Typeface Story
- FOCUS. The focus of the project is the issue of climate change and how to raise awareness, communicate and get people together for this cause.
- AUDIENCE. The typeface is created for protesters, activists, people who contribute as well as uninformed people.
- IMPACT. The typeface would be valuable and impactful because it connects people for an emergency situation; raises awareness; it is recognizable protest language, easy to share and use trough the platforms and resources available.
- PROPOSAL. As part of the Creative Conscious brief, we had to research Extinction Rebellion and create content that supports their movement. Trough the research we found out that their typeface is not connected to their philosophy. We believe that typography equals language, and has the power to communicate a message, give a voice. The aim of the project is to tackle the issue of climate change by creating a recognizable typeface leading to a graphic identity accessible to everybody. Give the protest movement a 'voice', articulate their beliefs trough a symbolic typeface.
Research
The project started from SOUNDS, PROTEST and EMERGENCY of the situation. We quickly realized they all have the concept of intensity in common.
Intensity
Intensity
- the quality of being felt strongly or having a very strong effect (climate change)
- the strength of something that can be measured such as sound, etc. (sounds)
Based on this concept, we experimented with cymatics.
Cymatics is the study of sound and vibration made visible.
Sound affects physical materials and has the quality of creating geometric patterns.
It has 2 main proprieties: frequency - measured in Hertz, and Intensity.
Humans hear sounds between 20-20.000 Hz. In our perspective this would translate as a metaphor for protest - Wanting to get your voice heard but not being heard - the limit between noise and silence, between peace and chaos.
Cymatics is the study of sound and vibration made visible.
Sound affects physical materials and has the quality of creating geometric patterns.
It has 2 main proprieties: frequency - measured in Hertz, and Intensity.
Humans hear sounds between 20-20.000 Hz. In our perspective this would translate as a metaphor for protest - Wanting to get your voice heard but not being heard - the limit between noise and silence, between peace and chaos.
The grid of the typeface is based and developed on the patterns of sound, cymatics. Sound generates from the simplest to the most complicated cymatic patterns based on the frequency and intensity.
- low - simple pattern
- high - complex pattern
Would it work?
The typeface is meant to be geometric and experimental, created for big display (materials used for climate change protest movement). It is suitable for a limited amount of text on-page, in order to ensure readability and legibility. Sounds-of-Protest embraces limitations and acts as an art form experiment rather than conforming to traditional typographic rules. It is meant to be a climate change 'code' that embodies the message and unites, intrigues and informs the audience.