Intone - MA Typeface Design

Manutius Greek
Negative Remarks:
1. The Regular Greek is way too
playful.
2. The Italic rho and epsilon are
too round for the style of the
typeface.
Positive remarks:
1. The descender of the “m” has
something intresting that I should
try to apply to my Latin.
2. On the Italic, letters like eta,
mu and alpha resemble the Latin
version.
3. The weight on the vertical axis
gives a better impression of the
Greek letterform.
2.3 Starting with greek both italic and roman
As stated in my brief, I had a very precise idea of the look I wanted my Greek to have. I drew
my inspiration from these old Greek manuscripts, leading me into switching my tool to the
ottoman pen. Despite the change, the result was still either too wooden or too handwritten.
My exposure to the currently available Greek typefaces aiming to look like Latin didn’t
offer any help. I couldn’t find a balance between “wooden” and handwritten and, most
importantly, I couldn’t decide which features to borrow from the Latin, in order to maintain
coherence. Since my Roman design was not set, it would be difficult to make decisions
regarding the Greek. It lead me, however, in discovering new features that could also be
implemented in the Roman. So, I turned to my Greek Italic.
Truth be told, Greek is a script allowing a lot of freedom of shapes. It is harder, though,
to create a uniform pattern compared to the Latin. Greek Italic is closer to the nature of
the Greek script than the Upright, which was developed for typographic use. It was easier
to borrow shapes from the Latin, when creating the Greek Italic, as the modularity of the
stroke was very fitting. Designing the Greek and having to deal with round shapes and big
counters made me realize: Despite Latin Italic being angunlar, shapes with big counters or
some others (e.g. “o”, “v”, “w”) would not match the rest of the typeface due to being less
angular.
2.4 Waking up with a new idea for an Italic
Gerry recommended that I should work on one more Italic. I also realized that just an Upright
Italic cannot fully replace an Italic. Therefore, I started creating an Italic that would
have a cursive feel (like writing with a pen). The letters would not touch, as to create a more
typographic look. Starting points were the very low junctions (that in a second staged were
also applied to my Roman and Upright Italic) and strong serifs that almost touch, trans-
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