Century Gothic

Century Gothic was designed in 1991, for Monotype Type Foundry. It is classified as a geometric sans serif font. Interestingly enough, it is a digital typeface that has yet to be made into an actual physical type. It was inspired by the Lanston Monotype Foundry typeface known as Twentieth Century, designed by Sol Hess between 1937 and 1947. 

Century Gothic has many notable features. One significant characteristic it holds, is its single story lowercase “a” and “g”. The overall character of the typeface is very geometric and generalized. It does not contain many true variations in its weight. Its x-height is quite large, with ascenders that are very subtle and minute. The lowercase “i” and “j” have thick and rounded dots or tittles. 

Century Gothic is found frequently in movie posters. It is also the main typeface for a few television stations, like The Ellen Degeneres Show and House.

 

Papyrus

Created in 1982, Papyrus was intended to emulate what English text would look like if hand-drawn on papyrus thousands of years ago. It was originally hand-drawn with a calligraphy pen on textured paper, giving it the rough quality it holds. It has a very distinctive character, with irregularities in its edges and curves. The capital letterforms are very broad, and their crossbar heights vary. The overall quality of the letters is very representative of traditional calligraphic strokes.

Today, Papyrus is owned by ITC type foundry. Originally, a type foundry named Letraset owned the font.

Its most common use is in text that is meant to look antiqued or old. In addition, some consider it the national font of the Middle East.

 

Trajan

This Old style serif typeface was created in 1989, by Carol Twombly for Adobe Type Foundry. Interestingly enough, this font is actually an all caps font due to its inspiration from the Roman Square Capitals. Trajan Pro, a modified version of the font, includes a set of lowercase and small caps.Trajan is very unique in its thin, extended stems, and sharp serifs. The “Q” is especially noticeable, with its long tail that extends all the way beneath the next letterform.  

This font has been used in the entertainment business. Movie posters, book covers, and tv shows have all featured this font. As a kid, my favorite book series was “The Series of Unfortunate Events,” a series of stories of the lives of 3 orphaned children with a great deal of money left in their name, who are constantly running from an evil and strange man who attempts to steal their fortunes. This series used Trajan on all of their book covers. The Titanic, one of the most beloved american films of all time, also used Trajan in their movie poster. Many universities use the font for their logo. 

 

Trajan

This Old style serif typeface was created in 1989, by Carol Twombly for Adobe Type Foundry. Interestingly enough, this font is actually an all caps font due to its inspiration from the Roman Square Capitals. Trajan Pro, a modified version of the font, includes a set of lowercase and small caps.Trajan is very unique in its thin, extended stems, and sharp serifs. The “Q” is especially noticeable, with its long tail that extends all the way beneath the next letterform.  

This font has been used in the entertainment business. Movie posters, book covers, and tv shows have all featured this font. As a kid, my favorite book series was “The Series of Unfortunate Events,” a series of stories of the lives of 3 orphaned children with a great deal of money left in their name, who are constantly running from an evil and strange man who attempts to steal their fortunes. This series used Trajan on all of their book covers. The Titanic, one of the most beloved american films of all time, also used Trajan in their movie poster. Many universities use the font for their logo. 

 

Times New Roman

This serif typeface was made for The Times, a British newspaper, in 1931. It was created by Victor Lardent, a designer for Monotype. The typeface was designed after The Times was criticized for being poorly designed and lacking in its typographic features. Lardent sought to make a typeface that was both appealing and easily readable in small print. The font made its debut appearance in The Times on October 3, 1932. The Times used Times New Roman for 40 years, until 2004 when the publication switched its format from broadsheet to tabloid. Many variants of the typeface were then created to accommodate the changes of The Times.

Times New Roman has been very influential in the design of other fonts, such as Georgia. The font can be found in many publications all over the world, especially in books and other mass distributed publications. To this day, it is nearly impossible to find computer software that does not include Times New Roman font.

Today, Times New Roman belongs to the Monotype type foundry. Microsoft is known for their adoption of this font. It is not to be confused with Times Roman, which is licensed to Linotype and used by Adobe and Apple. It can be classified as a Transitional Serif font. It comes in just about every variation you can think of: regular, bold, condensed, semi-bold, small text, extra bold, medium, etc. 

Below are examples of Times New Roman found within the body text of famous publications like National Geographic, Time Magazine, and Rolling Stone. 

Myriad

In the early 1990s, Robert Slimbach and Carol Twombly came together to create a font that was generic and universal, for Adobe. The result was a sans serif font that was just that, generic and lacking in personality, but was infinitely usable and simple. In 1992, Myriad was released in the Adobe Originals Series, becoming the lead typeface in Adobe’s Multiple Master font format. It was noted for its flexibility, allowing its character to change drastically depending on variables like weight, width, optical size, and style. Many considered the font to be a close cousin of the popular humanist font, Frutiger.

Other companies like Apple, Walmart, and Wells Fargo adopted the font, making slight if any variations to the typeface. Many prefer the font to Helvetica, the font dubbed the default font of the millennia.

 

Highway Gothic

Highway Gothic:

Also referred to as a FHWA Series font, Highway Gothic is a sans serif typeface created by the US Federal Highway Administration in 1945 for use in road signs. In 1966, modifications were made, adding lowercase letters into the mix. The intention was to increase legibility for drivers driving at high speeds and from afar. This typeface was not only adopted in the US, but also in Canada, Mexico, Spain, Australia, The Netherlands, Turkey, Brazil, Chile, and New Zealand.

It was produced in 7 different variations, titled with capital letters. These are classified as “A”, “B”, “C”, “D”, “E”, “E(M)”, and “F” ranging from “A,” the narrowest, and “F,” the widest. I believe it is classified as a Modern Sans Serif font. Then in the 1990’s, Tobias Frere-Jones designed the typeface Interstate, inspired by the FHWA series.

Around 2004, a new typeface was created, known as Clearview, to begin replacing Interstate Gothic. It is said to be slightly more open, light, and crisp. The motive behind finding a new font to replace Highway Gothic began when the state of Oregon wanted to add tourist information to highway signs without increasing the overall size of the signs. Signs using Highway Gothic that were once hard to read from 700 feet became legible from 900-1000 feet using Clearview. 

 

 

Cooper Black

This heavily weighted font was created in 1921 by Oswald Bruce Cooper, and released by Barnhart Brothers & Spindler type foundry in 1922. Its classified as an Old Style Serif font, recognized for its extra bold weight. Inspiration for this typeface came from many different sources, including: Art Nouveau, Art Deco, and the Industrial Age. Cooper Old Style had previously gained popularity during the 1920s and 30s, ultimately leading to the creation of Cooper Black. This typeface was most widely embraced during the 1970s.

The forms of the letters have a rounded, blunt serifs and heavy vertical stems, in comparison to the crossbars. Serifs also appear “blurred” at times, especially from a distance. In addition, its counters are small. Overall, the font is considered warm and bold. The uppercase “O” and “Q” are easily recognizable with their backward-tilting counters, and the lowercase “i” and “j” has elliptical dots. In addition, I think it goes without saying that the font lacks contrast, making is well suited for placement on a different and distinct background. Oz Cooper, a member of the Cooper family, commented on the modified Cooper Black, saying “Cooper Black fits the need of far-sighted printers with near-sighted customers.”

Gotham

This digital Geometric Sans Serif was created by the American Typeface designer, Tobias Frere-Jones, in 2000. Its owned by the Hoefer and Frere-Jones Foundry. It was inspired by a popular architectural signage during the 20th century, especially in New York City. It’s simplicity highlights the 1920s era where “Type, like architecture, like the organization of society itself, was to be reduced to its bare, efficient essentials, rid of undesirable, local or ethnic elements.” 

This font has increased in popularity most recently due to its use in the 2008 Barak Obama campaign posters. Its first use, however, was for GQ magazine, for its “masculine, fresh, and new” essence. 

Gotham is noted for its short descenders and ascenders. Obviously since it is a geometric sans serif font, the general shapes of the forms resemble squares, triangles, and circles. However, unlike some geometric sans serifs, the caps of the “A”, “W”, and “M” do NOT come to a point, but are instead cut straight across. The diagonal stems flare-out relatively wide in my opinion. Interestingly enough, the lowercase “b” and “d” have broad bowls, yet the “r”, “j”, and “f” are extremely narrow in comparison. 

 

GILL SANS

A Humanist Sans Serif font, Gill Sans was created by Eric Gill in 1926. The font derived from a window painting Eric had done on a local bookshop window, where he worked. In 1928, Gill Sans was rereleased by Monotype Foundry. In 1929, Eric Gill was commissioned to create the signage for the London Railway System. 

His goal in creating this typeface was to produce a sans serif font that was easily readable and able to be used for both text and headings. 

The uppercase has pieces of the traditional roman fonts like Baskerville and Caslon. It has 14 variants. The uppercase M, similar to Futura, is modeled after a square box, however the inside diagonal stems meet closer in the center. Gill Sans is obviously less geometric than Futura but is frequently used as an alternate to the popular geometric sans serif font. Similar to its other Humanist san serif relatives, Gill Sans has a two-story lowercase “a” and “g”. 

Gill Sans is the most well known Humanist Sans Serif font, and is in fact the primary example used in Lupton’s text used in class. It can be found almost anywhere: in movie covers, book titles, and store fronts. As it so happens, when my family and I traveled to London a few years ago, we took the London Underground everywhere we went. On the last day I decided it was only right to take a picture of the classic red and blue signs that appeared at every stop to direct Londoner’s to their correct destination. SO, included below is my picture from the London Underground transport system… you never know when family vacation pictures will come in handy! 🙂