The Professional Photoshop Book - Volume 7 2015

ENHANCE TYPE IN PHOTOSHOP

Of course, it’s one thing to design a few letters and

illustrate or animate one example of them being

used, it’s quite another to design a whole font of

your own. Indeed, “Designing a typeface is perhaps

the most difficult process in all of graphic design,”

says Mach. “A typeface has to be close to perfect,

which can take months or years to finish. The eye

for detail gets better with experience as well, so

there is a constant revisiting to get the weights,

terminals or counters of letters to work correctly

next to one another. After the letters are complete,

the kerning phase begins in a program like Fontlab,

which takes additional time. Thinking about how

letters work together in words and sentences helps

the most. A helpful professor once taught me the

best way to begin a typeface is to take inspiration

from something like a piece of architecture or a

subtle part of nature. Sometimes an idea can even

come from a single letter, sign or old poster that

does not have a full alphabet built out. It is the type

designer’s job to fill in the blanks.”

But whatever level and style of typography you’re

doing, Photoshop can be part of the process.

Alexander Klement says he “always works in a

non-destructive way with my Photoshop files. Smart

layers are my best friend, they are so useful in

keeping layers clean and manageable with lots going

on within the nested Smart layer. I also use

adjustment layers and on occasion Smart filters.”

Stankevich uses Photoshop “to enhance my

drawings with colour and to combine and

collage elements from different drawings into one

composition. I also use it to create patterns from the

artwork. My primary tool is the Brush with all its

various presets, as well as the Gradient tool for

colour effects. I also use masking and layer blending

I think colour plays a large

part in my lettering style,

so I like to be able to work in

colour from the start and

working in Photoshop means

than I play with a lot of different

colourways at the same time or

with a few clicks

LINZIE HUNTER / WWW.LINZIEHUNTER.CO.UK

JANELLE CUMMINS EXPLAINS HOW SHE COMBINES WORDS AND MOVEMENT

CASE STUDY: FEAR OF THE UNKNOWN

Motion graphics designer Janelle Cummins

created a piece in her final year at the

Savannah College of Art and Design called Fear

of the Unknown, and she enjoyed the freedom

it being a personal project gave her.

“While most of the project used typography

as texture,” she explains,”the very first scene

depended heavily on type for communication. I

chose to use a Moorish proverb to depict the

theme of ‘Fear of the Unknown’. I worked out of

sequence and designed my third and fourth

frames first so that I could get an idea of the

visual language of the piece. Once that was done, I

experimented with different computer generated

fonts. I looked at serifs, sans serifs, geometric,

slabs, basically everything in my font library.

Nothing felt personal or tactile enough for this

piece. So, I made the decision to use my own hand

crafted type. I used a computer generated

font to determine the layout, hierarchy, color

and size of the text. Once I was pleased with

this I rewrote everything with my own

handwriting and used the Pen tool to create

cutout paper letter forms. Using my own

handwriting was not the first solution I came

up with, but I am glad that it was the final

solution, as it personalised the piece.”

©

Bart van D

elft

M:“designing softer flourishes or nature-based explorations” S eth Mach says he has taken inspiration from Art Nouveau when

© Seth

Mach

Graphics & new media

152 The Professional Photoshop Book

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