Paul Murray, Graphic Designer » Traditional art

Inspiring fluid & abstract typography by Sam Winston

Paul Murray — Sun, 16 Oct 2011 12:42:39 +0000

Sam Winston is an artist who produces beautiful typographic creations reminiscent of visual/concrete poetry that make us question our understanding of words.

I recently came across one of his eye-catching editorial pieces on Pinterest, and from there I followed the link to his site and was blown away. I’m most definitely a fan.

Dictionary Story

Orphan

A collection of found notes, scrawls and printed material, with single words collated into groups.

Made Up True Story

An experimental story with an irregular reading pattern that illustrates itself.

New York Times editorial

Play

All images copyright Sam Winston.

A guide to hand-drawing typography from 1929

Paul Murray — Wed, 10 Aug 2011 17:35:00 +0000

During a recent trip to Portsmouth, I popped into a little book shop on Albert Road in Southsea called Adelphi Books. The shop is literally overflowing with books from every imaginable interest, both fiction and non-fiction.

Not in the same sense as somewhere like Waterstones, with everything neatly shelved and ordered, but literally heaving with books, magazines and various publications tucked away into every corner or stacked up in piles on the floor and under the owners counter.

I love little shops like that one, they’re a gold mine for bargain-priced inspiration that you just don’t find in high street chains.

After asking the owner if he had any books related to graphic design history, theory, practices, etc or anything more specific such as typography, he disappeared behind a row of 6 foot high shelves and emerged shortly after with this little beauty.

This is basically a guide to hand lettering posters and signs using pen and brushes that was originally published in 1929, over 80 years ago, amazingly making it older than any of my grandparents.

It was produced by The Esterbrook Steel Pen MFG Company, who from what I can gather, also produced the Drawlet pens used, described and advertised within the book.

After a brief introduction, we’re shown examples of different pen nibs and the strokes they produce when used.

It then goes onto outline the correct method for using the pens, detailing how to hold the pen for optimum results, and I presume to avoid smudging.

Next we get a beginner guide to drawing the individual alphabet characters in a Gothic (sans serif) typeface, demonstrating which part of the character to start with and where to end the pen stroke.

Then, the Roman (serif) alphabet gets the same treatment.

Some further examples, this time listed with the pen number used to draw them.

The following section demonstrates several different typeface examples, all hand-drawn, along with a short description about them.

The next section of the book gives examples of adding character to your lettering. Unsurprisingly, some of these are pretty cheesy by todays modern typography standards but they’re still a good indication of how a typeface can imply a theme.

This is followed by advice on grabbing attention with headlines.

Then there’s a brief example of some borders, followed by a page on layout and composition…

…with examples.

The last few pages are used for advertising Drawlet pens, with the inside jacket featuring an advertisement for a a monthly publication called Signs which “publishes month by month articles and information on all matters of interest to those in the lettering and ticket writing trades”, which at the time was available from W.H Smith (& Sons).

Needless to say I’d love to get my hands on a copy so will definitely be on the look out for one, should any have survived.

Minimalist compositions – collage experiments

Paul Murray — Sun, 07 Aug 2011 14:33:55 +0000

In a bid to escape the cursed technology and open up my creative flow, I’ve gone back to my roots (so to speak) and have began again experimenting with collage and clippings from newspapers and magazines. When I was about 14 I used to produce a lot of surreal ‘artwork’ in this manner, thinking it would bring me a fortune when I sold it to a rich art collector. I recently uncovered some of these creations and they were embarrassingly bad. In another 10 years I’ll probably look back at these and think the same.

The idea with these wasn’t to worry so much about the content, but rather the composition of the elements and the shapes or textures they make, which could possibly prove inspirational in future projects.

Cropped in this one would make an interesting vinyl album cover. If the circle was central it could show through the design on the record label.

Yes, that’s Joseph Merrick.

Looking at this one, I now wish I’d placed the lines below the darker circle.

Boba Fett is THE most over-hyped character in Star Wars. He’s rubbish and I’ve never understood his cult appeal. Wanna argue about it? Fire me a comment.

Beautiful typography and logotypes by Doyald Young

Paul Murray — Fri, 06 May 2011 15:28:38 +0000

Doyald Young was a respected and designer, author and teacher. This beautiful and moving film explores his life and his work.

He prided himself on designing truly unique logotypes, all drawn from scratch by hand using pencil and paper, something that truly inspires me.

The delicate way he draws is mesmerising, and his patience and attention to detail are second to none. His final sketches are absolutely beautiful, even more so because they are hand-made.

Upon seeing this film I was inspired to explore the sketching stage of design much more and only utilise software and technology to complete the design once the idea is finalised.

Sadly Young died in February this year but he will always be remembered as one of the truly great designers.

Some of his work…

Image courtesy of stepinsidedesign.com

Image courtesy of lettercult.com

Words you can touch – physical typography examples

Paul Murray — Thu, 05 May 2011 10:54:31 +0000

Whilst working on ideas recently for a typographic book cover I explored the option of typography created from physical objects. In this modern technological age, it’s easy to disregard traditional methods of graphic design in favour of clean, quick software solutions. Yet software doesn’t allow much experimentation as accidents that could spark a new idea are quickly undone via a simple keyboard shortcut.

Below are several examples of experimental typography and design, all created from real-world, physical objects and materials, which all have unique
characteristics and charm, that you simply don’t get from software created design.