Although I am rather interested in typeface classification, I don't recall hearing the term "neo-humanist" before. Where did you pick that up? Definition? Examples?

Cheers,

T

Neo-Romancer? ;-)

Hi Thomas,

That "Neo-Humanist" neologism appears in a paper by Keith Tam entitled "Calligraphic Tendencies in the Development of Sans Serif types in the Twentieth Century". It is in page 47. The link is as follows:

http://www.keithtam.net/documents/sanserif.pdf

A recent 'Neo-Humanist' could be Stone Humanist. Do you know of any other ones?

By the way, if one googgles:

"Neo Humanist" typefaces

A lot of stuff pops up...

Boris

No Riccardo, the word is "Neo-Humanist". Keith Tam in his paper “Calligraphic Tendencies in the Development of Sans Serif types in the Twentieth Century" conciders "Neo-Humanist" typefaces Meta, Scala Sans, Quadraant Sans, Thesis Sans and Via.

Boris

No omega,

Riccardo is quite right, the term "Noe Humanist" is quite "Neo Romantic", don't you thin so too? I do like a lot Stone Humanist it looks unbelievably romantic.

I’m eyeing Neo Fraktur just ’round the bend.

Thank you, Hypatia! :-)
Actually, omega, I was answering to your first question, about what will come after.
But it was just a (feeble) joke.
(maybe here isn’t the best place for SF jokes)

Neo-grottuetous :-)

ChrisL

Hmmm. I have just read that section of Tam's thesis, and while he's a smart fellow, a good typographer and a nice guy, I am not yet convinced that the humanist sans typefaces of the 90s are all that different than those of the 80s. Their positioning in an extended family is more common, but not entirely new (e.g. Stone Sans / Serif, Legacy Sans / Serif). There aren't any specific design traits he calls out that distinguish these from their predecessors. Availability of oldstyle figures, maybe? But these are not such a fundamental characteristic of a typeface, in my mind, unless they are made the default figures.

Cheers,

T

Well, I agree with you Thomas that Tam isn’t quite convincing in respect to the difference between the humanist sans of the 80s and 90s and the specific design traits that he mentions. He raises some interesting issues and if one (or even better, a typographic scholar) includes all and all humanist typefaces designed up to the present day and then analyzes them his conclusions would be more acceptable than Tam’s.

Just put Johnston’s London Underground Sans side by side with Frutiger Next, the former does give the impression of being quite aged, a classic nevertheless… while on the other hand Frutiger Next emanates postmodern aesthetics.

And here comes an interesting question, which was the very first Humanist Sans? Doric Bold, aka Humanist 970 (1870) or Johnston’s London Underground Sans (1916)?

I see your point omega, maybe you are right

What have the typographic scholars written about the Humanist Sans of today, those designed after 2000?

What is the current trend to design Neo Grotesque or to design Neo Humanist typefaces?

And could it be true that Doric Bold (Humanist 970) predates Johnston’s London Underground Sans?

I would love to hear some replies to my questions. Damn it I am quite curious about it all.

I think Martin Majoor's ideology has shaped many contemporary ideas on how a sans serif design is created. Scala Sans was a literal derivation of the Bembo-like Scala Serif. So contemporary sans=humanist/Venetian type muddied into grotesques, without any pursuit of an essential form.

Yeah, but Syntax was designed in the 1960s, and Syntax was sort of designed as a sans serif Sabon. While Scala Sans really fits to Scala, since they have a similar skeleton & weight, etc., the idea of of looking back on the proportions of a Garalde for the design of a new sans serif isn't neo-anything. Syntax pre-dates Frutiger, so it is definitely before the enormous crest of humanist sans serifs came along.

What Dan said.

Mind you, that doesn't eliminate the possibility of a trend emerging in the 90s, even if it had roots going back to the 60s. I'm just saying it looks more gradual to me, and I still saw lots of other kinds of sans being designed in the 90s.

Cheers,

T

Thomas would you mind telling us which are all these other kinds of sans being desgned in the 90s? Just a quick overview if it is not too much trouble.

Are the Humanist Sans based or derived exclusively from Humanist Serif typefaces like the fifteenth-century romans associated with the Italian printing of the period?

I have a maybe silly question: Couldn’t someone derive a Sans from Garalde, Transitional or Didone? Has it been done and if so, which Sans are they?

Helvetica (Neo Grotesque) does follow Bodoni’s (Modern/Didone) construction very closely, but it doesn’t have any stroke contrast to speak of.

Thank you Frode.

Couldn’t someone derive a Sans from Garalde, Transitional or Didone? Has it been done and if so, which Sans are they?

Garalde: my Aroma is based on Bembo
Transitional: Have a look at František Štorm's John Sans.
Didone: as Frode mentioned, that would be Akzidenz/Helvetica based on Bodoni or the Clarendons.

Thank God for small favors... Finally a direct and clear reply to one of my questions. do you know by any chance Tim which was the very first Humanist Sans and who designed it?

By the way, I took a look at your Aroma typefae, I Love it.

My point was two-fold:

- In the 90s there were still grotesques, neo-grotesques, geometric sans and even humanist sans being designed and released that did not fit any obvious "neo-humanist" mold. What it is fair to say, and may be all that Tam was trying to say, is that some particular style of humanist sans became much more popular. However, one would need to define the characteristics of that style.

- I would be very interested in how one defines the characteristics of this "neo-humanist" style, as to whether said characteristics are particularly "new" in the 90s or have antecedents in the 80s and earlier. I'm expecting the latter, but it depends on the definition.

For my part, as long as we have somebody calling themselves "Hypatia" in the thread, I'll note that the past decade or so saw a resurgence of geometric sans, which was largely a revival, stylistically: Avenir came back into vogue, and new typefaces like Gotham and Neutraface were innovative and well-executed, yet also in the style of previous work. (My* own Hypatia Sans was intended to be part of that geometric sans resurgence.)

Cheers,

T

* I'll continue to call it "my" typeface as a shorthand, and because the main ideas and all the outlines of the upright were my doing, but I owe a huge debt to Robert Slimbach for constant input and guidance, Miguel Sousa and Robert for doing the kerning on the upright faces, and now Paul Hunt for finishing the italics.

More kerning possibilities could allow more open letterforms, contrary to lead type letterforms for printing? "Humanist" letterforms could loose their reference to calligraphy?

Hmmmmmmmmm… the postings in this thread are quite interesting and informative and yet my original question was “Which kinds of typefaces are likely to succeed the Grotesques and Humanist Sans in the future?"

As no one actually gave his views about this particular topic, I thought a bit about it and this is what I came up with:

1. We could have a new type of Sans Serifs based directly on 'almost upright' handwriting and enhanced structurally according to the principles of Graphology.
2. We could alternatively have Sans Serifs based on curvatures and other structural details found in industrial objects, such as cars and even architectural buildings.
3. The Geometric Sans on the other had might evolve from experimental typefaces and ideas such as those presented in Letter Spirit:

http://www.cogsci.indiana.edu/farg/mcgrawg/lspirit.html

4. New type design algorithms will be invented and their use will give rise to a whole new species of typefaces, Serif and Sans Serif.

I look forward to hear your own views about it.

This Letter Spirit fonts look a bit weird, but something might come out of it if one tries hard. About the other ways that you propose I doubt if anyone would be interested at the moment. After all, there is an enormous multitude of typefaces available and hundreds more are being designed every year using the currently available techniques.

Pointing out obscure experiments done by cogsci or tracking the multitude of typefaces available seems like an unreliable way of anticipating what typefaces will "likely succeed" (I do think that is a good rephrasing of this question). A better way of looking at this is by seeing how the neo-grotesques/neo-humanists address the problems that exist in typographic settings.

I still think that Scala Serif/Sans as well as other early super families are the most notable contemporary examples of how the sans serif can be used in a complete typographic system. They address the problem of the lack of harmony that exists in a setting where non-linear reading occurs (as mentioned by Tam p.12), without being overly ambitious in creating a sans serif that aims to bear the full burden of body copy.

I think that when one neglects looking at how typefaces are being used, the explanation of their success—or potential success—becomes too speculative.

Hi Eric,

You make some well thought off and quite valid points and I do agree totally with most of them.

- ‘Pointing out obscure experiments done by cogsci or tracking the multitude of typefaces available seems like an unreliable way of anticipating what typefaces will “likely succeed”...’

Surely the ‘cogsci’ experimenters have neither the experience nor the talent to come up with streamlined ‘Letter Spirit’ typefaces as a seasoned type designer would have done and obviously they never thought of testing them typographically. They way they look now (and if they are improved upon) they could be used for display or to deign logos with.

Nevertheless, it is something innovative and I believe that eventually a type designer or two might pick up these ideas and come up with quite acceptable ‘Letter Spirit’ inspired typefaces, geometric sans typefaces.

"Super families" feel to me a bit like a marketing trick.

Right you are Peter,

To design a magazine from scartch one wouldn't need more than 2-3 weights from 2-3 font families maximum and for book typography hardly more than 2-3 typefaces. Super-families are just Marketing in most cases.

Grades and optical sizes seems more useful to me, but this is sort of off topic. Hrant argues that late Evert Bloemsma’s Legato represent a whole new angle to drawing type. He didn’t base the inner counter and black on the motion of a tool, but rather took advantage of the digital tools to shape them individually.

Yes Frode, Legato is superb indeed, and all one reads about it in the threads here.

I would not put it too extreme, but fonts should not work too specific. Sans serif that resembles a serif font, etc. can be quite boring. Making a typeface wider for use at caption size is not always a good idea if you need caption size to put more text on limited space. Titling could be meant for reading from some distance.
How about "rounded" as a future tendency, or indy, "hand drawn", vernacular, experimental?