TYPOGRAPHY

This semester I am teaching a typography course at LSUS.  As a first part of the course we watched the movie TYPEFACE.  Learning a little about how typographers have worked with woodtype.  Then we had a small lecture on the history of typography.  After all that nitty gritty stuff was taken care of we started on the fun stuff.  The students were given a exercise to redraw in small form the letter A in a specific type face.  Next they were given a new typeface to draw as perfectly as they were able in large scale.  Before they were allowed to get started on that they needed to write a paper about this history of that type and the designer that created it.  Below are images of student engaging with metal type and beginning work on their large scale letter forms.  I was extremely impressed with a majority of the work the students have done for that part of the project.

The next part of the project involved taking the same typeface and coming up with something creative of their own.  The project had no restrictions except they needed to use the typeface from the last large letter form and recreate it in any medium they wanted. We had a variety of mediums from airbrush, to sewing fabric to paper, coffee and modge podge, graffiti spray and even quilted paper. It was great to see a group of students excited to design something on their own based on a foundation of knowledge they were gathering from class.  One of the best things I heard was from a student who is in this class and another class.  They said that both of their textbooks had become their coffee table books and they loved having them.  A student in another class ask if they could read the rest of the book for class.  This semester is proving to be an interesting one.  It is my hope that I can continue to inspire these up and coming designers to give it all they got and never be afraid to make great things that turn heads.