Locked lesson.

Upgrade

About this lesson

Exploring some different font options

Quick reference

Searching for Fonts

Exploring some different font options.

When to use

Once your main logo is in place we can begin looking at some fonts that will compliment our design.

Instructions

  • Begin by opening the Searching for Fonts  Exercise.ai file
  • If you have any extra shapes from the last lesson on a new layer, we are going to select them and then cut them by pressing Command/Ctrl+X
  • Select the Third Pass layer and make sure that it's unlocked before pressing Command/Ctrl+F to paste the shapes in front
  • If you didn't need any extra layers in the previous lesson, go ahead and add one now and change the name of the layer to 'Fonts'
  • Double click to the right of your new layer name and change the label color to Cyan to differentiate it from our pass layers
  • Go to the View Menu and check off the option that says 'Snap to Grid'
  • Select your Artboard Tool from the toolbar, and then click on the New Artboard icon in the top toolbar
  • Place your new artboard just to the right of your original artboard and it should be easier to align it with the top edge since we have the Snap to Grid option checked off
  • Once you have placed your new artboard, return to the View Menu and uncheck the Snap to Grid option
  • Grab your Text Tool (T) and type out the word 'Bulls' 
  • Make the text larger by holding down the Shift Key and dragging outwards from any of the four corners of the bounding box
  • Next, if you don't have any fonts that you would like to use for this you can use a free font site such as Font Squirrel or DaFont.com
  • Download a few typefaces that you would like to try out for this exercise, but don't feel like you have to use the exact same ones that I have selected
  • Once you have downloaded and installed the fonts you want to use select your text using the Selection Tool (V)
  • Go to the Window Menu and choose Type > Character to bring up the Character panel
  • Type in the first few letters or full name of any of your fonts and then press the Enter key to apply it to your text
  • Hold down the Alt/Option key and drag your font downwards while holding Shift to make a copy of it
  • Select the new copy of your text and return to the Character panel where you can select a different font
  • Repeat this as needed until you have a few different font options displayed on your artboard
  • From here we will try to narrow down our choices so that we end up with one or two typefaces that feel like good choices for the look and feel of the logo

Hints & tips

  • When trying out different fonts it can be helpful to drag a copy on top of your logo, or place it behind the logo by moving the layer containing your text below the main artwork or illustration.
  • When creating a logo it is generally a good idea to keep the fonts to a minimum - two to three different fonts at the most.
Login to download
  • 00:05 Now that our logo is pretty much set we can actually begin thinking
  • 00:08 about different type faces or fonts that we may want to use with our logo.
  • 00:12 So the firs thing that I wanna do is actually just take
  • 00:15 these pieces from our layer six and merge it with
  • 00:19 our third pass layer just to get rid of any extra pieces that we don't need.
  • 00:23 So I'm going to press Cmd + A after I lock these other layers.
  • 00:27 That's just going to select everything else that is on layer 6.
  • 00:31 I'm going to press Cmd + X to cut it.
  • 00:33 Now unlock layer 3 or our third pass and then press Cmd +F to paste it in front.
  • 00:40 Now I can lock that layer once again double click layer sticks and
  • 00:43 we'll just go ahead and call this layer fonts or type.
  • 00:48 Now I'm gonna double click to the right of that layer and I'm just going to change
  • 00:52 the color to cyan that way it'll differentiate it from our other layers.
  • 00:56 Now, what I want to do next is come up to the view menu, scroll all the way down and
  • 01:01 choose snap to grid.
  • 01:03 Now I can select my art board tool,
  • 01:06 come up here to where it says new art board on the top and just
  • 01:09 create a new art board just to the right of the art board containing our artwork.
  • 01:14 Now, I'll come back to the view menu and turn off snap the grid.
  • 01:18 So on this new layer,
  • 01:20 what I want to do is actually go ahead grab my text tool by pressing T.
  • 01:24 And I'm just going to type out the word bulls.
  • 01:27 And then I will hold down the Shift key and
  • 01:29 drag this out from the bottom right corner to make it larger.
  • 01:33 Now, what I would recommend for you guys is either if you don't have a lot of fonts
  • 01:38 on your own you can go to sites like creative market and purchase fonts or
  • 01:41 you can always use websites that have free fronts like DaFont or Font Squirrel.
  • 01:46 Now I've kind of went ahead and done that just to grab a couple of different fonts
  • 01:49 here that I can take a look at that I've already downloaded for free.
  • 01:53 So you guys can try some of these fonts.
  • 01:55 I grabbed these from thefont.com.
  • 01:58 And let's just go ahead and try a few of these out.
  • 02:01 So what I'd like to do is grab my text and I'll go ahead and
  • 02:05 pull up my type panel by going to window type character and
  • 02:09 then I can try a few of these different ones out.
  • 02:15 We have this one which is kind of a nice heavy and
  • 02:19 sporty font we've also got built titling which is a nice more condensed font and
  • 02:26 we have a few others I think another one is called Quartzo.
  • 02:31 And let's also try a font called Prime Time Regular.
  • 02:36 Right, so these are four funds.
  • 02:37 They are all sons here and fonts, but you can see that each have
  • 02:40 slightly different way characteristics in field to them.
  • 02:44 So, what I usually like to do or just type out a word and try this in as many
  • 02:49 different fonts as I am thinking of using until I can kind of narrow it down.
  • 02:54 I can tell right off the bat that I'm probably not going to use this one
  • 02:58 on the top.
  • 02:58 So I'm actually going to remove that.
  • 03:01 And what I like about using condensed fonts is because they do feel sporty but
  • 03:04 you can also make them a bit larger.
  • 03:07 Than you would with a wide font like this one on the bottom.
  • 03:11 And you can kind of see how it looks if I just place it on top of the artwork.
  • 03:15 And if we actually drag this layer below our first patched layer
  • 03:19 it will be behind it.
  • 03:20 So you can kind of get a sense of how these different fonts look
  • 03:24 once you overlap them with the artwork.
  • 03:26 That's something I like to do just to get a sense of what I'm dealing with and
  • 03:31 what this could look like.
  • 03:33 So I actually don't mind that one in the middle there and
  • 03:35 let's just try our condensed font as well.
  • 03:38 This one actually fits pretty nicely on the top, but it is a little bit plain
  • 03:42 looking, so I'll probably have to dress these fonts up a bit.
  • 03:45 But for now I'm going to go in one of these two directions.
  • 03:49 So I'm thinking I'll probably either use bulk titling bold or
  • 03:54 we'll be using Quartzo demo bold.
  • 03:57 But the basic idea is to try a few of these different fonts out,
  • 04:01 do a little bit of exploration and find one that you think will work best for
  • 04:04 the personality of your design.

Lesson notes are only available for subscribers.

Gift this course