The Keyboard is a Tool Kit — Typophile archive

MaxK21 June 2004 · 11:55

The recent News and Events posting for Bruno Maag's talk Type is a design tool at St
Bride Institute in London on July 13, states that "Changes in technology over the last 20 years have meant that type is now not only regarded as a carrier of information but a design tool. In particular, its importance within branding/corporate identity will be assessed and the practical issues in creating type for such an environment demonstrated."

The blurry overlap between functional typography and expressive graphic forms always have intrigued me. Jan Middendorp defines my work as

Chris Rugen21 June 2004 · 21:33

There's a company called Ideazon that's created something called the the Zboard, in a practical variation on this idea. It's essentially a keyboard-like base which can accomodate interchangeable faces that use application-specific labels (and even keys).

So, you can have a Photoshop keyboard and a Medal of Honor (a videogame) keyboard, etc. The shapes of the buttons themselves also vary, based on what the applications' keyboard usage techniques involve.

In its current form, it's not directly related to typesetting, but I'm sure someone could develop an InDesign digital typsetting or font-specific keyboard face