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July 29, 2002: Cooper Black: Behind the Typeface

I don't usually post links to other sites- I think that there are enough in my linklist to keep most people busy. However, once in a long while, you find an inspired work of art like Cooper Black: Behind the Typeface- a seven minute Flash movie about the history of the popular Font. I've used Cooper Black a few times, but I generally prefer the san-serifed heavy fonts (like Impact).

Ideas

Comments

Geoffrey Lee's Impact eh?



You should look into Jonathan Hoefler's excellent Champion Gothic typefaces. I think they are visually more dynamic than Impact. And being an extended family, show more range than the single weight Impact.



Hoefler Type Foundry can be found here: www.typography.com



As for Cooper Black, I've never really cared for it much. In fact I don't even care for the Goudy Heavyface that was according to this presentation, supposedly inspired by Oswald Bruce Cooper's designs (in fact, Goudy Heavyface was a modification of Goudy Old Style which was designed in 1915; the heavier versions that became Heavyface was commissioned by Lanston Monotype to compete with Cooper's designs and like any respectable typographer, Goudy took the money). I guess I am of the camp that feels Goudy's prolificness prevented him from creating more refined work. Cooper and Goudy were both primarily in advertising and packaging, and I have always had my bones to pick with advertising typography.



The site is amusing enough, spoofing VH1's Behind the music sensationalist tabloid atmosphere. I had to laugh when I saw Benton's Hobo (ATF 1910) and Smith's Brush Script (ATF 1942). I list dates because a lot of people tend to think Hobo was from the '60s. The site was obviously poking fun at kitschy and campy typeforms.

Posted by James on July 29, 2002 1:40 PM

Nerds.



I'm a happy nerd, now that I'm set up with a computer at work.

Posted by Jen on July 29, 2002 3:30 PM

Yeah, it's funny, I was just looking at my many Cooper Black fonts the other day. Boy they sure are ugly, in a nice kind of way.

Posted by AB on July 29, 2002 6:25 PM

James' post is right on the money. I wish I knew more about fonts- but I can safely hide behind the system limitations that only allow me to reliably display about seven fonts safely in most browsers.

Posted by jake on July 30, 2002 12:01 AM

And some would say seven typefaces is more than enough. That depends, of course on which seven...

Posted by James on July 30, 2002 1:50 AM

Dobkin: the font!



http://www.dafont.com/voir.php?libelle=Dobkin

Posted by jake on August 5, 2002 10:32 PM

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