March 28, 2024

In the last few decades, there has been an exponential rise in the interest towards typography and calligraphy. There are a huge number of designers and artists available in the world whose careers are based out of custom character designs, typography and various other forms of designing related to them. If you are aspiring to be a designer and take it up as a profession, lettering is a skill you must have on your resume. But first, you have to understand its difference from typography so that you are not misled.

Similarities and Differences –

The phrase ‘hand-lettered typography’ is extremely used even though the words used are contradictory. Handwritten characters are different from the characters available in typography. There are various concepts that are same, but it is their differences that set them apart.

Definition – Typography is concerned with the style and arrangement of typeset. It has more to do with how letters will appear on a surface and it is directly related to the movable printing system. In today’s digital world, it is nothing but the fonts that we use in every software. In reality, typography is a subset of custom character or lettering which is the art of drawing letters. All the efforts go into making the letters look flawless and attractive. It is hand-drawn mostly with pens, brushes, and even with graphic designing software.

Career – At most, a person can take typography as a hobby because it is hard to get recognition in this space in today’s crowded world. On the other hand, hand-written characters are unique and have endless applications and it has become an integral part of a designer’s career. In today’s designing world, typography is hardly used in logo designing which is where the real earning is. Custom character has totally taken over logo designing as every client wants a unique logo with patented design and letters that have not been used before. Even in posters, tattoos, various designs, custom characters have a monopoly. There is always a huge demand for skilled people in custom letter designs.

In short, typography is used wherever the text is quite lengthy and professional whereas custom characters are used when there are a few words to be displayed to attract attention and set oneself apart from the crowd. Even though both of the types have endless application and creativity options, lettering is much more interesting and less crowded to shine and make a career and name out of it.

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