Learn how to turn a doodle into a terrific, fully functional font with this easy-to-follow guide to hand lettering and how to do it. With 30 complete alphabets drawn in a variety of styles by a team of designers and illustrators, you too can learn how to create energetic, funky fonts that seem to jump off the screen, the poster, or the page. With tips and demonstrations on how you can copy or adapt the alphabets to make them your own and sections on how to use your fonts online as well as on paper, this is a do-it-yourself book that will appeal to anyone who has ever begun a hand-lettered project – then wondered why it didn’t have the punch of professional work. Let your inner creativity flow and put your personality into a bespoke font designed by you!

The now-classic introduction to designing typography, handsomely redesigned and updated for the digital age In this invaluable book, Karen Cheng explains the processes behind creating and designing type, one of the most important tools of graphic design. She addresses issues of structure, optical compensation, and legibility, with special emphasis given to the often-overlooked relationships between letters and shapes in font design. In this second edition, students and professional graphic designers alike will benefit from an expanded discussion of the creative practice of designing type—what designers need to consider, their rationale, and issues of accessibility—in the context of contemporary processes for the digital age. Illustrated with more than 400 diagrams that demonstrate visual principles and letter construction, ranging from informal progress sketches to final type designs and diagrams, this essential guide analyzes a wide range of classic and modern typefaces, including those from many premier type foundries. Cheng’s text covers the history of type, the primary systems of typeface classification, the parts of a letter, and the effects of new technology on design methodology, among many other key topics.

There are many ways to make your writing feel more personal, but none carries the charge of using a custom-drawn font. Draw Your Own Alphabets is a fun, hands-on workbook that teaches how to create funky hand-lettered fonts sure to jump off the page, poster, or screen. Presenting thirty complete alphabets, custom-drawn in a variety of styles by various young designers and illustrators, this do-it-yourself guide demonstrates how to adapt the letters and make them your own. Whether you dip in and out of your favorite lettering styles, or work through the book practicing various alphabets, you'll be creating your own fonts in no time. A technical section shows how to put your hand-drawn creations to practice—from transferring letters to a computer and using them online to mixing and matching different alphabets.

Say it with chalk! Learn the art of hand-drawn chalk lettering from an Etsy superstar in a book complete with chalkboards! Ubiquitous at boutiques and cafés, on Etsy and Pinterest, in stationery and home decor, the art of chalk lettering is hotter than ever. Valerie McKeehan, an Etsy standout, teaches us everything we need to know to create gorgeous hand-drawn chalk designs. In over 60 lessons, learn the ABCs of lettering (literally) and basic styles: serif, sans serif, and script. Next, how to lay out a design, combine various styles into one cohesive piece, and add shadows and dimension. Master more advanced letter styles, from faceted to ribbon to “vintage circus.” Use banners, borders, flourishes. And finally, 12 projects to show off your newfound skills, including a Winter Wonderland Snow Globe; a smartphone-themed birthday card to text friends and family; a one-of-a-kind party invitation to create, photograph, and mail; and a bake sale sign guaranteed to put everyone who sees it in the mood for a cupcake! The book is also a practice space, with three foldout “chalkboards”—the inside cover and foldout back cover are lined with blackboard paper.

The basics of the profession and practice of architecture, presented in illustrated A-Z form. The word "architect" is a noun, but Doug Patt uses it as a verb—coining a term and making a point about using parts of speech and parts of buildings in new ways. Changing the function of a word, or a room, can produce surprise and meaning. In How to Architect, Patt—an architect and the creator of a series of wildly popular online videos about architecture—presents the basics of architecture in A-Z form, starting with "A is for Asymmetry" (as seen in Chartres Cathedral and Frank Gehry), detouring through "N is for Narrative," and ending with "Z is for Zeal" (a quality that successful architects tend to have, even in fiction—see The Fountainhead's architect-hero Howard Roark.) How to Architect is a book to guide you on the road to architecture. If you are just starting on that journey or thinking about becoming an architect, it is a place to begin. If you are already an architect and want to remind yourself of what drew you to the profession, it is a book of affirmation. And if you are just curious about what goes into the design and construction of buildings, this book tells you how architects think. Patt introduces each entry with a hand-drawn letter, and accompanies the text with illustrations that illuminate the concept discussed: a fallen Humpty Dumpty illustrates the perils of fragile egos; photographs of an X-Acto knife and other hand tools remind us of architecture's nondigital origins. How to Architect offers encouragement to aspiring architects but also mounts a defense of architecture as a profession—by calling out a defiant verb: architect!

We are all type consumers and interact with type in our everyday lives. Typefaces in all shapes and sizes evoke an emotional response and trigger associated memories before we've even read the words. How to Draw Type and Influence People shows how we use type to understand different messages. Each typeface is introduced and explained and then creative exercises show the reader how to draw each font and invite them to explore the associations evoked by the styles, to reveal why they have come about and how to create their own versions. Ideal for all those who work with type daily, this book provides an accessible way in to the world of typefaces, for the general reader, but also graphic designers who want to explore fonts in more detail and design their own letterforms.

Practical Font Design has built a niche for itself among graphic and Web designers who want to build their own fonts: especially with the first book. I learned a lot since I wrote that first book. This radically revised, updated, and expanded third edition combines the first two books. They are rearranged so they make a lot more sense and some brand new material is added. This is a quick introduction showing a workflow to build new fonts using FontLab 5. Fourteen fonts are developed in this book including an 8-font text family and a companion 4-font sans serif for headers. The techniques are simple and easy to understand. The results are completely under your control.