Martin Majoor
Martin Majoor ( born October 14, 1960 in Baarn, Netherlands) is a Dutch type designer and typographer.
Biography
Martin Majoor busy getting ready since the mid- 1980s with type design. While studying at the Academy of Arts in Arnhem (1980-1985), he worked at URW in Hamburg, where he was introduced to the first digital writing system IKARUS. Serré (1984 ) was his first digitized font. In 1986, he began his career as a typographic designer in the Research and Development at Océ in the Netherlands Department. Here he worked on screen typography and the development of digital fonts for laser printers.
In 1988 he took up the position of a graphic designer at the Music Centre Vredenburg in Utrecht. The graphic design studio to the concert hall used as one of the first in the Netherlands a computer for the manufacture of their printing needs. Since the 16 fonts that time there for desktop publishing was, contained neither old style figures still small caps or ligatures to Majoor decided, even to create a typeface. In fact, his Scala was then one of the first Mac fonts with all these properties. In 1991 FF Scala as a first text font of the newly founded Font font library on the market, published by FSI FontShop International. Two years later, Scala was supplemented by a sans serif version, Scala Sans.
1994 Martin Majoor got the offer, together with Jan Kees Schelvis the new phone book of the Dutch PTT (now KPN ) to make. He not only designed the typography of the insides, but this also developed a new sans-serif typeface called Telefont. The version Tele FontList he used for the small set name in the main part of the reference book, the version text telephone for the information section in the front area ( with small caps and old style figures again ).
FF Scala Jewel, a set of four decorative varieties, originated in 1996. Majoor rated this oddity in response to the extensive phonebook job and the substantive work involved. Two years later the Scala range was expanded with 13 new versions, including Light, Black and Condensed.
The FF Seria family - a large family of serif and sans serif versions - was designed from 1996 to 2000. Majoor was for two international awards: the International Typographic Award 2001 in London, the other from the ATypI type design competition Bukva: raz! in Moscow.
The FF Nexus was released in October 2004 FontShop International was the first OpenType font on the market. It is a font family with serif, sans serif and Slabserif versions, all related to each other. There are also two versions Swash and a typewriter variant. 2006 got Majoor in London for the Nexus Creative Review Type Design Award in the category "Text Families".
Majoor taught 1990-1996 at Colleges of Arts in Arnhem and Breda. He gave lectures in Antwerp, Paris, San Francisco, Barcelona, Berlin, Warsaw and Stockholm. His works were shown at exhibitions in New York, Frankfurt, Cologne and Paris. Some of his books have been awarded for their excellent typography. Since 1997 Majoor works as a book designer and type designer in Arnhem and Warsaw.
Writings of Martin Majoor
- FF Scala
- Telefont
- FF Seria
- FF Nexus
- FF Sada (in collaboration with Pascal Zoghbi )
FF Scala
With the design of Scala Martin Majoor started in 1987. He worked at this time as a graphic designer for the music center Vredenburg in Utrecht, one of the first agencies that worked with desktop publishing systems. None of it available there 16 PostScript fonts included small caps, or ligatures, but he needed for his work. He decided to make their own script for his employer, which satisfied his demands.
He named the font after the famous opera house, Teatro alla Scala in Milan. Three reasons contributed to this trend: the at this time for opera performances and very active concert house of his employer, the historical roots of the famous idol, ranging as that of his writing in the 18th century, and the further meaning of the word Scala (spectrum). This Majoor wanted to point out the scope of the integrated family, which includes both a serif and a sans serif version, each in font styles ranging from Light to Black, and is suitable for both formal as well as for decorative typographic design tasks.
The FF Scala is a serif Renaissance Antiqua, which was published in 1990 as the first text fonts of the newly founded FontFont label and has since been expanded, most recently in the OpenType conversion. How many contemporary Dutch Antiquas it is not a revival of a single historical writing, but shows influences of various models. Majoor was influenced in the design of humanistic fonts like Bembo and writings of the French typographer Pierre Simon Fournier the mid 18th century. In contrast to these models, however, he strove for a weaker contrast and stronger serifs, as most PostScript fonts were too thin in his view. The roots of the Italic FF Scala are even older origin, they are inspired by works of the Italian type designer Ludovico degli Arrighi Vicentino ( 1475-1527 ).
The FF Scala Sans is a humanist (dynamic ) linear sans with Renaissance character, which was published in 1993 as a counterpart to the Serif. When designing the finishing strokes of FF Scala were separated and have adjusted their contrast. Still based on the same basic shape, so both families can be used well combined. This made the font family at graphic designers and typesetters very popular and made widely available, there were a few families digitally available, which were so well developed and optimized for digital typesetting. FF Scala Sans also has true small caps, different digit shapes and numerous ligatures.
1997 also a decorative special form of capital letters was published, the FF Scala Jewels. She is influenced by Dutch decorative capitals from the Baroque period.
FF Seria
Seria is the second large family Majoors. He had conceived as a " typographic workhorse " with burly basic form for all requirements of the amount set His Scala, but because of their squat geometry, especially the small upper and lower lengths, it is less suitable for texts that require creative grace, for example, poetic, certificates and fine prints.
Majoor considered initially to derive a specialized version of Scala for these claims, but quickly realized that only a redesign of a viable business writing could lead. The first sketches for Seria he made on 25 July 1996 on the train from Berlin to Warsaw on a napkin.
Typical of the Seria are the extremely large upper and lower lengths, which automatically pulls a small x-height by itself. It follows the tradition herein two little common models, namely the Centaur by Bruce Rogers and the Trinité by Bram de Does. Probably the most unusual feature of the Seria is the upright italic ( " Italic" ).
As with the Scala led Majoor also of the Seria a sans serif version from. Seria Seria Sans and include small caps, three types of figures ( old style figures, tabular figures, or "lining figures" and old style figures with different character widths ) and various f - ligatures.
FF Nexus
The Font Family Nexus (2004) - the name is the Latin word for " connection, connection, link " - put Majoor the same basic principle as the Scala and Seria: " The serif and sans serif version of a font should join hands, they should harmonize and cooperate with each other " in contrast to the two previous families but Nexus does not only include a serif and a sans serif version, but also two more. FF Nexus mix and FF Nexus Typewriter. The Nexus family therefore lend itself particularly well to the representation of the same text in different languages.