Reddit reviews Designing with Type, 5th Edition: The Essential Guide to Typography

We found 9 Reddit comments about Designing with Type, 5th Edition: The Essential Guide to Typography. Here are the top ones, ranked by their Reddit score.

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9 Reddit comments about Designing with Type, 5th Edition: The Essential Guide to Typography:

u/quilford · 11 pointsr/design_critiques

I feel like you've been hammered here because of the amateurish nature of your work. Honestly though, I'm pretty sure that's why you came here, knowing that it wasn't up to par, and wanting to know how to change that. Here are some things that I would focus on if I were you:

Typography: By this, I don't mean using different typefaces, but rather the study of how to structure information in a legible manner. I work as a wireframer right now, and everything that I do is Arial. Because of that, I have a maniacal focus on size, leading, value, and block shapes to create a hierarchical system on a grid. A lot of it comes from practice, but I can also recommend some books, Thinking with Type, Designing with Type, Making and Breaking the Grid, and The Mac is Not a Typewriter. Typography is one of the most requested skills by design directors because it is hard and can be very bland, but it is absolutely vital for successful work.

Balance and Rhythm: When you are designing pieces, one of the important things to consider is the structure of negative and positive space. This structure influences the way that the piece is read, and the way that people move through the information. You seem to rely on center aligning things a lot, which is dangerous because it creates no action or movement. This topic isn't as advanced as typography so it's harder to give specific resources, but you can find information on this in any basic design text. I enjoyed Alex White's fundamentals book.

Style and Illustration: The type is amateurish, but what makes the work feel dated is the illustration style. When digital illustration was younger and the tools were rougher, the sort of illustration that I see in your portfolio was very common. The most recent trend has been "Flat", but honestly, anything that can complement or hide the digital nature of its creation can work. If you really would like illustration to be a continued part of your work, I would find some tutorials to really strengthen your Illustrator and Photoshop skills, perhaps stuff from Skillshare or Lynda, or even just internet tutorials.

In General: So to be blunt, you do have a long way to go, I'm not going to sugar coat that. That being said, you do have 2 things extremely in your favor right now.

You produce a lot of work. You're getting practice.
You know something is wrong. You're looking for a way to improve.

Ira Glass has a really incredible short piece about creative work that describes the place where you are caught right now. Your taste is not aligning with your skills. You have taken the first step in the right direction, so now you need to go study more and keep seeking critique (Not criticism). Whether that is on design_critiques, or from a colleague or friend doesn't matter. Find a place where someone who is better than you can tell you what isn't working and challenge your status quo.

Good luck, and keep at it!

u/michaellonger · 11 pointsr/typography

Not sure about websites, but these books are absolute must-reads for learning typography.

Thinking With Type

Designing With Type

The Elements of Typographic Style

u/smoonster · 4 pointsr/web_design

Books that helped me get started with design:
Designing with Type

Making and Breaking the Grid

Most of these books discuss working with printed materials, but the principles are the same in the web.

u/_Turul_ · 2 pointsr/graphic_design

u/extraminimal · 2 pointsr/typography

Zero experience?

If you have no experience in typography or design, I recommend learning typography as a starting point. Letterpress printing is a fascinating pursuit on its own, but you'll get much more out of it if you prepare yourself with a strong foundation in typography.

The cool thing about learning typography as it's more often practiced today is there's plenty of carryover from the metal type of a letterpress. Terms like leading and uppercase have meanings that transcend the physical medium, but relate to the history of applying typography with metal type. That's the best way to look at letterpress printing &mdash; it's a specific form of applied typography.

To learn how to use a letterpress without learning general typography is to learn penmanship without knowing a written language.

To get started, I recommend reading an introductory typography book:

http://www.amazon.com/Designing-Type-5th-Edition-Typography/dp/0823014134/

Practice a bit, then make your way through Bringhurst:

http://www.amazon.com/The-Elements-Typographic-Style-Anniversary/dp/0881792128/

Much of Bringhurst will be review, but you won't fully appreciate it without already having a basic comprehensive understanding.

Any learning you can do before touching a machine should be done. I recommend this path because working with a letterpress is time consuming and potentially expensive. If you jump straight into producing letterpress work without a typographic background, it will be of poor quality. You can learn the basics much faster digitally, while also gaining the eye that will help you when you move into letterpress printing.

u/occasionallurker · 2 pointsr/Design

if you don't own this, you should.

u/pixel_mover · 2 pointsr/graphic_design

https://www.amazon.com/dp/0823014134/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_m6MPyb1RTHSF2

You buy that book. And you read every page. Twice. Then you trace your name over and over in different fonts until your hands feel like they're going to fall off. Then you read the book again. Then you trace again until your hand blisters. You learn to use indesign. And about paragraph styles and character styles and rules. Hidden characters and soft breaks and hard breaks and en vs. em dashes and points and drop caps and tabs. And then you pick a book in the public domain, and you rag the whole damn text manually. Full page. Five column.

And when you've done that, you've put yourself through type I at an art school level. And you'll never look at letterforms the same again.

It's so, so worth it.

u/maksbarzo · 1 pointr/design_critiques

I agree about your photography and 3D designs. With a bit of work, you can turn these, or any other artwork into different design pieces. Simple things like CD covers, business cards, posters, can quickly beef up your portfolio.

Consider adding Typography to your extra curricular studies. A lot of your stuff that you think isn't portfolio worthy, might be after some thoughtful typesetting. Thinking with Type and Designing with Type are old standbys that are easily available.

u/CharlieL29 · 1 pointr/Design

I actually had to buy both books mentioned above as well as Designing with Type which is pretty good.

It's probably more of a beginner's book to typography (history of type, anatomy, terms and definitions, ect.), but I've enjoyed using it. Elements of Typographic Style and Thinking with Type are a little more advanced imo. All good books to have.