What makes FF Legato so unique?

[Frode Bo Helland]

This topic was imported from the Typophile platform

I'd love some explanation and opinions!

[Jan]

Its design concept.

I can’t put it any better myself, so here’s what Hrant Papazian had to say on typographica (best of 2004):

Evert Bloemsma's Legato typeface is something truly new, which is extremely rare. Its essential attribute is that the black of the individual letterforms is made equal in importance to the white inside and between the letters. It does this by disposing of the linking between the two edges of the black, something inherent in the conventional forming of shapes derived from a marking tool, such as the broad-nib pen.

By making the black and white harmonize, Legato approaches an ideal of readability, since reading involves the perception of positive/negative space as one thing. Also, it does this while still appearing conventional to the reader -- a key feature in any text face. All this makes it the best typeface of a much longer period than just 2004!

[geraintf]

i'm sure you're aware of the previous discussion here:
https://typography.guru/forums/topic/24636-forwarding/revisions/14636/view
https://typography.guru/forums/topic/17740-forwarding?from=50&comments_per_page=50

many claims have been made about legato, principally about how it achieves balance between black and white without resort to traditional stroke-based models. and it is sometimes said the white in legato is designed to be 'inter-glyph' rather than just a counter. have i got that right?

i agree further discussion would be good, especially if legato is as significant a design as some have claimed. what i'd like to see is some pics patiently and clearly illustrating these points. hrant, is that something you'd be interested in doing?

cheers

g

[geraintf]

sorry jan, you got there before me!

[nina]

Frode, look at its "o" really large and you'll see how the inner contour is independent from the outer one, following a different design logic. To my eyes, the amazing thing is that they still click together: the glyphs feel very harmonious (definitely not like they're collaged together from non-matching contours).

Rather than just an interesting experiment, I see this as a huge cultural contribution. In my view, this marks an important step in the emancipation of the "medium" of digital type from its predecessors. Today we don't design "strokes", we design separate contours, and I think Legato demonstrates very vividly – and very beautifully – what kind of impact that can have on a new* way of seeing, and making, type.
* "New" not in a destroying-all-that's-old-for-the-sake-of-it sense, and not in a "we do this because we can" way; but in an open-minded, constructive and practicable way. It's not a Po-Mo experiment; it actually works/reads very well!

(God I love it.)

[enne_son]

My controversial take on legato can be found here:
https://typography.guru/forums/topic/26140-forwarding
and here:
https://typography.guru/forums/topic/62083-forwarding

[Jan]

... I see this as a huge cultural contribution. In my view, this marks an important step in the emancipation of the “medium” of digital type from its predecessors. Today we don’t design “strokes”, we design separate contours ...

Very well put.
The tools of the time have always influenced the aesthetic of type, not always for the good of legibility (BoDidoni - Etching/Engraving).
Legato is consequently a product of the tool of our time (vector drawing software), but carefully acknowledges what the reader has learned in centuries to be legible.

[nina]

"Legato is consequently a product of the tool of our time"
Absolutely, and it utilizes the possiblities of said tool in an extremely interesting way. I mean, what vector drawing software really allows us to do is to design individual contours, i.e. also really design the white. As was also mentioned in this thread, so many people talk about how the white is important, but for me personally, I never really "saw" it until I discovered Legato. In Legato, the white is not just the ground the black figure lies on – it interacts with the black. I don't quite understand yet what that may do for readability, but if nothing else, it's very exciting. The glyphs look a lot more… alive.

[John Hudson]

It's always good to have an opportunity to think about Legato again.

Lately I've been thinking that the concept of stroke, while not applicable to Legato in the traditional way, can't be entirely dismissed either. Or, to put it another way, what we call stroke in other typefaces is actually a composite phenomenon made up of the relationship of edges not only to each other but also to a line. And while in Legato the relationship of the edges is liberated, the sense of the line remains and this is part of what makes it ‘click together’ or ‘appear conventional’. What is the line? In stroke-based writing and parachirographic type design, it is the path that the stroke follows, and hence the underlying structure of the letters. In Legato, the structure is undeniably there, despite the independent treatement of the inner and outer walls. In one sense, this shouldn't surprise us, since the shapes of our letters derive from a stroke-written alphabet -- unlike, say, cuneiform -- and hence they retain the line-structure even when subjected to novel design treatments (a more radical departure, in this regard, is something like Renner's original design for the Future lowercase r, which begins to break the line-structure). In another sense, though, Legato must make us pause, and ask just what establishes the line when the inner and outer lines lose their relationship to each other?

[kentlew]

> “Legato is consequently a product of the tool of our time”

> what vector drawing software really allows us to do is to design individual contours

I don't agree that this characteristic is inherently unique to vector-based digital type design. The ability to work with interior and exterior contours independently has pretty much always been there.

When cutting a metal punch using counterpunches, one would pretty much cut the counterpunch completely separate from the punch, generally in advance of the punch itself. So interior counters are determined independent of the cutting of the outer contours. How one relates the cutting of those outer contours, then, is a choice, not necessarily determined by the tools.

Phototype masters could just as easily have been made from a solid outer shape with an independent contour cut from white material and superimposed. Or, if cutting rubylith, there is nothing inherently limiting about the tools that prevents considering interior independent of exterior.

I'm not arguing that Legato is not a product or phenomenon of our time, but I don't think you can put it down to the tools.

-- Kent.

[nina]

"The ability to work with interior and exterior contours independently has pretty much always been there."

Oh, good point. I guess that leaves us with the question why something like Legato wasn't already conceived of in metal, or any other one of those "older" medial contexts. Or are there any pre-digital typefaces that attempt something like Legato?

To remain on the level of tools/media for a second, I'd at least suggest it's easier to do this in vectors, and more flexible – as in, less laborious to quickly try out many variants and new ideas, and to play with the shapes; so that, while the digital medium isn't the only one to allow for such treatments, it may well be more conducive to them.

On the level of the broader cultural context, my theory* is that for something like Legato to emerge, PoMo craziness had to happen,** and pass, to allow for the new medium to truly start searching for its own and inherently new "visual vocabulary" – which will be independent from the established one to a degree, but not so narcissistic as to be anti-usability. Which FWIW is a classic feature of medial paradigm shifts.

* Which is always in a state of (re-)construction, and doesn't claim to be "right".

** Which of course, in turn, goes back to the availability, and flexibility, of digital tools; so I guess that goes to show how intrinsically connected visual shapes are both to the tools/media they're shaped by, and to their overall cultural context.

[Jan]

When cutting a metal punch using counterpunches, one would pretty much cut the counterpunch completely separate from the punch, generally in advance of the punch itself. So interior counters are determined independent of the cutting of the outer contours.

Yep. Good point. And this plays an important role in the process and progress from, let’s say, venetian to transitional style.

But, I think the digital tools offer possibilities to experiment with construction in a way formally not available, numeric precision for example. So it may be not about the emancipation of the countershape from the shape in general, but how it’s done.

Scan from FontShop’s Inspiration July 2004:

[kentlew]

Don't get me wrong: I'm on board for the thesis that there's something about Legato that may be unique to this cultural moment.

But I still can't accept that digital tools are a driving factor.

> I’d at least suggest it’s easier to do this in vectors, and more flexible – as in, less laborious to quickly try out many variants and new ideas,

Altaira, only insofar as there is an overall acceleration of the heuristic try-it-and-see process.

But, for example, replicating what I'm interpreting in Jan's image -- the -0.5° / +4.5° experiment -- would be no big deal in a non-digital environment. I'm thinking phototype more than metal, in this case. Draw two ovals (using compass and french curves for instance), put 'em down on a table and rotate to your heart's desire until you get just the right relationship. Not *that* big a deal. Pretty flexible.

When they're just right, take a photograph, make a film master, arrange some test words and phrases, see what they look like. True, getting them into an actual font and on to plates and a press for real printed samples, maybe a bit more work. But really, digital tools aren't such a quantum shift as to make something like Legato inconceivable in a previous technological environment -- from the standpoint of working methods and technique.

I think it's more about a zeitgeist/gestalt thing, not technology, tools, or materials.

[kentlew]

> numeric precision for example.

Numeric rigidity, perhaps, but I don't know about "precision" per se.

Let me point out that Linotype brass machining was capable of tolerances down to one-quarter of a thousandth of an inch. Much finer than a single unit in a 1000-unit Postscript em at anything under 288 pt sizes.

There are curves in Linotype working drawings from the 1940s that are tricky to replicate with beziers. And having done so, those curves are going to get obliterated at 12-point output in a way that they aren't in metal.

All I'm saying is that numerical precision is a tricky notion. Anyone who's worked with rotated ovals and then tried to get bezier extrema points to maintain those precise curves will understand what I'm talking about.

[Nick Shinn]

I'm sure there have been yet other "emancipated countershape" types before Legato.
But the effect in Legato is relatively understated. Evert was a beautiful and subtle draftsman, and made it central to his designs--few could have successfully executed a concept such as Cocon.

[nina]

"only insofar as there is an overall acceleration of the heuristic try-it-and-see process"
I believe the "liberation" from costly, material, long-winded and involved processes in the type design and testing workflow that the digital environment has brought about has definitely cultivated an atmosphere of "freedom" in experimentation.
It's not only what a given tool can or can't do that matters, but rather what it suggests doing, or makes easy to do. I'm sure somebody could technically have drawn something like Legato using a pen on parchment, but then they didn't.
Tools influence thinking. And yes they influence heuristics, not just production. Ideas are born in friction and dialogue with tools, and materials. A pen is more conducive to drawing single strokes, while two contours with nodes and handles on them are posing the question more overtly if they should be treated as two sides of the same "line", or more independently.

"replicating what I’m interpreting in Jan’s image — the -0.5° / +4.5° experiment — would be no big deal in a non-digital environment"
Except of course Bloemsma didn't just rotate the contours and voilà. I still can't figure out what exactly he did, but to me it looks like some serious node tweakage going on. I'm still not saying this wouldn't have been technically possible in a non-digital workflow, but I personally don't see how anyone would arrive at such a solution with non-digital tools (notwithstanding the fact I'm a beginner in this, and might just not be seeing things).

I tend to agree it's probably more about an overall cultural context than just the tools taken by themselves. But I'm suspecting that's more of a rhetorical/logical difference, since I believe that this same cultural context is itself heavily influenced by the tools/possibilities at the disposal of those people who make publicly visible things, and by the solutions found by them via the tools/possibilities – in a rather involved circular relationship.

"I’m sure there have been yet other “emancipated countershape” types before Legato."
Lots. Display faces, and Po-Mo experiments.
What I was trying to get at was that Legato doesn't just emancipate the counterspace for the fun of it, but actually ends up being beautifully readable, which makes it such an amazing fusion of novelty and usability. Are there any text faces that did this previously? (Serious question, I'm ready to be educated. :-) )

[William Berkson]

>Are there any text faces that did this previously?

I don't think there are any other faces that have done what Jan's very helpful graphic shows: squared off rounds, with a forward slant outside and a back slant inside.

This is innovative, but to my eyes rather ungainly and awkward, and though readable, also no breakthrough on readability. To me Legato is very interesting, without really being a successful design.

Something which has a resemblance in some ways is Fedra. It also has somewhat squared off rounds, and subtle differences between the inner and outer outlines. To me it is a fresh and very successful design, both in aesthetics and readability.

I don't see Legato as a significant breakthrough for the future of type design. Note for a start that Bloemsma's theory of Legato is not Hrant's theory. Bloemsma was concerned to get 'flow' from one letter forward to the next, and correct the tendency of Roman letters to turn into a picket fence--which is indeed a real and important problem.

The name 'Legato' clearly indicates this goal. Bloemsma wasn't concerned so much with 'notan', the balance of black and white, as with forward movement and coherence of word image, which he thought was harmed by the dominance of verticals.

Further, having the inner and outer outlines follow different patterns, and not follow the pen is as old as Jenson. The modifications are generally more subtle than in the case of Legato, though as Kent noted already Dwiggins was willing to go further than his predecessors, in consciously changing inner outlines to make a tension between inner and outer shapes. The innovation here in Legato is to me not any innovation in notan or in departing from the written stroke, or in having inner and outer shapes different. Instead, it is the innovative stress pattern that Bloemsma himself points to in the diagram that Jan reproduces.

Bloemsma's experiment is intriguing because it was innovative, and he carried it though with great subtlety and control. But personally I think in the end it doesn't work. The "s" is particularly awkward and heavy to my eyes.

I don't think I've ever seen it here in the US in print. Have any graphic designers taken it up in Europe? It might just be ahead of its time, as Hrant argues, with some great breakthrough on notan. But it may also just be a fascinating but unsuccessful experiment, which is my suspicion.

[Jan]

What I love about Legato is not so much the look of the typeface itself (although I think there is beauty in it) but the idea behind it. The top-heavy Antique Olive-like thing may have been Bloemsma’s personal taste or an ideal idea of his, but apart from that I wonder what he would have come up with next.
If Legato is a successful design or not isn’t the question. The question is if Bloemsma’s way was a new one with potential for a general new approach to designing type or not.

[John Hudson]

Nick, thanks for posting the Artefact image: this is a good example of a design in which the way in which relationship between the inner and outer walls is 'emancipated' in a way that breaks the sense of line: the letters, while still recognisable, devolve into light and heavy shapes, disrupting the commonly acknowledged structures. If this is contrasted to the approach in Legato, one can see that Evert always maintained the familiar structures, even as he manipulated their edges and, hence, the space in and around them.

[kentlew]

Altaira -- I'm playing Devil's advocate. In other circumstances, I've actually argued your point.

> A pen is more conducive to drawing single strokes, while two contours with nodes and handles on them are posing the question more overtly if they should be treated as two sides of the same “line”, or more independently.

Yes, but what then is a metal punch and graver more conducive to? And what is an x-acto knife and sheet of rubylith more conducive to? These have been other type design tools and materials at other points in time. (If you ever have the chance, you should try to witness Dave Farey cutting letters in rubylith. He used to demonstrate this regularly at conferences & gatherings, but I don't know if he does it any more. Maybe someone's got footage somewhere.)

[William Berkson]

>If Legato is a successful design or not isn’t the question. The question is if Bloemsma’s way was a new one with potential for a general new approach to designing type or not.

Well, I don't see why we can't look at both questions. If it wasn't successful--and I don't here mean commercial success--then I think there's a higher bar to make the case that it's a breakthrough, to be followed. I don't see what the general new approach is, if not the changed stress, which I don't think works.

Hrant sees some kind of breakthrough in balancing black and white is a more readable way. I don't see that, and if that's not the breakthrough, what is?

If it is the breakthrough, then show me another example, or create one, and I'll be convinced. Kris Sowersby did a Legato-influenced sans that I think was more successful aesthetically than Legato, but I don't think it used the forward stress of the black, which is the distinctive design idea of Legato. --A back-slant of the white is, of course, a characteristic of old style type.

I agree it is very sad that Bloemsma is not around to further his innovative ideas, and it seems he was much loved by those who knew him.

[metalfoot]

Every now and again threads appear on Typophile that make me wish there were a book form of this website...

I learn so much here!

[nina]

"Yes, but what then is a metal punch and graver more conducive to?"
Heh, Kent, I had a sentence in there that read something like, "I don't know enough about the processes of punchcutting et al. to bring them into this equation", but I deleted it because I thought I was writing too much anyway. :-Y
Certainly a direct/logical assumption would be that punches and gravers are not especially conducive to adhering to a rigid "stroke" based model – but then I don't really understand why the latter has been followed for so long even with those tools. Maybe because culturally, there's still been a traditionalist adhesion to the pen, a dominating conservatism. And that seems to change a bit recently, I assume due to the [tool-/visuals-inspired] visual/cultural shift we've been going through.

Regarding how Dwiggins designed counterspace: It'd be very interesting if somebody could maybe put up some pictures/samples or post some links? I've seen the hmnu counters in Caledonia, which you cite/show in the Whitman specimen, but not much more that would clearly show this approach of his.

By the way, one thing I've found quite striking about showing Legato to people not obsessed with type has been that, not only do they tend not to realize what's going on with the contours (which probably means it's so low-key that it's definitely not too innovative to work in text), but some actually see a hand-written/"calligraphic ductus" in it – the very same thing it breaks! I wonder if that has something to do with John's "line" idea. Maybe Legato strikes that fine line (ignore bad pun) where its black and white aren't yet perceived as totally independent black and white "areas of space", but the "stroke" isn't really there anymore either? Hmm.

"…though readable, also no breakthrough on readability"
William, considering it has no serifs, to my eyes it's quite amazingly readable for longish text, which I think may very well come down to the way it handles the white. I have an idea about that brewing… but have to get some work out of the way first. But then maybe Hrant will join in.

Speaking of Fedra (which I agree is a great design), I must say the interplay between the contours doesn't strike me as nearly as distinctive a feature in Fedra as it is in Legato. If anything, it's extremely subtle, to the point where I wonder if it was as much a driving force behind the making of Fedra as it was in Legato.

"Kris Sowersby did a Legato-influenced sans that I think was more successful aesthetically than Legato"
Oh really? What's it called?

[William Berkson]

It was called Karbon. I found the thread, but the link to the sample is dead, and Kris has taken it down from his web site. Hrant was over the moon about it.

I think I see some influence of it in his Seranno, but that is a different design, with less of a Legato feel in it.

[enne_son]

Nina, about some people seeing a calligraphic ductus in Legato, see the post I referenced above: https://typography.guru/forums/topic/26140-forwarding (my 25 November 2005 3:04 pm post).

I wrote there as well: "it is possible that fundamental—rather than incidental—norm-violations, such as those introduced in Bloemsma’s Legato, where the violations are neither additive or subtractive (or based on sampling, like for instance Fudoni), might lead to something that is advantageous from a ’heightened readability’ point of view." So I think what is unique about Legato is that it's norm violations are fundamental rather than incidental.

The 25 November 2005 3:04 pm post tries to suggest why I think this is advantageous from a readability or perceptual processing in reading point of view as well.

I think the vector-based paradigm catalyses and facilitates such interventions and initiatives, however I agree with Kent that. In digital fonts it is still the font and not the outline that is designed. A font is designed by defining shapes and counter-shapes through vector manipulation. The vector is not the intentional object of design. When it's mathematics or geometry become the object of design, I think type design fails.