Learning Typography with Typekit Practice

The way that I feel about fonts and typography can be summed up by a quote from The Lord of Rings, where Gandalf says of Hobbits, “You can learn all that there is to know about their ways in a month, and yet after a hundred years they can still surprise you…” Yes, I know how geeky that sounds. But it rings so true (no pun intended).

Here at CreativePro, we have literally hundreds of articles by experts like Ilene Strizver, Jim Felici, and others to help you choose and use typefaces to make your projects better. But even if you read every single one of those articles (and I hope you do!) there would still be more to learn. That’s why I love resources like Adobe’s Typekit Practice.

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You might already be familiar with Typekit, the service that comes with a membership in Adobe’s Creative Cloud and gives you access to hundreds of high-quality fonts for use in web, print, and digital publishing projects. But you might not know about Typekit Practice, the wonderful set of resources at the Typekit website for learning how to get the most out of your fonts.

To improve your knowledge and skills for working with type, Typekit Practice offers lessons on topics like Caring about OpenType features, Selecting typefaces for body text, and Using shades for eye-catching emphasis.

The site also offers a set of references to articles, books, websites, talks, and more, as well as a list of recommended books, with links to purchase or borrow them from your local library.

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Also, definitely check out the Typekit blog for up-to-date info on all things related to Typekit. And, if you use Twitter you can follow Adobe Typekit (@typekit) for even more great type-related content, and to connect with the folks behind the fonts.

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By the way, if any of you are as geeky as I am (and I know for a fact that some of you are), then you’ll probably also enjoy Lord of the Fonts, at TheOneRing.net. This article details all the fonts used in the Lord of the Rings and Hobbit films and marketing materials. Not surprisingly, several Adobe fonts were used (including ones you can get through Typekit), like the estimable Trajan Pro by Carol Twombly.

Editor in Chief of CreativePro. Instructor at LinkedIn Learning with courses on InDesign, Illustrator, Photoshop, GIMP, Inkscape, and Affinity Publisher.
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