Kickstarter newsletter and more stuff to figure out

 Yesterday, "Are you my typeface?" got featured on the Kickstarter newsletter.  Thanks Kickstarter!  I had no idea that it had happened and only noticed when I started seeing pledges that had been referred from the newsletter page. It was really exciting.  I think the most exciting part was that people, especially parents, reacted so positively to the book. Every time someone mentioned they wanted to read the book with their children, it made me as a parent just step back and say "wow." That so many people have taken the time to pledge and send me messages is perhaps the most rewarding (no pun intended) part of the project so far.

There's still a lot of work done on my end, and the first order of business is to try and figure out international shipping. I'm really surprised and grateful for all of the support and interest this project has garnered from the international design and parenting community.  So hopefully I'm going to have the cost and logistics for international shipping figured out by the end of today and post updates on the main project page and in this space. Thanks for all of your help guys!

~Jesse

24 Days left!

Hey guys,

The kickstarter is going great.  8% funded so far.  I'm trying to get to more and more outlets for spreading the word.  I've added another backer reward.  People keep asking for a different ending to the book depending on their favorite font, so for the highest level of reward I'll rewrite the book to reflect your favorite font.  Comic Sans is not an option. No seriously guys, stop asking for Comic Sans.

Kickstarter Launched!

Hey everyone,

I launched the kickstarter on Friday, which was super exciting. I've been delaying and delaying as I tried to perfect different parts of the project.  Finally, I just decided I had to go for it and hit the launch button as I was heading out the door. I was going to a wedding in Maine and expected to have internet at the cottage we rented so I could send out emails, post on facebook etc. Unfortunately, the internet didn't work so I've been radio silent until today.  It was really great to get back this morning and see that some people had already signed up for the book.  Anyways, things are off to a great start. Let me know in the comments if you have any questions. I'll keep posting to this space as things develop.

Planning for the kickstarter video

So I'm currently working on the planning stages of producing a video for the kickstarter page. This is probably the most important part of the kickstarter aside from the product itself.  I've made short movies for classes and other projects, but those were really just clips put together in imovie. So yet another good opportunity to develop a skill I don't have!

I talked to a couple of people who have a lot of experience in making higher quality videos and they told me that having a guiding vision or feel is key to production. The main message of my video is that "Are you my typeface?" is a fun way for children and their parents to explore typography.  I could have gone with an ironic or funny take on typography (cue any comic sans joke you want), but I decided that just showing kids and their parents using the book and enjoying it together was closer to the experience I want to convey.  So I'm going to make a more documentary-style video with perhaps a scripted introduction or voiceover by me. An important note for making documentaries that I learned from my conversations is that you should shoot all of the documentary video first as you're not really sure what you're going to get. After you edit that part, then you can go and make any scripted segues or introductions that fit your material.

In order to stay organized and in an effort to be prepared, I've made some storyboard sketches and a shot list of things I would like to capture. However, I understand that I'm going to be working with very small actors, so I'll take what I can get.

Shot list with accompanying storyboards

Child using the book

• Over the shoulder shot of child reading the book
• medium shot of child sitting reading the book on floor
• close up of child's hands turning the pages
• medium shot of child standing at a table reading the book
• medium shot of child using the book as a hat or in some other way not reading it
• medium shot of child reading the book on a couch
• child selecting book out of other books

Children using the book

• medium shot of two children reading the book together sitting on the floor
• close up of child handing book to other child

Parents talking about the book

• One parent sitting in a chair talking to camera
• Two parents sitting on couches talking to camera

Parents and children reading the book

• medium shot of parent reading child book sitting cross-legged on the floor
• medium shot of parent reading child book sitting on couch
• child sitting on parents leg 

Daycare teachers talking about the book

• shot from behind children with teacher reading book to them
• shot from behind teacher reading to children
• shot of teacher in a chair talking to camera   zz

This is what I've come up with so far, I'm going to try and shoot some video within the next couple weeks and see what I can get.

Letterpress!

I met with Melinda from the Boston Paper Collective on Tuesday. They have an awesome community book arts studio, you should definitely check it out if you're in the Boston area. Their handmade paper is truly astounding. Marbling, painting with pulp, sculptural work, they have some incredibly talented people working there.  So how does my visit tie into "Are you my typeface?", other than it's a great opportunity to learn about letterpress? Well, I'm now working on making a limited print run of one of the posters.  There are lots of ways to do it, but I'm experimenting with using a CNC router on plywood make the forms. Whatever the outcome, I'm definitely going to take advantage of the instruction the studio offers to learn all the ins and outs of letterpress.   Hopefully we'll have some cool hand-printed posters to send out to you guys.  There's lots of other options with what to do with the printing capabilities offered by this studio. So if you have ideas of things you'd like to see, leave a note in the comments.

Even more posters

I had the original poster design printed yesterday to see how it looked at full-size.  The printer had some  problems with the layers in the pdf, so the printing isn't quite right.  Either not everything printed, or the colors came out wrong.  Anyways, a good reminder that you should always do proofs before doing a big print job.  Luckily, I was only doing one-offs as a test run to help me with the design process.  Check out the results below, more pics after the break.

Poster Redux

I've been working on more options for the poster.  I played with the saturation on all of the layers, on some of the layers, moved around some stuff. I have lots of different options right now. I also learned how to add a poll to the blog. So maybe you guys could vote on your favorite one.  A little crowdsourced designing anyone?  Anyways, images after the break.