PS: I know some of the lines are a little jagged, so don’t bother commenting on that.

So the experiment is in challenging the boundaries of legibility? I can still read it, so you may not have gone far enough, though that “W” at the beginning was a stumbling block. I initially read that more as “lxl”. The rest is pretty clear.

why is ’your’ underlined? it feels forced, and the rule is not really in keeping with the lettering. maybe if it curved up or down on one end? but even then, the emphasis seems unnecessary, and sounds like “what’s in your wallet?”

It’s not really about challenging legibility. This is only part of the whole piece, and I’m looking for help on the design of the actual letters.

The first question to ask yourself is, “What am I trying to achieve with this piece”? Then you (and we) can have an idea of where you are going. It’s hard to critique something if we don’t know what the goal of the design is, or what the exhibition is about.

(Also, this type of query should be posted in the Critique or Design forums.)

It took me more than a minute to recognize the first word...

Richard:

I guess I should have explained better the the actual concept in the first place.
Think of the text as something temporary - the words will probably change. The subject of the exhibition is “in focus”, and my piece will be about what focus your life has.

I’m going to split the sentence into 4 parts, sort of like a puzzle. Each part will be printed on a transparent sheet. The four sheets are hanging from the roof on a straight line behind each other with 50 cm space between them. I’ll shrink the parts according to perspective, making the “whole picture” only visible from a certain point in the room.

Viewing just one of the sheets will not make any sense, and I’m trying to make it even more unrecognizable by building the letters with these lines and curves as seen above.

However, I’m actually only looking for help on improving the actual shapes of the letters.

> It’s not really about challenging legibility

Then it fails.

(Sorry, but I am not a big fan of illegible communications.)

Well thank you! I just asked for some HELP on improving my work, and all you can tell me is that it fails.

You state your objective is not to challenge legibility, The letter shapes you have chosen do exactly that. It succeeds at what your objective is not, so your true objective, if actually achieved, is not readily apparent. This can be interpreted as failure.

Your plan to break up the line of text on multiple planes is enough to make this difficult for the viewer. Don’t make it harder on them by using letter shapes that are not readily recognizable even when viewed from the angle that assembles the text. A simple geometric sans face such as a light weight of Futura should be enough if the letters are suspended in this multi-plane system.

Thanks for explaining the concept, Frank — sounds cool. As for the letter shapes, I too had a bit of trouble with W and only got it from the context. I feel that the a could use some changes too, maybe because the teardrop shape is a bit narrow. Also, there is less space between the strokes of the y than in the other characters shown here.

Thanks. That’s the sort of feedback I’m looking for. (Forgive me Don!)

As I tried to explain earlier, I want something initially abstract to shape words when viewed from a certain point. I feel a typical sans like Futura might be to easily recognized as text.

One thing I was thinking about after I posted my comments is that your strokes might be a bit thin if they will be seen from a distance... So you might want to do some testing with 1:1 prints, hanging them from a wall and stepping back to look at them.

“I guess I should have explained better the the actual concept in the first place.”
That helps, thanks. Now, I think this is brilliant. You’ve chosen an unforgivingly thin stem, a great challenge, well done. Stop. :)

Cheers!

I agree with Cuttlefish, though the advice may not be well-recieved. When I was at Cranbrook, there were plenty of designers (Alen Hori, Scott Makela) “destroying legibility.” Trust me, that is what you are doing. It’s cool, really. But the problem is we are not seeing a photo of the installation, but instead a screen shot of the “perfect” view of the letter forms. I doubt most viewers will recognize them as type when you further fragment them as you describe. Futura is a wonderful, amazing font. When you break it up it wil resemble clearly drawn lines and shapes. When you stand at the perfect spot, the cosmos will come into focus and you will get the “aha!” moment you crave.

H. Todd Duren,
designer. educator. yada yada

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