排版设计

The core task of this step is to conduct systematic typography research and determine font design direction, laying the foundation for the font design project. Type design first requires clarifying design goals and usage scenarios—fonts for different purposes have different design requirements. Through extensive typography research and in-depth user analysis, find the positioning and differentiation direction for font design.

• Clarify the purpose and target scenarios of font design, whether it is display font, text font, brand custom font, or creative display font, analyze functional and stylistic requirements of fonts for different application scenarios
• Conduct font market research and competitor analysis, collect similar font cases, analyze from dimensions of font style, stroke characteristics, structural features, applicable scenarios, identify market gaps and design opportunities
• Determine style positioning and emotional expression of font design, define the temperament and tone of the font (such as modern, classical, elegant, powerful, cute, tech, etc.), write font design positioning brief

This step is the creative development phase of font design, starting from hand-drawn sketches to explore the modeling language and style characteristics of fonts. Type design is plastic art; every stroke requires careful design. Throughnumerous sketch exploration and repeated deliberation, find unique and elegant font modeling language, establish stroke characteristics and structural rules of the font.

• Conduct hand-drawn sketch exploration, starting from individual characters, try different stroke processing methods, structural proportions, style characteristics, drawnumerous design sketches, explore various possibilities
• Establish font stroke system, design modeling features of basic strokes (dot, horizontal, vertical, left-falling, right-falling, turning, hook, etc.), including detailed processing of stroke start, stroke end, turning, radian, thickness variation, etc.
• Establish structural rules of the font, determine center of gravity position, face size, middle palace tightness, stroke thickness contrast and other structural parameters, form unified design language

This step is the phase of expanding single font design into a complete font library, designing all characters according to unified design specifications, ensuring systematicness and integrity of the font. A complete font library needs to contain a specified number of characters, and all characters must be highly unified in style. Through systematic design and strict quality control, create professional-level font products.

• Determine character range according to font character set standards (such as GB2312, GBK, ASCII, etc.), plan character set scale, design in batches classified by radicals, structure, stroke count, etc.
• Systematically design all characters according to established stroke style and structural rules, maintain unified style, symmetrical size, consistent center of gravity, coordinated spacing for each character, pay attention to handling of special structure characters
• Establish font design specification document, record design principles, stroke characteristics, structural rules, special character processing methods, etc., as reference standards during design process, ensure design consistency

This step focuses on detail optimization and typography effect testing of fonts, which is a key link to improving font quality. The ultimate value of fonts is reflected in typography applications; fine adjustment of character spacing has huge impact on overall typography effect. Through refined kerning adjustment and multi-scenario typography testing, ensure fonts have excellent performance in practical applications.

• Perform fine adjustment of tracking and kerning, determine baseline tracking according to font style and purpose, perform kerning fine-tuning optimization for common letter/Chinese character combinations
• Conduct multi-scenario typography testing, including body text typography testing, headline typography testing, different font size testing, different line spacing/character spacing combination testing,检验 readability and aesthetics of fonts in practical applications
• Conduct cross-platform testing, test display effects and compatibility of fonts on different operating systems (Windows/Mac/iOS/Android), different software (Adobe series, Office series, web browsers), perform font optimization based on test results, adjust detail issues affecting typography effect

This step is the concluding phase of font design, generating designed fonts into usable font files and producing professional design presentations. Font file generation requires professional technical processing to ensure complete font functions and standardized files. Exquisite font presentation can better present the design concept and application value of the font.

• Use professional font editing software (such as Glyphs, FontLab, FontForge) to generate font files, export multiple formats such as OpenType (.otf), TrueType (.ttf), Web fonts (.woff/.woff2)
• Set OpenType features of the font, such as ligatures, alternate characters, small caps, figure styles and other advanced functions, write font metadata information (font name, designer, version number, copyright information, etc.)
• Produce font design presentation, including font specimen, application scenario renderings, design process records, design explanation document, etc., systematically present font design concept and application effect