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?
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.
- 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.
- 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.
- Open your Text Week document in Illustrator and go to the fourth (lower right) artboard.
- Use the pre-set Graphic Styles libraries and the Type Tool to create five words that look like what is being described. For example:
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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