Typography Workshop
As a graphic designer, I feel it is important to practice passionately in your own free time as well as design professionally for a living. My passionate practice usually takes the form of lettering or typography and from time-to-time I’ll take a class or workshop to help me further my skills. Last weekend I was lucky enough to score a place in a class at WorkShop in Redfern run by amazing Australian Typographer Luke Lucas.
I’ve been admiring Luke’s work since university when I would read and collect LifeLounge magazine, so to have a chance to learn from him was an opportunity I didn’t want to miss. And I wasn’t disappointed.
To start, Luke talked us through his work progress and gave us an overview of how he approaches designing a type piece and what techniques he employs in his craft. He made a point to mention that the three most important factors to consider in any typography work are:
- Who is your Audience?
- Where is the piece being used? and
- The Hierarchy of the information or words.
Other interesting tid-bits I took away from the class include:
- Lettering is a wonderful way to express meaning on a deeper level than just what the words say
- Use known design cues to help express meaning/qualities, such as props, gestures, different materials etc.
- Lighting effects are a great way to add depth to your design
- Consider using a mix of ‘everything’ (type, illustration and photography) in a lettering piece.
Luke then showed the class how to achieve some of his recognisable techniques including ribbon effects, “toothpaste” type and constellation lettering in Photoshop and Illustrator. It was a great class, and I got to meet some really nice people who also love type.
You can check out Luke’s work on his Behance profile.
Emma