Category Archives: Computer Graphic Design

Computer Graphic Design Assignments and Information

Illustrator Type Week: Expressive Text

Objective:

I can use the Appearance and Graphic Styles panels in Illustrator to produce expressive text.

Web Links:

Adobe Illustrator CC: Graphic Styles
Adobe Illustrator CC: Appearance Attributes
Adobe Fonts: https://fonts.adobe.com/
DaFont.com – Download Free Fonts: https://www.dafont.com/

Topics Discussed:

Typography
Appearance Panel
Graphic Styles Panel
Expressive Text

Assignment:

Visit the Adobe tutorial links. Follow the instructions to learn how to use the Appearance Panel, and how to save object appearances as Graphic Styles.

Back in the early Twentieth century, there was a group of designers called The Modernists, and they developed a movement called Modernism. The Modernists believed that text should not be expressive, and meaning should only be derived from the word itself (i.e. the word “dog” should not look like a “dog”).

However, young designers who grew up during the time of Modernism asked the question: Why can’t the word “dog” look like a dog?

wwdog

Text that visually looks like the thing it is describing is called Expressive Text, and Illustrator has special tools that make the production of Expressive Text extremely easy and effective. Today we are going to explore the use of these tools to produce some expressive text of our own.

  1. Check out the Adobe Fonts and DaFont.com links. We will discuss in class how these sites make it easy to download and install new and useful typefaces for use in your designs.
  2. Watch the in-class demonstration, or visit the links above to learn how to use the Appearance Panel, how to save object appearances as Graphic Styles, and how to access the pre-set Graphic Styles libraries.
  3. Open your Text Week document in Illustrator and go to the fourth (lower right) artboard.
  4. Use the pre-set Graphic Styles libraries and the Type Tool to create five words that look like what is being described. For example:

Try to use different words and graphic styles than the ones in the example. When you have all five words and all of the previous assignments, save your document.

Make sure that you have all four Artboards completed, and turn it in to today’s Assignment Post in our Google Classroom to complete the Typography Week activities.

Assigned: February 27th, 2025
Teacher Pacing Due Date: February 28th, 2025

INTRO TO TYPOGRAPHY – FONT RESOURCES – SPRING 2025

In today’s assignment we will learn how to use Adobe Fonts and free resources on the Internet to find and download new fonts.

Objective:

  • I can demonstrate my ability to identify and utilize typefaces from the four major typeface categories by locating and utilizing font resources from Adobe and on the Internet so that I can most effectively communicate written messages.

Vocabulary Words:

  • Type
  • Typeface
  • Font
  • Serif
  • Sans Serif
  • Script
  • Ornamental/Decorative/Display

Links:

Google Classroom

Adobe Fonts: https://fonts.adobe.com/
DaFont.com – Download Free Fonts: https://www.dafont.com/

Topics Discussed:

  • Serif Fonts
  • Sans Serif Fonts
  • Script Fonts
  • Ornamental/Decorative/Display Fonts

Assignment:

  1. Follow along with today’s in-class presentation to learn about the paid Adobe Fonts utility and free font resources on the Internet.
  2. Check out the Adobe Fonts and DaFont.com links. We will discuss in class how these sites make it easy to download and install new and useful typefaces for use in your designs.
  3. Download and install five new fonts and use the actual font to write the name of each font in 36 point type on the 3rd artboard. We will be using these and other fonts to complete the 4th artboard by the end of this week!

Assigned: February 25th, 2025
Teacher Pacing Due Date: February 26th, 2025