#phototypesetting

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[mallguts]

a study of an H. Berthold Diatype phototypesetting machine - an often forgotten bridge technology between letterpress and fully digital typesetting. photo I referenced off of: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Diatype_typesetter.jpg

7/15/24

[bonniegrrl]

I’m very proud of this article I wrote for the Fall 2019 issue #4 of Type Magazine about a woman who still uses a vintage Morisawa phototypesetting machine from the ‘60s in her business in Japan. She’s inspiring me to experiment with using older printing machines! 😍 https://www.instagram.com/p/B3z1w1_ged8/?igshid=s3j2ga96d3b6

[uwmspeccoll]

Typography Tuesday

This week we present examples from three volumes of About U.S., Experimental Typography by American Designers, produced in 1960 by Dr. Robert Leslie’s New York shop, The Composing Room, and published by the German design periodical Der Druckspiegel. Leslie was a medical doctor who also developed an expertise in graphic design and typography, founding The Composing Room in 1927 with Sol Cantor. By the late 1950s, hot-metal type was beginning to give way to phototypography and the possibility of typesetting that was difficult if not impossible by mechanical means. Beatrice Warde’s maxim that type should be invisible was being challenged by the expressive possibilities of photo-typesetting.

Edited by Dr. Leslie’s long-time editorial associate Percy Seitlin, About U.S. was a series of booklets specifically designed to present American experimental typography to a European design audience through topics that typified the United States. Each booklet was designed by noted American typographers and graphic designers. “That New York” was designed by Robert Brownjohn, Ivan Chermayeff, and Thomas Geismar, “Come Home to Jazz” was designed by Herb Lubalin, and “Love of Apples” was designed by Gene Federico.

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[365typo]

Phototypesetting with the Berthold “diatype”

The Berthold “diatype” was a phototypesetting machine introduced around 1960. This video, shot at the printing museum Pavillon-Presse in Weimar, Germany explains how this device works. 

Created by Ralf Herrmann, Typography.Guru.

[daveeveritt]

My father, at De Montfort University in the 80s, with a Linotype computer typesetting machine. He was a consultant to Oxford University on the subject, and wrote machine and assembly code that enabled devices otherwise unconnected at the time to communicate with each other.