Comments on: Found Typography

Found Typography

anastasiav — Thu, 22 Jan 2004 15:34:18 -0800

Found Typography
... and if you liked that, please also try Hundreds of Thousands, both from Itchy Robot

By: CrunchyFrog

CrunchyFrog — Thu, 22 Jan 2004 16:03:31 -0800

More found typography from James "Kibo" Parry, Usenet legend and former typesetter.

By: fenriq

fenriq — Thu, 22 Jan 2004 16:17:39 -0800

I don't get it, what's the point?

By: howa2396

howa2396 — Thu, 22 Jan 2004 18:14:50 -0800

Its a deeper observation of fonts and typography as found in our lives everyday and a more in depth look at an art we often fail to admire as we pass through the day.

By: romanb

romanb — Thu, 22 Jan 2004 18:20:09 -0800

It's also entertaining in the sports bloopers sense.

By: carter

carter — Thu, 22 Jan 2004 20:34:30 -0800

Nice, thanks, anastasiav. I don't think it was even found typography, but I liked the beemer with the "HAL 9000" licence plate. Not that I'm a fan of vanity plates, but I thought that was funny.

By: plep

plep — Fri, 23 Jan 2004 00:45:18 -0800

[this is good]

By: cortex

cortex — Fri, 23 Jan 2004 05:31:35 -0800

You know your kerning is too tight when the width of "Ti" is less than the width of "T". I remember being thrilled somehow when I found out that Kibo was a typography geek.

By: VulcanMike

VulcanMike — Fri, 23 Jan 2004 07:35:36 -0800

This is going to sound super-picky, but I expected this to be exclusively amateur typography in the wild. For example, the "Moscone Center" is only intriguing from a leading and kerning perspective, and the "Psychology Applied To Teaching" only demonstrates how the cover design looks on a bench. Or the Gogurt package? Perhaps I don't get it. I wouldn't take a poster of Starry Night out of someone's garbage barrel and call it found art. The recycling photo and others of the like are awesome, though.

By: jpoulos

jpoulos — Fri, 23 Jan 2004 08:09:36 -0800

It isn't earth-shattering stuff, but on some levels it's kinda cool. Sure, we're surrounded by this stuff every day, and we could probably look around right from where we're sitting and see all sorts of examples of this stuff. It isn't the typography itself that's cool, it's the act of putting them all together. By taking these everyday examples and removing all the context, we can actually focus on the typography--which we would otherwise ignore. Art is about context--it's about how images (not just visual images) relate to the "real" world. So this isn't Art (Typography). It's a study of the concept of Art (Typography).

By: itchyrobot

itchyrobot — Fri, 23 Jan 2004 10:25:58 -0800

Thanks for the link and all of the comments. It's always interesting to read people's reactions. So, the point. The point is to share things that I found interesting. I guess I'm interested in the fact that type is something that constantly surrounds us (and something that some people dedicate their lives to), yet to most people is completely invisible. VulcanMike, I found the shadows and the colors to be interesting on the Moscone Center sign, and the fact that they type's own three-dimensionality was what made it hard to read, not really the leading or kerning. I thought the Psychology Applied to Teaching book was intersting because it was such a clean, modernist design that had become tattered and degraded. And that the style of the cover was so dated. The Gogurt tube, well, I just thought the combination of Star Wars and a tube full of yogurt was kind of strange. Co-branding at its best. I wouldn't call finding a poster of Starry Night in the trash found art, but if you found an original painting in the trash, then I would, even if it wasn't of the quality of Starry Night (although the normal use of the term "found art" is to find objects and to combine them to create art).