The evolution and development of Chinese and English basic glyphs

Read a book, look at a newspaper, writing from the beginning of the emergence of its role to play its unshakable, full of each of us every day of life, but in the complex text design, to jump away from these designs, but also to see what the original text is like, cherish their every time the metamorphosis ...

　　Chinese font of the song body

The beginning of Chinese writing, as in Egypt, was evolved from pictures and hieroglyphics. But its evolution is different. The evolution of Chinese characters has always maintained the original painting or symbol content, only in the formation of more text, on the basis of the original text, to make a variety of combinations, in order to form more text, which is unique in the history of world culture. The development of Chinese characters, after the reunification of China by Qin Shihuang, Chinese characters have been a series of simplified, standardized processing. Before the appearance of the plank printing, ancient classics in order to circulate the need can only hand copied, because the manual transcription cost high efficiency bottom, easy to make mistake, so the plank printing gradually prevails. In this way, in order to create a convenient, gradually engravers invented a new font, it is characterized by: Zigzag founder, horizontal straight thick. There are small triangular decorations at the turning point. This font is more standard than italics and becomes a standard font for large-scale use. This is no doubt a new font that has evolved from italics in order to carve a book. Because this kind of typeface is popular in the Song Dynasty after the engraving of the woodblock printing books, posterity called this feature of the font is "song body." Italicized word from its history, its characteristics have been fixed and used until modern times, until the mechanized printing industry has emerged. In modern printing to distinguish more detailed, the horizontal thin vertical thick into the "old song body." The character of the font Fangzheng, strokes horizontal vertical, horizontal thin vertical thick, angular, well-structured, neat and uniform, there is a strong stroke regularity, so that people in the reading of a comfortable and eye-catching feeling. In modern printing mainly used for books or newspapers in the body part. Italicized word inherited the aesthetic charm of Chinese calligraphy, and still maintained the essential features of Chinese calligraphy in strokes. In comparison with Tang Kaizhi Ging, we can see more clearly, such as point, NA, skimming and turning the duncuo processing, is the calligraphy brushwork a high degree of artistic generalization.

Figure 4 Fonts In addition to the first of the most conservative of the old song body, the other 3 are derived from the italicized word body, we can see that the first two kinds of chest line is larger (the font is relatively open), which is the obvious comparison of modern fonts, and the back two font chest line is relatively small, biased to traditional fonts. Traditional XXFarEastFont-Arial, it can be seen that there are many characters of italics in it, red small circle inside the triangular scale (small triangular decoration) relatively rigid, is the angular geometry of the composition, although the sense of rigor but people feel too serious and formal, so in the use of modern design, We are more inclined to use other italicized word shapes. Compared with the traditional song body, the scale of the long song body is not so sharp, stop the pen at the point of the pause twist, look mellow a lot. The long song body looks more long than the general song body, that is to say, the chest line is relatively small, it's horizontal, vertical thickness similar, point, skim, NA, pick, hook more straight, comprehensive old song and imitation characteristics. Large standard song, it is characterized by the contrast between the two strokes is obvious, strokes moderate weight, not so tough, straight style, eye-catching, often used in the text title, cover and advertising design, with a modern sense (similar to the thick lining line, the following will be mentioned). Song, the biggest feature is all the same width ", the style is more inclined to handwriting, it is in fact the Huizong of the book of the Thin Gold font evolved, features are thin straight, horizontal draw pen with hook, vertical stroke with points, such as dagger, such as cutting knife, vertical hook slender; If the Song Dynasty is a representative font with decorative art, Then the opposite is the black body, the black body is characterized by horizontal and vertical line width equal, remove too much decorative details, more concise. Because of the development of the printing industry at that time, the main body is used in the song body, want to highlight the title part of the development of bold.

The blackbody itself belongs to a more modern font, so its literal and chest lines are relatively large, this is easier to read, according to different needs, the design of the horizontal strokes of different thickness of the black form, the most basic is the first, slender bold characters to light, delicate feeling, thick bold word to people heavy, stout, the feeling of strength, These glyphs are designed according to different needs. In addition to the two basic glyphs of XXFarEastFont-Arial and blackbody, there are many different kinds of Chinese glyphs, such as

PS: The lining of the word will be mentioned later, because the lining and no liner body is the development of western fonts, applied in the Chinese style, the song is the lining of the body, the black body is no liner.

　　There is no liner in the English font

The process of the creation of the western alphabet, through the evolution of Egypt → Phoenician → Greece, finally in the Roman body, by the Western world widely used to now and popular in the world. With the production of movable type, more and more designers strive to create beautiful and more readable fonts on the basis of the original Roman, and now the alphabet used in Europe, called the Latin alphabet or Roman alphabet, is the most widely used letter in the world. The English alphabet is generally divided into liner body (serif), sans serif (sans serif) and other fonts. Serif font, which means that there are additional decorations at the beginning and end of the stroke, and that the strokes are different in thickness. The opposite of the sans-serif is without these extra decorations, and the strokes are about the same thickness. The modern lining appeared at the end of 18th century, emphasizing the strong contrast between the coarse and thick strokes, which aggravated the vertical painting and made the lining line slender. Most modern liner bodies are less readable than old body and transition liner bodies.

Lining body can be divided into traditional and modern fonts, the above image of the traditional lining (left) and the modern lining body (right)

The traditional liner body, see the most slender part of the letter S, with a red dashed dotted line can be seen that its finer parts always remain tilted, that is, the thickness of the stroke is changed, it looks more traditional, this is a basic style. and modern liner body, stroke thickness always take care of the same state, relatively more rational, mechanical, standardized feeling. Then look at the base bracket (I will call it the stent) the traditional bracket its stroke connection is curved, and the modern is straight geometry, this can also be understood as a kind of opposite of perceptual and rational presentation way.

No liner body can be divided into 3 categories, the order of the above figure is classical sans-serif, transitional sans-serif, modern sans-serif

Classical sans-serif are the same as traditional Arial, the most prominent feature is more decorative details, the bottom has a bracket (but because it is no liner, strokes will not appear on the obvious radian, the shape of the comparison geometry, a point of strength) transition sans serif font is between the classical and modern zigzag, The biggest feature is that both the sense of modern sense and concise feeling also without losing sensibility slightly strokes, slender delicate feeling. You can see the red circle part of the second in the figure above, its rotation, the same thickness distribution at the pause. Modern sans-serif fonts are characterized by a balance between strokes and a symbol of rationality.

In traditional text printing, it is generally accepted that the lining has a better readability (compared to sans serif), especially in large passages, where the line increases the visual reference to the letter when reading. Sans serif are often used in headings, shorter text passages, or some entertainment. But as modern life and trends change, today's people are becoming more and more likely to use sans-serif because they look "cleaner". Sans serif fonts are also readable when the text is large enough. And because sans-serif fonts are usually artistic, it is often pleasing to display on a display, and there is a lot more to it than serif fonts, so there is a lot of room for choice.

In addition to the absence of serif, there are other fonts: for example, some of the more curly, close to the nature of the Baroque style handwriting, and some in order to meet the design styles of distorted fonts

From these basic glyphs we can find: The text in the process of development, but also constantly experienced to the process of simplifying. The establishment of Bauhaus school, the impact of industrial product design thinking mode, so that people in the process of design from the past advocating natural, complex process culture separation, design in the bud, from industrial products to graphic arts, are reflected.

Here is a look at the application of these glyphs in real life:

The English font in the image above is a modern liner body, "hair line", it is characterized by meticulous line, looks very flat, thick and thin lines contrast clear, clear, with a modern sense.

The title section above is a traditional sans serif of a zigzag, the screen reflects a similar to the traditional industrial production of the screen, in the selection of fonts in order to meet the needs of the atmosphere at the time, and can highlight the theme, the selection of the thick lining line, coarse strong and very classical.

The title above is a completely modern, sans serif style, with a layout that is horizontally designed, font on the selection of a relatively slender sans serif body, visual center point is also in the center, and the left side of the screen has echoes of the details of the design, and the smaller the echoes of the word cavity larger font, relatively easy to read, but the visual center point is relatively scattered some, People's sight will be more open.

Relative to the above glyph, this book design because it has only text, so need to use text to control the entire layout. In this case, the most important information at the information level is the thicker, chest line larger font, the use of strokes and the contrast to attract more attention; two very extreme weight of the font together, with this contrast to highlight the prominent, weakening the weakening, but not the space to support full.

This invitation, above, uses curly handwriting to make people feel very close, lively and cheerful.

This is a Japanese poster of the font, ancient Chinese writings like the use of vertical row, from right to left to arrange, Japan until now still adopted, the above image of this font is similar to the Chinese song body of the thin Gold book font, to maintain its stroke characteristics at the same time, it will be more smooth processing, and a lot of natural feeling of intimacy.

This is actually a Li Yongji book cover, because he is in the book to share his growth path, tell how personal experience or the background of the impact of his brand design ideas, so the cover should appear on his brand packaging. In order to cater to the overall design temperament, the title does not appear in the thick, coarse-linear blackbody, which is too powerful, but chooses the medium-black with moderate strength, which appears to be slender and moderate, and where the font of the contrast is interspersed; attention is drawn to the rhythm of power, and there is no sense of forced reading. The design of vertical line is very traditional.