Typography
Reflective Blog 02
Our second session on typographical hierarchy helped me understand the proper ways of creating hierarchies in typography. I believe that typographic hierarchy plays a vital role in prioritizing the importance given to each information in a layout as it directs the viewer’s eye to take visual cues to read the material from the start to the finishing text.
From our session, I came across the relationship between scale, weight, texture, typefaces, choices and combinations, color, positioning, space, etc. when creating a layout; that helped me in my later assignment.
An important point I learned from this class was the selection of the combination of typefaces. I already knew the key factor of using a combination of serif and san-serif to reflect better contrast in a project. But after today’s discussion, I was able to comprehend another key point better i.e. to use typefaces of similar implied shapes or x-heights to balance out and create a contrast yet appealing hierarchy.
Relevant to the topic, I read a research article titled, “Analysis of English Typography in Pakistani Truck Art” by Hassan Ali Qureshi. The research opts for the critical analysis of the use of English typography is Pakistani truck art. While reading the article I came across a few interesting uses of typographical hierarchy to cater to certain issues in truck art. Culturally, the colors used for typography in Pakistani truck art are strikingly loud to grab attention and allow readability from a distance. However, the trucks which are involved in some illegal or any sort of suspicious activities, prefer black typography to avoid visibility and readability from a distance especially during the night. This point intrigued me and helped me comprehend how color can be a hierarchical game-changer in typography as well.
Another point that grasped my attention was the fact that the some truck drivers have to get English typography over their trucks for advertising, but due to their preference of Urdu over the English language; they get English typography from the back to the right side of the truck, and Urdu from the front to the left as the front and the left part is more exposed as compared to the back or right one. This shows how hierarchy can also be created by positioning and the arrangement of the text over the overall layout.
Organizing text can be a challenging thing if one is not sure of the combining techniques. The lecture on typographical hierarchy and the article that I read, made it more fun for me, that by applying different styles and type effects, I can easily achieve a flow with just type. It helped me to analyze how viewers read and digest information when using these techniques so that copy is organized and flows in a logical format for creating the most usable typographic layouts.
Article pdf link:
