Thanksgiving is around the corner and I just have to say that I am SO thankful for technology. I recently watched the movie “Helvetica” and recommend it for anyone who is a designer, thinking of becoming a designer or anyone who has a passion for legibility.
Helvetica is a feature-length independent film about typography, graphic design and global visual culture. It looks at the proliferation of one typeface (which recently celebrated its 50th birthday) as part of a larger conversation about the way type affects our lives.
It really opens your eyes about the history of typography not to mention the differing values that designers often have when it comes to choosing a typeface. The ultimate message I took away was: design is subjective.
Additionally, I stumbled across this clip below via “I love Typography” and I can’t imagine how much painstaking work went into the traditional method of printing. Thank God we don’t have to hand-craft paragraphs of text from hand-cut letters anymore. And complex layers are not to be feared!
Entry Filed under: Elsewhere
7 Comments
1. devolved… | November 24th, 2008 at 3:58 pm
The film Helvetica ruined me …
I now have an unhealthy obsession with the font and use the face pretty much on everything, but in my defense it’s not my fault … i didn’t make it so nice!
2. Zim… | November 24th, 2008 at 4:24 pm
It looks interesting, I’ll try to watch it. Thanks :)
3. crewzta… | November 24th, 2008 at 4:45 pm
When in doubt go use Helvetica.
4. john… | November 25th, 2008 at 4:04 pm
Two nice clips. I could recognize the Dutch in a sec :-)
The font is a champ in the movie of course.
5. Carlos Hermoso… | November 25th, 2008 at 10:55 pm
Nice one!
6. thaisie… | November 29th, 2008 at 9:53 am
indeed a great movie..
i liked also the part where someone explained how to create a font. so you have n which can be easy transformed to a h etc..
ps. the vimeo movie is not working.
7. mithridain… | December 20th, 2008 at 1:29 am
I bought a copy of the documentary after watching it.