Chapter 8
Designing Type
End of Chapter Review Answers
1. What questions should you consider when planning a new font design?
You need to ask yourself who, what, where, when, why and how:
• Who will use this font, and who will read it?
• What characters will be included in this font? Uppercase? Lowercase? Will you include numerals,
2. What kind of research should you conduct before beginning to design a font?
Research for designing a new font should include viewing and studying as many typefaces as possible. Visit
the web sites of existing foundries to view their online catalogs and to order their printed catalogs. Go to a
3. What preliminary decisions will help ensure consistency in the design of your character set?
4. Why would you choose one rendering method over another? Explain an appropriate use for each method
discussed.
You should choose one rendering method over another based on your intended look and feel for the font, and
also upon how you plan for it to be viewed . A typeface design that is to look calligraphic or hand stamped
5. What are overshoot guidelines and what is their use?
6. Discuss the legal and moral implications of reviving or modifying an existing font.
When reviving or modifying an existing font it is important to give the original designer credit if known. A font
7. Which letterforms can be derived from which other letterforms?
From the letterform I you can derive J, T and H.
8. Describe three optical illusions that will influence the way you design specific letters.
Circles and triangles look smaller than squares of the same size so it is necessary to slightly enlarge circular
9. How can you test the characters and spacing of your font? When should you perform these tests?
10. Why is kerning important to font design?
11. Describe three specimen formats and their most appropriate uses.
Possible answers:
Line specimens– showcase a typeface, one line at a time. A line specimen can include any number of
measures of type, and can display type style or size variations, or both. Sometimes the letters appear
alphabetically. Other times they are arranged to spell words in English, Latin, or other languages. Content of