Johannes Gutenberg

Printing Press

Research from the Phillip B. Meggs, Alston W. Purvis - Meggs’ History of Graphic Design

Printing was created by the Chinese. This was the first form of printing. They created relief printing, spaces around an image being cut away, which left the remaining design printed with ink on paper. it would then be rubbed allowing the image to be transferred onto the the paper.

During the third century, the evolution of stamps for clay was created which was a hypothesis of how printing was created. During these chops were created and engravings which were usually calligraphic onto a flat surface such as Jade and silver then red ink made from cinnabar would form the impression these are like present-day stamps.

The second hypothesis is that the early Chinese practice of ink rubbings in stone qs was a permanent record. copies of these inscriptions were made by making ink rubbings on thin paper and then pressed onto the stone carvings to make the print.

In woodblock print, each character is cut away and in 1045 this process was extended which created the movable type which was used throughout Asia. characters were placed in a sequence allowing printing to happen. These types were made out of clay and glue. in Korea, bronze movable type was created as they were less fragile. This was created by cultures that have thousands of characters meaning that it allowed it to become widely used throughout the Far East.

After the Renaissance, the sharing of ideas came about which allowed the revolution of most types in Europe because of Johannes Gutenberg's invention which was more than 500 years after the Chinese

There was a demand for more books in Germany, France and the Netherlands, especially the bible. Johannes Gutenburg was a goldsmith and did an apprenticeship in engraving and metalwork which allowed him to come up with metal moulds that were interchangeable allowing for more than one use. In 1452 made an effort to produce the first graphic book which was the bible. Johannes Gutenberg was seen as a revisionary inventor as he used the skills of the Chinese to make up his printing press as he refined the original technology and the technique used.

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Typography Glossary

After reading the chapter in the textbook “Graphic Design in Context, Typography” by Denise Gonzales Crisp, I understood what these keywords mean and how they help to create and present different typefaces.

Typeface

These characters share the same visual appearance, including numbers, letters, punctuation and special characters. a typeface can be defined by strokes, counters and proportions. A typeface can have a type family. A family is the variations of the one typeface which can be the weight, proportion and posture.

San Serif

A San serif is a typeface that doesn't have a serif the end of the strokes do not have any perpendicular lines. some examples of san serif typefaces are Arial, Futura, and Helvetica.

Serif

A serif is a small perpendicular line that is at the end of a stoke. some serifs can be bracketed, different widths from where they meet the stroke

Slab Serif

A slab serif is a heavy unbracketed serif, these are normally thinker than the strokes that are used in the particular typeface.