

via typographica.org via popurls

When I first stumbled on this typographica.org post I thought, “Wow, it’s kinda late in 2007 for a 2006 list.” But, with the sheer number of cool (and useful) fonts highlighted I can hardly blame them.

While University Old Style is our house typeface and one of UC Berkeley’s identifying components, there’s got to be room in your font toolbox for some of Typographica’s Favorite Fonts of 2006.

S'mores and kerning

I thought I was kind of a nerd, but at least I'm not showing up to this (full disclosure: I did, however go here.)

Alternately, check out FONTSELF. This is a pretty alpha project that seems to be aimed at providing the ability to create fonts that preserve the gestures of a given handwriting and the original look of the drawing appliance (ball-point pen, pencil, ink, paper, etc.)

Looks like they're promising an online tool for uploading drawings, adjusting metrics and kerning, and possibly an adobe plug-in for using the faces off of the interweb. As of now, you can look at it online and wish that it existed -- like the iPhone!

Helvetica—The Movie

This makes me smile (first time all week). —Roland

"Helvetica is a club." Neville Brody
____________________________________

Love it or hate it, Helvetica looms large in visual culture. Helvetica is a feature-length film exploring the proliferation of one typeface as part of a larger conversation about the way type affects our lives. Featuring a who's who of graphic and type designers, including Massimo Vignelli, Matthew Carter, and Erik Spiekermann.

Helvetica was co-produced by Swiss Dots and Veer and directed by Gary Hustwit. Read the director's film blog at helveticafilm.com.