Bodoni - Typeface Poster

This was our first typography project, with Professor Jorge Montero.

I love typography because I’m a bookworm and have spent a great part of my life endlessly sifting through all sorts of letters and it is wonderful to finally sit down and see what’s behind their designs. 

Also, since illustration and typography cross over so often, I might as well learn both disciplines so I can do it myself in the future.

Anyway, we were given a typeface at random. I got Bodoni. Elegant, vertical, high contrast Bodoni.

We had to pretend this was a new typeface that we designed and are revealing to the world by means of a double-sided poster. 

Aaand here is the front:

(Click to view larger.)

And the back:

(Click to view larger.)

I chose purple since Bodoni is a very elegant typeface and purple is a regal colour. White so that the letters would enhance the natural contrast of Bodoni’s letterform and orange to stand out against the purple (instead of using the expected complimentary, blinding yellow.)  I also inverted the colours to stylistically relate the two sides.

This is the only graphic design class I've ever taken, so it felt really bizarre at first. Everybody went straight to designing on the computers and they were immediately consumed in this never-ending rhythm of clicks while I basically felt pretty castrated until I grabbed some pencil and paper and started sketching out my design by hand.

This may be because I'm an illustrator, but I feel that computers, while fast and efficient, highly limit the way you think about the design. Designing on a computer is a step removed from your senses. It is infinitely more intuitive to manipulate the letters with your bare hands instead of pressing keys and clicking on a mouse. Currently, I feel like computers are more of a tool that allow you to reproduce these designs cleanly and efficiently after the initial planning on paper.

Both front and back poster designs © Tatiana Dengo 2010.