There is good news for graphic designers. The ‘Gang of Four’ in the design and typeface world, namely Adobe, Google, Apple and Microsoft, have come together to create a never-before-seen type technology called ‘variable fonts’. Fonts are the variations of typefaces that allow graphic designers to create escalating effects and contrast for the printed and online media, as well as the larger world of artistic communication. The special characteristics of variable fonts is to make the use of regular fonts more flexible by overcoming their predefined static weights and provide a smooth transition between the various dimensions.
Font pairings are the new trend in logo design by combining multiple fonts. The watercolour fonts of 2018 are rising in popularity with complementary handwritten fonts to soften the impact of the typeface. The pressure and impact on Indian typography is posing a challenge to Indian graphic designers Girish Dalvi, Hanif Kureshi, Suman Bhandary, Furqan Jawed and Khyati Trehan. As vernacular media and advertising grows, catching up with novel demands is a race they enjoy.
The last Census records that India has 23 official languages and around 1,600 unofficial tongues, including dialects. The fluctuations of Indian history is unique as different cultures were assimilated into local languages. Some of the scripts originated in ancient Brahmi; trade and Islamic influences brought Arabic writing and the Raj established English which has evolved the Indian sub-lingo, Hinglish.
With globalisation and the NRI boom, Indian typefaces are being used in campaigns of international corporates. The gauntlet was first picked up by prominent Indian typographers and design firms such as the Ahmedabad-based Ek Type Collective founded by Girish Dalvi, Noopur Datye, and Sarang Kulkarni.
The first typeface design company, Indian Type Foundry, was set up in 2009 by Satya Rajpurohit and the Scandinavian designer Peter Bilak, who have been creating fonts for companies in India and abroad with a team of 15 calligraphers, researchers and academics. The popular ‘Baloo’ font is available in 10 Indian scripts such as Malayalam, Kannada and Odia, and also in Latin. According to Google Fonts, Baloo is used by 5,000 websites around the world. By 2019, the Ahmadabad-based company firmed its position in the Indian Typeface Hall of Fame with stellar contributions such as pioneering ‘Fedra Hindi’ and designing ‘Kohinoor’, which can be applied to all Indian languages and the san serif type ‘Akhand’ in 12 Indian languages.
Since each of the scripts has a unique structure, texture and distinct visual grammar, global users ignore the authenticity of script. Ek Type’s Girish Dalvi says that they are not doing “justice to the script grammar”. Dalvi co-relates the variations in Indian designs to the change of language and script every 500-odd miles in the country. The PMO uses Ek Type’s ‘Mukta Devanagari’ and Latin fonts. It is also found in over 45,000 websites and enjoys a large advertising client base such as Coca-Cola, Vodafone, and Flipkart.
The market has become more focused: Bhandary designed ‘Mina’ for Bengali readers who didn’t have much of variety to choose from, though Bangla is the seventh most spoken language in the world. Sri Lankan typographer Tharique Azeez designed ‘Pavanam’ and ‘Kavivanar’ types to relieve the “typographic monotony” in Tamil books and online. The advantage is that they use non-propeitory code for other designers to develop their own versions.
Modern Indian type design draws on the heritage factor: Kureshi works to preserve India’s typographic history by digitising the writing of street painters. Pooja Saxena and Nirbheek Chauhan converted Hindi and Marathi text in the Devanagari script to Bharati Braille. Neelakash Kshetrimayum, a National Institute of Design alumnus is the author of the first Manipuri typeface. Delhi-based Khyati Trehan, whose avante garde work in 3D created the ‘Tarsus’ font family for the ITF and DesignTaxi Typeface, is inspired by 26 world-changing Inventions. “Nothing broadly sums up the roots of graphic design as well as type does,” she says.