how do you design an imme­di­ately rec­og­niz­able iden­tity that describes you pre­cisely? how can you build a cap­ti­vat­ing and com­pelling site that tells your story? how will you get your mes­sage in front of the exact peo­ple who are look­ing for you?

Typeface designers wrestle with the world of pixels

A New York Times reporter sits down with typog­ra­phy gurus, Jonathan Hoe­fler and Tobias Frere-Jones to dis­cuss some of the chal­lenges fac­ing graphic and web design­ers. Incon­sis­tent ren­der­ing of type­faces due to dif­fer­ent oper­at­ing sys­tems, web browsers and dif­fer­ent user set­tings. View the Times arti­cle.

Three tips I have: 1– Reset your browser zoom set­ting, this at least ren­ders the same sized type that the designer intended. 2– Upgrade to Fire­fox or Safari, any browser but Explorer. 3– Check to see that your mon­i­tor is set to it’s high­est res­o­lu­tion set­ting. I’m always amazed to see how many peo­ple never bother to check this setting.

Design — Type­face Design­ers Wres­tle With the World of Pix­els — NYTimes.com.

January 11th, 2010 | robert merola | Typography, Web Design | No Comments »

New York designer gets new identity

Logo and iden­tity for Ali­son Rose New York

New York inte­rior designer Ali­son Rose asked Robert Merola to cre­ate a new logo design and cor­po­rate iden­tity for her design busi­ness. In addi­tion to busi­ness papers a bridal pack­age was cre­ated. A sim­ple black square defines the logo­type and a cus­tomized Hel­vetica Neue in var­i­ous weights com­pletes the under­stated iden­tity. Visit the web­site.

August 20th, 2007 | robert merola | Logo Design, Typography | No Comments »

Typography old school video

The basic prin­ci­ples of typog­ra­phy have not changed much in four-hundred years says David Dab­ner in new short.

In this beau­ti­ful 5 minute film by Omair Bar­lat­ulla, David Dab­ner demon­strates how an old tool can still teach us a lot about typog­ra­phy and design in a com­puter dom­i­nated craft.

In this inter­view, Dab­ner, a typog­ra­pher who teaches type and design at the Lon­don Col­lege of Print­ing, uses the time con­sum­ing art of Let­ter­press, to slow down the design process, giv­ing stu­dents more time to think about typography.

Dab­ner offers some valu­able advise to young design­ers many who have never expe­ri­enced the tac­tile plea­sure of hand draw or hand set type.

A must see for any­one who remem­bers the plea­sure of an indus­try where beau­ti­ful typog­ra­phy required an invest­ment of time, mus­cle, plan­ning and thought.

View Typog­ra­phy School

October 27th, 2006 | robert merola | Typography, Videos | No Comments »