I spend a lot of time following two fascinations: product packaging and hand lettering. Together with a few other small fixations, those 2 have been my significant ones for numerous years now, I've finally reached the point where I can really claim them as "fixations" without getting a significant response from the little voice in the back of my head.
When you invest so much time investigating and studying a topic, you end up being extremely focused, directionally and objectively. However of course some of the research product you run into turns out to be digressive to whatever your focus occurs to be at the time, so you absorb what you can from it, then rack it-- like the celebrity bobblehead that entertained you for a while, but is now a nearly invisible ornament eating dust and plumes somewhere in your environment.
And similar to the bobblehead might fall off the rack one day to remind you of its presence, a few of my lettering research study material revealed itself in my head one day for no specific reason.
Hand lettering is now mainly viewed as an American art. Somebody with my historic understanding about lettering may be snooty enough to reach pointing out the British origins of nearly everything American, consisting of lettering-- however for one of the most part, the contemporary point of view associates fantastic lettering with America. The same perspective likewise associates blackletter, gothics and sans serifs with Germany.
So you can envision my simultaneous surprise and impatience when, in my research for among my American lettering-based font styles, I encountered a German lettering book from 1953, by an artist called Bentele. It was no usage for me due to the fact that it didn't move my focus at that specific time, but a couple of months ago I was admiring what we take for granted-- the sky is blue, blackletter is German, lettering is American-- and discovered myself flipping through the pages of that book again.
The lettering because book is positive and casual indication making stuff, but it has a slightly weird and youthful experimentation at its heart. I expect I discover it odd since it deviates a lot from the American stuff I'm utilized to dealing with for so long now. To make a long story short, what's inside that German book functioned as the semilla, which is Spanish for seed, for the typeface you see all over these pages.
With Semilla, my normal regular headed out the window. My life for a while was all Bezier all the time. No unique analog or digital brushes or pens were used in drawing these types. They're the product of a real Bezier process, all beginning with a point creating a curve to another point, which draws a curve to another point, and so on. It's a really time-consuming procedure, however at the end I am pleased that it can get to basically the very same outcomes easier and more traditional approaches accomplish.
And as typical with my typefaces, the OpenType is plenty and a great deal of fun. Try out replacement and automation is still a terrific pleasure for me. It is the OpenType that always conserves me from the relatively endless work hours every type designer must undoubtedly have to face at one point in his career.
The artistic photos used in this brochure are by French professional photographer and designer Stéphane Giner. He is really deserving of your patronage, so please keep an eye out for his wonderful work.
I hope you like Semilla and take pleasure in using it. I have a feeling that it marks a transition to a more curious and flexible duration in my profession, but just time will tell.
Font Family: Semilla Regular