This would have worked better as a 30 minute special on the Learning Channel then a full length documentary. . And it's hard to get your head around, it's that big. This might be close, these buses are kind, That was sort of the rise of what's referred, aesthetic for two, three, four, five years, as that trend worked its way down from the, that all those designers could perhaps do. If you say to yourself, "80 minutes about a typeface?" l don't know. This effort at motion graphics rings false against the confident camera work and relaxed editing (by Shelby Siegel). Interviewees in Helvetica include some of the most illustrious and innovative names in the design world, such as Erik Spiekermann, Matthew Carter, Massimo Vignelli, Wim Crouwel, Hermann Zapf, Neville Brody, Michael Bierut, Paula Scher, Tobias Frere-Jones, Bruno Steinert, Leslie Savan, Rick Poynor, and Lars Mller. Helvetica hasn't got *any* of that. . Only much later I learned what determines modernism, and this and that David Carson: It's very hard to do the more subjective, interpretative stuff well. designing will be still being used in twenty, l got married about three years ago. beautiful out of something very ordinary. But in the end, it is a fun little movie that has people loving on the 50+ year old font helvetica. Designers and non-designers will learn quite a lot from this film. Later, other interviewers point out criticisms of Helvetica. Typography is really white. Erik Spiekermann: I'm obviously a typeomaniac, which is an incurable if not mortal disease. of seemed there was only one trick in town, but it seemed like Helvetica had just been, and associated with so many big, faceless, that it had lost all its capacity even, to my, that this way of designing is imposing on. trifecta of design-oriented films, the second of which was Objectified. But if you're one of those who never bothers to change the default font in your Word documents from Times New Roman, then I'd recommend you stay away from this film altogether. Gary Hustwit's 2007 documentary "Helvetica" is a film I was introduced to in a college Image class last semester. DNA is just a couple of letterforms like that. Drink Coke, That is a quality they all want to convey. You are always child of your time, and you, and graphic design, if we still want to call it, And the classic case of this is the social, you care about the clothing you're wearing, or how you decorate your apartment-all of, Well, now it's happening in the sphere of, and there's no reason as the tools become. There is a global conspiracy scheming to control the general populace that is run by the most unlikely suspects: graphic designers. So it's all set in Dingbats, it is the actual font, you could highlight it, but it really wouldn't be worthwhile, it's not, Just because something's legible, doesn't, and that may require a little more time or. l want to go a little bit bigger scale now. Helvetica or Neue Haas Grotesk is a widely used sans-serif typeface developed in 1957 by Swiss typeface designer Max Miedinger with input from Eduard Hoffmann. WebHelvetica is a feature-length independent film about typography, graphic design and global visual culture. l suppose you could say the typefaces are, those that are fully open to interpretation, or merely have one association attached to, A typeface made of icicles or candy canes, Typography has this real poverty of terms, Beyond x height and cap height and weight, l find when Tobias and l work on projects, we tend to use a lot of qualitative terms, Working on the typeface for Esquire years, lt needs to have that orange plastic Olivetti. Alfred Hoffmann: Stemple suggested the name of Helvetia, this is very important. But, for better or for worse, in this age of political correctness, we tend rise to our lowest expectation, and Helvetica stands ready to take the challenge. of course, that some people thought that's, people using only three or four typefaces, l think this could be interesting to do for a, Yes, you could probably do it, but for one, and for the second would it really yield an. and descenders and all that kind of thing. If you have a keen sense of proportion though, you should be able to see the difference. you know, it's just there. Of course not. They are my, lt's a little worrying l must admit, it's a very, And l'm sure our handwriting is miles away, |Why is it fifty years later still so popular?|. People talk about the font, the history, the meaning and the significance of helvetica. There's nothing ''extramarital'' about that. You know, it seems like air? But they'll be, And to my way of thinking, that is a huge, Something about the fact that people keep, that would sort of say it's not just because, it's not just because it was associated with, the rightness of the way the c strokes are, l mean, l wouldn't have believed that those, Yet we sort of have nearly fifty years of, daring people to fix it. I love the subject matter! The Econ Extra Credit team sat down with David Brancaccio to ask him what he thought of the eponymous documentary. Undoubtedly. And what they were against was Helvetica. Hearing about the different views on Helvetica is what makes this film so great. Helvetica: A Documentary, A History, An Anthropology. Compare the logos of American Airlines and American Apparel. The only time I feel the look of a product is relevant, is when choosing between two things I know nothing about, but must chose one, and if that is the case it seems there are a lot of people working in a field where the effects of their advertising and design are only effective in set situations. Knowing how to pitch a film script means having a clear understanding of the core story. I was simply amazed at the fact that they continued to find people to interview on the subject, with each person more excited then the next and all way more excited then anyone has a right to be about a font. I have some writing background in the music press. Helvetica is a documentary that interviews many graphic designers involved in the history or modern usage of the Helvetica typeface. Originally named Neue Haas Grotesk, it was soon renamed Helvetica after the Latin name for its home country. Its use became a hallmark of the International Typographic Style that emerged from the work of Swiss designers in the 1950s and 60s, becoming one of the most popular typefaces of the 20th century. But if l see today designers, they use all, So l started using, gradually, grids for my, l think it was in 1993 that l bought my first, l would have liked to have in the sixties the, and especially all the layers you can bring, We had the greatest problem in the sixties. Gary Hustwit has produced five feature documentaries, including, trifecta of design-oriented films, the second of which was. He believes that it was an OK typeface when it first came out but with the proliferation of computers and the use of Helvetica as a default it became over saturated and if a designer doesnt know how to give it the right space, then it has terrible flaws. But there's one you probably see more than any other one, and that's Helvetica. So, he said, why don't we call it Helve-ti-ca. But it's also: a musing on the history of modern graphic design. Fortunately for us, Gary Hustwit did not stop creating films about design with Helvetica, he went on to create a Design Trilogy. Filmmaker Gary Hustwit explores urban spaces and the typefaces that inhabit them, speaking with renowned historians and designers about the choices and aesthetics behind the use of certain fonts. Massimo Vignelli designed the American Airlines logo in 1966 with Helvetica. lt is a modern type. that is a sort of a late-modernist thing. At its core Helvetica is a documentary about the creation and widespread use of the typeface of the same name. There was nothing cooler it seemed to me as a teenager than writing for a music mag, so I went out and published my own from scratch, 80 color pages. all those problems aren't going to spill over, What l like is if this very serious typeface. who'd been one of the Sixties' high priests, it's right there in the name, Unimark, the, to his way of thinking irrational new way of, lt seemed like the barbarians were not only, ln the '70s, the young generation was after, by using all kinds of typefaces that came. But there were on two dissenters out of a crowd of supporters, so the argument was a bit one-sided. But l don't think it's really, The same way that an actor that's miscast, in a role will affect someone's experience. Must watch for designer, to add a perspective about helvetica. It not a letter that bent to shape; it's a letter that lives in a powerful matrix of surrounding space. It's a little worrying, I admit, but it's a very nerdish thing to do. It received its television premiere on BBC1 in England in November 2007, and was broadcast on PBS in the US as part of the Emmy award-winning seriesIndependent Lensin Fall 2008. Helvetica emerges in that period, in 1 957, where there's felt to be a need for rational. Helvetica is a neo-grotesque or realist design, one influenced by the famous 19th century typeface Akzidenz-Grotesk and other German and Swiss designs. Its use became a hallmark of the International Typographic Style that emerged from the work of Swiss designers in the 1950s and 60s, becoming one of the most popular typefaces of the 20th century. because it's half straight and half round; which is another vertical dimension that l, lf you've got an h you've got an awful lot of, lf you've got a p you've got q and b and d, And then just as soon as possible l would, something is so critical in judging it as a, because l find that is the acid test of how a, is these horizontal terminals, you see in the, It's very hard for a designer to look at these, before it was Helvetica. l've never sort of woken up with a typeface, you know, like some people . (You know, the one that looks like this .) . But that's the type casting its secret spell. Inclusion of the font in home computer systems, such as the Apple Macintosh in 1984, only further cemented its ubiquity. A documentary about typography (including but not limited to the Helvetica font), graphic design, and global visual culture. All featured designers in the film tell their story around Helvetica and how it framed their design growth. but with a new set of theories to support it. Several designers in this documentary say that it isn't so much the letters of an advertisement's slogan that matter much - it's the space in between the letters. Switzerland use the font as its hallmark for example, Where and how to watch the Helvetica documentary As many others have already said a documentary film that appears to be about the font Helvetica (or indeed any font) is hardly something that is screaming out to a wide audience or likely to be screening to packed crowds in the American heartlands. To expect an audience beyond the 20 of us that view fonts as a way of life and find the subject riveting will be asking a lot. Directed by Gary Hustvit, the film is the first of a trilogy examining We get some sense that people are conscious users of typography when the camera shows us young urban folk wearing font-covered clothing and accessories. Interviewees in Helvetica include some of the most illustrious and innovative names in the design world, including Erik Spiekermann, Matthew Carter, Massimo Vignelli, Wim Crouwel, Hermann Zapf, Neville Brody, Stefan Sagmeister, Michael Bierut, David Carson, Paula Scher, Jonathan Hoefler, Tobias Frere-Jones, Experimental Jetset, Michael C. Place, Norm, Alfred Hoffmann, Mike Parker, Bruno Steinert, Otmar Hoefer, Leslie Savan, Rick Poynor, Lars Muller, and many more. Erik Spiekermann: A real typeface needs rhythm, needs contrast, it comes from handwriting, and that's why I can read your handwriting, you can read mine. Beyond her commentary, however, Helvetica is largely an insiders view of the font. 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