Intro: I am in the Amazon Design Leadership and
Neil Summerour: I'm the 2016 chair for the board; we started off earlier today with workshops and thanks for being here, and now I hand over to Carol
Carol Waller (TDC): I'm the executive director of TDC, its 33 years now for typecon, and I'm very happy to be here too. Its a membership organization, its 70th anniversity, and we now have weekly (was month) and are most well known for our competitions. Our communication design winners are here at typecon and you'll see our exhibit in the gallery here. 17 countries, 42 cities, and its amazing. The 20th Type Competitoin starts in mid September. Get online for early bird pricing. http://www.TDC.org We sponsored TypeCon since 2009 and its exciting to introduce award winning type designer from Lebanon, Nadine, who is now in London. She has a MATD and PhD Leiden, her work is featured in the 5th edition of graphic design history by Meggs and selected by FastCo as one of the most creative people in business.
Nadine: Good evening. Thanks for being here and to Carol introducing and SOTA and Amazon for brining this together. I thought when they invited me to open the conference I thought, wow I am OLD ;)
I was told this presentation is a little more personal than normal. So I won't show you my vacation photos, but its different to a talk on the main program. I've spoken at TypeCon before, this is different.
Disclaimers! I am talkabotu about politics and design. These political views are my own views, as a company Monotype is not engaged in politics but as a person I have my views. I wish we all would talk more about politics. I am one of 4 type directors at Monotype, we are encouraged to be different in our views.
One more disclaimer; I hope what I say is not insulting to people, if it is critical. Half the people might not like what I have to say, if this is a blue or a red state... Well, one reason I wanted to talk about politics is that my believe is that our typefaces can not be separated from the reality we live in. Type is an ingredient and there is a dialog between type and life.
First the reality, then the typefaces. I have 147 slides! Brace yourselves ;)
Article, "Making sense of one particular reality" by Bobby Azarian, Neuroscientist. You heard of Apple changing the gun into a toy gun. This is not an isolated incident; design has a strong role in shaping the conversation of the day.
Why is Trump so popular? This article talks about neuroscience; its not policy, not expertise, its simply trying to understand why he has massive support. One thing he talks about, google this article and you'll find it. "People who lack expertise don't have the expertise to know they don't; theyre not smart enough to realise they're dumb." These people are unaware that they are misinformed and expert opinoin won't sway them. #facepalm.
Trump says he'll build a wall, experts
So, there was Brexit. One of the politicians said, summing up the reality today, "people are tired of experts." Its a sad thing but true. People think it isn't important. As experts in our field its a sad reality, the lack of trust in instituions and experts. Another thing he talks about: Study found that conservatives have a stronger physiological reaction to startling noises. The reaction is automatic, and not a political thing, its a fact. To link it to politics, McCain said "what he did was he fired up the crazies." It is Terror mamagement theory: "WHen people are remidned of their mortality, they ... they act out more aggressivily towards those who don't". If you give a group 1/2 red shirts and 1/2 green shirts, people will bond with the same color shirt people. It takes effort to bond with people who are not like you, don't live like you. So when we are afraid, we are regressing back to base instincts.
The people who are dying from terrorist incidents is not as high as the media makes it appear. In the 100 days of obama's term, they had a montage of scary stuff, the political discourse on Fox News was all fear and terror; there was never such disrepect of a president in any era, it is a shameful thing. If you are scared if your own state and terrorists, well, what can you do. There is a climate of fear. For many years, people on the right want to criticise Obama, calling him hitler, with very silly comparisons. It is scary when someone running for president is really using nazi imagery, and you can't use the n word, nazi, against him. There's a good interview with John Stewart about the rise of Trumpism.
Trump is not an isolated incident; Palin was the case last time. It has got crazier and crazier; there is this Colbert "truthiness" where things feel true, eg that crimes are getting worse and worse, but the stats are showing crime is actually down. Its a fact people are afraid, it FEELS like that. We are at the point that where something FEELS true, then it is true. People don't distinguish between feelings and facts and when an entertainer can drive people's feelings, that's where we are now. That's scary.
So we listen to people speaking, and we vote, and we forget and then it cycles again. A voting record vs campaign promises. I can not believe a patriotic party like the Republicans can cut the benefits to the 911 veterans. It is a disgrace. So it is important to look at their promises about what they will do if elected.
There is power we can have, taking ownership of the consequences. B H C T. For people who were supporting Bernie, I feel the Bern too, but he didn't get the nomination. People don't want to vote for Hilary either, but I think we must vote for the program, not just the person. I encourage you to get the vote out, don't just vote but help your friends and family to vote; I can't tell you what to vote, but if I was voting here I would keep my conscious and vote for the party that is't crazy. Maybe you can go on vacation, maybe to Mexico, and find that Mexican people are not all racists.
Why am I saying this today? Beacause the crazy is always louder than the sane.
Politics is everything. It isn't just what is happening in London or Washington, and while it can be divisive, I think its important to get engaged in politics, not just every 4 years or 5 years nationally but also in
Obama said at the DNC, when he mention Trump, "Don't boo, vote!" That's it for the politics introduction. I hope it wasn't too painful.
Now on to design. I was stressed about this section. We are here for design, not politics. If trump is voted in, I want to know that I did everything I could to stop him being voted in.
So, why we design? I want to start with why I design.
I lived in Beirut 1978, and 1975 - 1990 it was the civil war. I attanded American University of Beirut in 1996 to study graphic design, on the heels of a country that was destroyed. I took typography classes. But we had a shocking reality: poor typogrpahy and gorgeous calligraphy. Very expensive but very poor typefaces. And amazing calligraphy. I had a great teacher, here he is. He taught me calligraphy, and he has been my mentor.
What caught my eye was the early Kufi; I knew softer, rounder letters. But this is powerful, strong, clean, it had a sense of modernity. I thought wow, it is possible that we arabs could be modern, because we had it before. I wanted to see modern typography in arabic. If you only have classical letterforms you do not have the voice you need. If you cannot speak about being contemporary, belonging to this century, taht the future if yours, you do not belong to 200 or 500 years ago. If you only keep that classical style, you are always in the desert riding a camel. I wanted something new.
No Expression; No Voice; No hope; No future.
This is a typeface I did for a [firm?] in Melbourne. There is this harmony between the text and the type.
At Reading I was asked to design other scripts; its not Pokemon Go, I'm not collecting scripts. I want better Arabic type to make visual communication better in the middle east; I don't care about other countries.
Its not about design for the sake of design, its not about yet another exotic script.
Here is Edward SOMEONE. He spoke at the AUB when I was a student, and he said he came "not to talk about the clash of civilizations but a dialog between them, peaceful but critical between equals, rather than a belligerent screaming match." This was in 2000, before 911 and ISIS. It got worse and worse since then. The solution is never more drones and bombinb. We should solve the root problem, not the symptoms. He asked, "who am I? What am I to do? This is not for philospohers but for every citizen. You can't hide inside your profession and say, I'm a doctor and all I want to do is get on with it." You are a citizen first.
So, the majority of my work is about the harmony and dialog of Arabic and Laitn, so you can put them on the same page and not have a clash. First I did Koufiya, the first time a person did both scripts at once to be in harmony. In 2003, it was early! The idea was to have Arabic and French or English together, the Latin always looks great, and you put the Arabic small so you can't see how badly they are done.
It effects your sense of self.
You guys have better type. Its hard to explain to people whose typography is amazing what is like to have only horrible choices. This is the only Latin design I made; as so many can do a better job than me. You have to accept there are more skilled people when it comes to Latin - and Arabic! I'm not saying I'm the best ;)
So after MATD I was offered a job at Linotype and when I got the offer at ATypI Vancouver, I asked JPF what he thought; "he said there are 2 gods at typography, Zapf and Frutiger, and they both worked at Linotype." So I said yes. Next ATypI was in Helsinki. Some people thought I gave up something by going corporate by not doing my own studio. I got a EU visa after 2 applications, and worked with amazing people like Frutiger to do Arabic versions of his typefaces, and t do 3 projects with Hermann Zapf... that was the best work experience I had, to sit with them and see how they see. You see their finished project and how they go about solving the problems. The finished product is a finished product, but the APPROACH is something you can take to many projects. There is more to learn there than in the results of a design process.
Here is Frutiger Arabic. Its a hybrid of Kufi and Nashk styles. Univers Next ARabic, another hbrid. DIN NExt Arabic, omre Kufi, and when you remove the pen influnce from both scripts you can get a closer match. Palatino Arabic. Palatino Sans Arabic. This is a small selection of the work I did.
I looed at my favourites of Linotype's bestsellers and made my Arabic version of them. I got a better undersatnding of how they work. The design at tthe end of the day is the little details but also the structure. How the typeface is built. Whatever meat you put on the skeleton, the base shows through.
I am in a school of though that looks at strucutres, movements, not thicks and thins.
I am also asked why I stay with Monotype. Could I move back for my family, and have a home. I've been there 11.5 years, and they are a family for me now too. I have family in USA and Canada too, but I have a family in Europe now, and these typefaces are my babies. Perhaps it is my 5 years in marketnig, I tend to tell people I will stay as long as there is something to learn, and I can change roles.
So, respectfully, things have been weird when it comes to MT and the type indusry in the last few yeras. We have been trashed. Sometimes correctly and sometimes incorreclty, openly or behind closed doors, and some is gournded and some is not. I think its a bit unfair. Humans are not perfect. When you have any family, the more people the more imperfect as they compaound. MT is not going anywhere and we dont want type designers to go awnywhere, so I want us to talk face to face and not hide behind twitter handles.
There is a lot of vitriol in politics globally, and in type. Some will talk to us privately and construcitvely. Its fine to disagree but I think there is more results in conversation instead of grandstanding. So, lets be more friendly. We live off one another, the ecommerce channels are there for indepdendent foundires. In some cases, the criticism is valid for me personally. BUt sometimes its not. And then it is a lack of undersatnding of the busienss.
There have never been as many talented type designers as there are today. At the same time, we are not dedicated to discussing the business of font licensing. People who are starting don't have much to read abot how to set up a foundry, how to sign a contract, what there should be in such a contract. That is a shame and needs to change. One of the things I wanted to talk about is that... well, I wan't talk about sex or guns, but its everything else I ever wanted to say. I'll be checking twitter afterawrds!
So, we all need to know how to protect our fonts! I read the contracting license agreement of another foundry, I love their work, a respectable agreement. They don't mention the trademark at all. That is the ONLY thing you can protect. But they have no mtnion who registers is, etc. But there was a mention of copyrigt. In the USA the type is not protected. The contract says the type belongs to the designer. But the data? Not stated. Who owns all the work done on the file?
I was hired by Bruno Steiner. He had a 'Garden of Type' presentation that he gave a few times, and he mentioned this image. "Type designers are like scribes, they love what they do, are not involved in the buisness side, and we pay our rent from our fonts, so there is no shame in talking about this."
100% of $100 = $100
50% of $100 = $50
50% of 50% of $100 = $25
25% of $100 = $25
Revenue vs End User Price
Direct vs Indirect
Market Reach
So, if you have 50%, is that 25% of the EUP or the foundry's revenue from the reseller?
I heard of a support call where the customer said the font wasn't working, and they were told to uninstall the font, and they deleted their whole fonts fodler.
I hrard of a customer unhappy with a font that supports cyrillic; he thought that a font with cyrillic could translate english to russian, and when he realised it couldn't do that, he wanted a refund.
So, if you are selling your own fonts directly, you get 100%. if you sell through a reserller as your own foundry, you get 50%. If you sell to a foundry, and they sell on a reseller, you get 25%.
But you have to think about the other factors, like market reach. Understand the different terms. Revenue vs EUP, what the foundry makes versys the EUP. You think doing your own foundry you get 100% but not $100 because you have to pay those support costs and so on.
You want to draw type all day? but you must do support? so, we should tell the next generation not what to do, but explain the math, how do you want to spend your time, doing customer support or designing? What you need to undersatnd is we have so many new designers every year, all the programs, and our community must formalize the community. Its not just the serif and where it came from.
Undersatnd the difference between a foundry and a distributino channel. We don't talk baout htis eough. There is a challenge of standing out. There are 100,000s of fonts. There is no 1 answer. Some make a name from themselves; it isn't just the quaity of the design. Its also the marketing of tyepfaces. How can we inspire people? When clients come to us, they want popular things, easy solutions. But we want experiments, new things. So we must find ways to talk about geting beyind specimens and microsites. I don't say "don't use helvetica" - definitely do use Helvetica! :) - but sometimes graphic desigenrs are too conservative in their choices.
So, introduction over ;) Joking :) There is a question of design space. Are we just filin gin the gaps? Who is aware of this recent controversy? ABout half. OK, there was the Emigre interview and the Klim Type response and others. Its a great topic, we should talk about this. Are we just filling in the gaps or is there really new spaces to explore? Show of hands? Everyone here is hopeful!
This is many questions in one. What is the design conversation today? We must design in a way that is relevant to people's lives. Where are we in the undersatnding of what happens in other parts? What happens in science? What is the mood of today? Social media, are being connected or not conected?
What are we contributing? Does anyone want what I am making? No one has to use a font. People decide. When we are thikning of these things, are we enabling people to say something they could not say before?
If it is similar to Helvetica with a twist, is that a problem?
well, words are meant to speak; that is what typefaces enable. its that moment of choice that typefaces lieve.
What makes a good typeface?
- Craft, how well is it done
- Cretaivity, how original is it
- Funitonality, what features does it provide
- Performance, how well do these features actually work
- Personalty, the voice it tries to do
There is an old Egyptian play, a guy enters the sauna without his glasses, and says, "I feel and I apologies, I feel and I apologies." ;)
So I didn't have this problem in Arabic as it is a green open field, to be unique is easy, but for Laitn, now I manage latin designers, I must be careful of this, as I don't want the designers I work with to step on toes.
What do we do in a crowded room that fills up? Do we get people out of it or do we push on the walls?
What makes it one of the Great? Zeigeist is a german word, the spirit of the times, and there is also timelessness.
So I had to look at the relation of Arabic and Latin, and the key for me is how the typfaces move. I look at how the typeface is moving, and that is liberating. If I say a German Text Sans Serif, then 90% of your decisions are made. Same with any category. If you use an existing category, you sit in a fixed room that gets more and more crowded.
I think a better way to start is with function, what is it meant to do, then you look at structure and movemment that can give you that.
Today I am drwaing headlines. I make a hairline even for designs where it is not needed by the client. It gives you a naked view of type design. There is a liberation in that. Then we look at the strcutre around that. Is it slow? Fast? Is it open? Strucured? Organic? what modulation? what treatmenent?
First you define the strcurre. Then the mvoement. That is now how I look at Arabic.
So I only supervising Latin. I am looking in fomr the outside. I am aware that there is a crowded room and I am outside looking in through a window. what i try to do, my answer since my PhD is first you research then we talk. So 2014 to 2015 I looked at the MyFonts Best Of, the TDC winners, and recent MATD and T&M works, and I categorised them based on movement.
The Sans: The workhouses. What we expect them to look like. 140 typefaces, I know maybe 5 :) The black and white are typographica, the red and blue are myfonts, and the others are TDC.
The Serifs: There were few overlaps in the typefaces on this list. Workhorses. This is just 1 hour of picks, not a PhD.
The Slabs.
The Friendlies. There is something cuddly about these. If a client says their brand is happy and friendly, they want these, could be sans or serif. There different kinds of friendly. This is more contemporary, you don't see them 200 years ago.
The Unexpected Families. You take the decision out of the designer's hand. Normally they have to pick a few fonts to work together. These, have so many styles that are all meant to go together. In the past they were separete families, not there is a single superfamily with a huge range in funcitoality. The distressed styles are very trendy now. Slabs, serifs, condensed, scripts... The type designers are versatile to do all these things.
The Corner. They have a wink, in there is some abuot changes in movement. Noe Text, Monster, etc.
The Experimental. This is my least favourite; when I say I want more experiemtnal types, I want workhorses with new solutsion. Here I mean, deconstructing the structure. It looks strange but sometimes you need that. They are hard to use in many ways, they are narrow.
The Wild. This is experiemntal pushed all the way, wher ethe letterforms are alsmost illegible.
The Broken. The movemnt does not continue; the movement is not just a corner, but a complete break in direction. Like a car bunnyhopping and stalling.
The Brush. What you get John Downer to do. There are many families based on brush scripts. Really interesting what happens here.
The Lush. Gorgeous curves. Clymer's Obsidian.
The Organic Cupcakes. The instagram fonts. THe hipster restaurants. The 2016 look. These typefaces are SO popular on MyFonts. Always in the top 50. Smomeone is lookig for this voice, and the question is, when someone wants a serif design that has that voice? Its open for us all to work on.
So... Is our design space crowded? Yes and no. Some areas, you push 5 units one way and its this and 10 units the other way its that... but looking at type that is the best today, there is a lot of creativity, its amazing. can we bring that skill and craft to the crowded space that we have? Sometimes it feels that what we think is right is not what our customers think is right?
Where do we look for inspiration? Each find inspratino somewhere. The space expands when we push the walls and experient, yes do hybrids, but do unexpected things too. its ok to fail, you do many typefaces and you will have some successes. you cant take it too personally. There is a lot of us, and if design space gets too crowded then we wont have room for us all.
Like in japan, someone was stuck under a train and all the people on the train got out to push it out of the way.
That's what we need to do.
Q and A
John Berry: I was thinking of the type in the last sections. Could these change the discourse, as you were talking in the earlier part?
NC: I would like to see that.
John Hudson: Hullo. I almost jumped up to clap when you say, if you are going to draw a typeface in a category you are already stuck. But then you brought along a lot of categories. Can you take an approach that doesn't use categories?
NC: I wanted to compare controlled vs uncontrolled typefaces. If we want to design... I have an internal design team where I banned the phrase geometric sans. We say, it should be serious. It should be wide because x. So we make the design decisoins without using existing genres. I won't say this works effectively, its an approach. But I want to say, lets forget what we know. In playing Piao, you learn the notes, then you unlearn the notes and learn to just play. We have many skilled type designers who internatlised what makes a letterform work. If they break those boundaries and unlearn what they know, maybe they can work outside categories.
??: There are movement to make handwriting as type, restore a metal type someone found in a basement...
NC: Its romanticism of type. If you loved their work, your connection to the handwriting is emotional. it keeps part of them alive.