typographic trends

i have been noticing an increasing number of self made banners for the new internet dj. the internet is a place where people can post their mixes from their very own home. words just wont get you noticed. we are generation of visual attention spans. what a better way to get noticed than to make a bad ass banner or flyer for your new track? the younger generations are finding ways to share information and files all over the world. i would assume most of the kids today don't get their music from shops, cds, vinals, but rather downloading single tracks from the internet. that's how i do it, and that's how i play my sets. the graphics for this kind of scene i believe started in europe, mainly england because a lot of hot dance tracks are produced there. i don't know if we (americans) aren't establishing some of these styles, but i sure as hell don't see them around here. companies that package music overseas have caught onto this trend and now on the album art feature type that is so simple and smooth you could shine my head with it. i would describe it as a serge of texture, deconstruction, and various geometric shapes. not to mention colors that will make your eyelids explode off your face. the bold colors are probably due to the fact it's what they see when those young whippersnappers go out partying during the wee hours of the morning. there are also elements of fragmentation and ambiguity. they are seeing how little they can show and still have a level of read. there are no bowls and the letters are primarily cut out of a single block. another big thing is to use fields of color that layer on top of one another to create abstract forms. a couple of companies that are doing it are: Build, Sarah Haraigue, the northern front and Atriva Design. i think it's important because we see these people trying to push the level of legibility. how much do we really need to see of a letter or word before we move onto the next one. i remember hearing about a study in which a group of students took words and mixed up the spelling except the first and last letters. while looking over the words, the subjects read phrases and didn't even notice the letters were mixed up. there is a level of familiarity with type, words, and sounds around us that we fill in as we go assuming it's correct. after looking at the letterforms i got to thinking 'everything is just so damn simplified and clean'. how much can i add to the composition and still have a level of read? perhaps i can still create simplified letterforms out of the piles of crap i'm going to dump on the page. my hope is to have the mass amounts of material aid in keeping the letterforms simple. hope to have very detailed, complex shapes building a part of something bigger, more beautiful and smooth. this also allows for multiple levels of read. beautiful from afar, cutthroat as you come closer. just as the pixel works, it's not smooth sailing, but tons of little squares. a grid structure so tight it makes nick karn look smooth. i can't decide why it is important. i guess we all need a sense of moving forward as if not to seem we are stuck in one place. this is why we have the urgency to create new things all the time.

more to come soon..