April 12, 2004 (330 Words)
There are two sides appearing to this project. One is an actual Windows application for editing typefaces, and the other is a more glamorous piece to display in a gallery space; This would have less emphasis on opening fonts and performing typographic features, and more emphasis on aesthetic/fun interaction with the possibility of owning your own font afterwards.
After dissecting a mouse and keyboard in an attempt to figure out how I can rewire them to perform other operations, it got me thinking that I was taking the emphasis away from the visual (although not very appealing at the moment), and maybe I could stick to a series of buttons performing random-esque commands to alter the face. These could be given a very visual method of alteration. For example, one button could make the screen look like a fish tank and bubbles could float through the letter to distort it. After-which it returns to a resting state. Another button could fire random holes in the font, or add jagged edges. I can visualise this more than I can visualise an alternate input, and the fact that the aesthetic and animation is appealing, won't make you think about the input. Everybody presses big red buttons at galleries!
So from this, I am going to concentrate on a series of alterations that can be produced by just pressing one button, with the theory that they can always be opened up into variables to fit another device if I see fit.
Initial ideas are
- Bubbles, Water, Ripples
- Holes, Punches
- Rough Edges, Jagged Edges, Spikes
- Wind, Breeze, Angles
- Stretching, Squashing, Tilting, Leaning, Rotating
Below is my first example of a source affecting the outline of a typeface. The circle is moved with the mouse over one letter and then the same route is applied to every letter. This can be easily mapped onto another input source as it only requires an x and y value.
I will post new animations as I develop them.