How about you think about the picture and decide what i might have said about it on your own. Sounds like a fabulous idea.

Welcome to Cedar City

Cedar City's Welcome sign....known as Festival City

day 14

i have finished reading 'death of the author'by roland barthes... very interesting.

the basic concept is that when a work is created, the author, the author's background, personal experiences, etc have no bearing on the work. the two are unrelated. so the context in which a work of art was created becomes unimportant to the viewer- it is irrelevant.

i think. i'm not a good explainer right now.

anyway, i am pretty sure that i have discussed this theory with my friend who is an english major (it is written in the context of literature). she and i both disagree with it.

everything about the author and their life informs their creation.

those are my initial thoughts on the subject. i will keep researching it and anyone else who has input, please share.

on an exciting note... i got them!

This is different from the modern type faces used today. More of an innocent, light, and whimsical treatment of type that fits the flavor of the faire.

Day 14: Too much?

Can you ever have too much of a good thing? I think so. This place may like neons a little too much. There are 8 small signs in the widows, the very large "Top Spot" title and the tall sign, all in neon. Yet, I still think it works somehow. Sorry about the bad quality, I took tons of pictures and none would work right.

Day 13: The Typical

So I was trying to find some neon type that was not the name of a store or resturant. This ad is one of many that you can find around town, usually at gas stations. The composition is well done on this ad.

A simpler time

Seeing this just makes me want to cry...

Wingers: The American Dinner

So sticking with the 1920's typefaces. I decided to look at different type's instead of the tradition san-serif. I kept driving by wingers going to work and for some reason i kept looking at the logo and wondering about the typeface they used. I took a picture and then looked it up. The typeface that they use here in cedar is called Metropolis and it came about in the 1920's as well. Its thin lines with certain letters are what separate it, also how compact the type face is. It took me awhile to find it because there are so many typeface's that look like it. It took forever to narrow it down but after asking other people we all agreed that it was that typeface. If you guys dont agree with it let me know and i'll start looking it up but since we have all agreed that no one really comments or even read's the blogs i'll just stick to what i came to a conclusion too.

Providence

So i was looking around town trying find more type faces that will fit the period i am looking at and after doing some more homework it was made easier to find typefaces that came about in the 1920's. The providence typeface in this sign is a good example of what the majority of typefaces looked like in the 1920's. The majority of them had no serif's and were thin and had that simple look to them. After driving by this sign it clicked and i had to take a picture of it. What i like most is that all the signs that have "providence" on them use that same kind. Which tells me that the whole providence center of town came about in that time but through out the years i has been kept up to date.

Shakespeare

I use to work for the Shakespeare Festival and was just curious of what type of fonts they used. Most of the fonts that was used was a sans serif font. Ummmm that is pretty much all I have to say about this post.

day 14:

I thought it would be fun to drive around Cedar with my dad who doesn't really know much about design and see what kind of typefaces he liked. Of all the pictures we took that day, he really likes the fresh apples sign that is in this picture. He could not really tell me why he liked this one the best. He did say that it was easy to read even though it was dirty and small. As we were looking at signs around town he said that he mostly liked the sign that had script fonts.

This sign is direct with the contrast of red ans white. I am not particularly a fan of the fresh apples sign. I think it is kind lopsided and not well put together. I thought it would be interesting to compare the perspectives on the same sign of someone who had not taken any classes in design and one who has.

Lions

Ok so this is a kinda crappy sketch but whatever. I was walking around the park and a saw the Lions club crest and it made me think how it is sort of an example of type that is meant to last and carry on a legacy. It represents the Lions international, obviously, but it also represents the club's ideals. The club has been around for some time and it's members come and go but the crest stays the same to carry on what was started many years ago.

-Dan Gill

graffiti

Day 13! Looking out a friends window, I thought it would be funny to write things across the top of people's cars. Of course most people would be really angry but it would be entertaining none the less.
I'm still really liking the idea of allowing the people of cedar city to contribute the the typographic messages around town. Most cities wouldn't support this graffiti style idea, but I think the people could really express themselves if this were allowed. In a designer's dream world all the typographic contributions would have tasteful leading and kearning, and would use classy typefaces (ie no papyrus). Maybe if this were the case, the city officials wouldn't have such a problem with it. That is the reason after all that graffiti isn't allowed right? Because it cheapens the look of buildings or objects. So what if all graffiti was well designer, conservative to some degree, and had a meaningful concept (no john smith was here).
This is obviously far fetched but I think that could fit in the parameters of the project. Something to think about at least.

Day 14: Jade Gelskey

Day 14: So today I wanted to look a little more at the Del Taco advertisement signs. So this one is another on the window like the one from yesterday. Instead of red its yellow which I think still works (although the food blends into it a little more where if it was standing out it might be better.

The text on these signs is kind of interesting. I am not sure off the top of my head which font it is, or if it created and is not a font commonly used. It does have a more festive feel which I think goes well with Mexican culture but I don't know if it fully works when examined. It almost has like a batman, superhero sort of feel. Maybe that's just me, but regardless I think it works pretty well and I doubt people are thinking "Batman" when viewing this sign.

The white text is slightly difficult to read but the hierarchy is very good on this sign. Part of me wonders if its more important to make that limited time only stand out more because I think that many people buy things when they think they will not be able to for very long. It definitely is a technique used by many companies. I also think the text in the bottom left could be tad bit bigger. I still am liking the overall look of these signs though, and I think they serve their purposes pretty dang well.