So Hard Done By

Fontastic!

I have been in a real font mood ever since I saw Gary Hustwit's Helvetica movie a few months back, and on top of all that, hearing the news that TypeCon will be in Buffalo next Summer is awesome! Like I had previously mentioned, Jill and I attended the Toronto edition in 2002, and it was a lot of fun.

Anyway with fonts on the mind, I give you this little bit of font-geekery. Mark Simonson, freelance graphic designer and type designer from St. Paul, Minnesota (who started in graphic design in 1976- my kind of guy!) has published this interesting bit about movies using incorrect fonts. Fonts out of place, mostly fonts from different eras misplaced-- like fonts from the '70s appearing in movies supposedly set in the 40s?! Ha! Attention to detail- very important!

The article is called Typecasting: The Use (and Misuse) of Period Typography in Movies and it includes references to Chocolat-- set in the '50s using ITC Benguiat, a typeface which debuted in 1978 and was mainly popular in the '80s and Ed Wood-- set in the '50s using Chicago, the original Macintosh system font (TrueType version, 1991). It also details movies that have painstakingly correctly used period fonts as well.

Pretty font geeky, I must say. Read it/view it/click it hear.

Another cool article Mark Simonson has written is 'The Scourge of Arial".
You graphic freaks know what I am talking about.... Helvetica it ain't!