Gotham vs HelveticaTypography Research Project #1Design 393 A2Bryan Kulba

Gotham vs Helvetica

Helvetica has seen widespread use by designers for signage or advertisements for many years. It is used more commonly than any other single typeface for these applications. In the last year however, I have noticed a trend where advertisements and signage have been moving from using Helvetica to the Gotham typeface, which is a relatively new typeface created by Hoefler & Frere-Jones. The Gotham typefaces seem to have a quality to them which Helvetica lacks. In my observation of it, I felt it appeared more open than Helvetica. In this paper, I set out to see if I could measure this impression I got from Gotham and also reflect on the reasons for its newfound popularity in use. I will focus on using the uppercase letterforms of Gotham Black and Helvetica Neue 95, which appear similar in weight.

Gotham has seen an unprecedented popularity for a new typeface which likely is, in part, due to the liberal use of it in Barack Obamaʼs presidential campaign posters, print media and website. Gotham was developed by the company Hoefler & Frere-Jones in 2000. The inspiration comes from what the company called ʻvernacular typeʼ which is described as type which was used by “engineers or draftsmen, most of whom worked outside of the typographic tradition.” As a result, the text was more in the realm of geometric sphere than traditional typefaces. What is interesting is that this type was not

Figure 1: Three examples of Gotham in public signage and advertisements.

a formal typeface, rather it was what seemed to develop and occur naturally among the creators. H&FJ suggest that this is because the forms are elemental and thus the intuitive and obvious way to build the letters, at least in the era this form of type was used (early to mid 20th century) in metal cast signage (public buildings, etc), neon signage, as well as hand painted lettering on vehicles.

Figure 2: Selection of some Gotham typeface weights

Helvetica was developed by Swiss Max Miedinger and Eduard Hoffmann in 1957. The original intent was to design a san-serif font that would be visually neutral and have no connotations attached to it for use in signage. In the 1960-70ʼs, Helveticaʼs widespread use and creation of new weights lead to inconsistency across the type family. In 1983, Linotype released Helvetica Neue which was a unified and consistent treatment of the original Helvetica which used a two digit scheme to define its weight and width. For example, a medium weight and width Helvetica would hold a value of 65, while a heavy, or black weight of normal width would be a 95.

Figure 3: Examples of Helvetica Neue weight and width numbering system

Figure Ground

A factor in legibility in type is the relationship of the characterʼs figure and the whitespace, or ground that it sits upon. If the character is too black, that is without enough whitespace within the characterʼs counters, etc, the character looses legibility at small sizes or when viewed from far away. To compare Gotham Black and Helvetica Neue 95, I ran comparisons of the ratio of figure to ground on each letterform. I did this by using Adobe Photoshopʼs analysis tools. I created rasterized versions of all the uppercase letters at a 55pt height and then measured the ratio of figure/ground in each letterform for both typefaces (figure 4). The percentage of figure to ground is consistently higher in Helvetica Neue 95 and in a t-stat test, this difference between the two typefaces is considered to be statistically significant (see appendix).

Overlay

By overlaying uppercase letters from Helvetica Neue 95 and Gotham Black, one can see the subtle variations is the two typefaces (figure 5). While the shared/overlapped area (dark red) is quite substantial, one can see that Helvetica Neue 95 uses a thicker line than the Gotham Black (blue). While Helvetica Neue 95 is slightly wider in most cases, Gotham Black shows more whitespace in the counters and in the central area of the letterforms, especially at the interfaces of strokes as we see in the K. With this extra space carved out, and the slightly thinner stroke the gives the font a more open feel but is balanced with mellower angles in diagonal strokes. What is also interesting is the counters a generally the same height in both typefaces, however the counters in Gotham Black are wider than Helvetica Neue 95 like in the cases of B and R as seen below.

Figure 4: Percentage of Figure/Ground in Letterforms

Figure 5: Overlay of Gotham Black (blue) and Helvetica Neue 95 (red).

40

46

52

58

64

70

76

82

88

94

100

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

Per

cent

age

of F

igur

e to

Gro

und

Helvetica Neue 95 Gotham Black

Conclusion

Gotham Black is a lighter font than Helvetica Neue 95. Statistically, its figure/ground relationship is significantly smaller than Helvetica Neue 95. When overlaid, it is clear that it also uses a lighter stroke than Helvetica Neue 95. When side by side, however the fonts appear to be of the same weight. This could be because Gotham Black uses slightly different ratios including mellower diagonal angles and wider counters combined with the lighter central visual weight to create the illusion it is heavier than it is. Does this result in an increased readability which could explain Gotham Blackʼs recent popularity? The increased whitespace could positively affect readability at small sizes or great distances and the simpler, ʻelementalʼ geometric forms could also improve readability. There is no doubt that Gotham Black is as clear and legible and suitable for signage as Helvetica Neue 95 is. Subjectively, It is also important to consider, the popularity may be due to Barack Obamaʼs generous use of the Gotham Family in his campaign. By using this typeface in what was considered a campaign which was themed on ʻchangeʼ and ʻhope,ʼ the designers relied on this relatively fresh font to promote that message instead of something like Helvetica which, although is a neutral typeface, has been the basis of countless identities and ad campaigns. Gotham typeface signaled change because it was distinct from Helvetica and was new to the eyes of the public. What is now ironic is that its use in Obamaʼs campaign has imparted its theme of change and hope back to the typeface, giving it connotations beyond what Hoefler & Frere-Jones would have ever intended or predicted. With this new connotation, Gotham has been adopted by designers in commercial uses such as ads and signage likely with the intention to give their work that feeling of change and hope.

Bibliography

Craig, James. Designing with Type, 5th Ed. New York: Watson-Guptill Publications, 2006.

“Helvetica” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helvetica (accessed October 20, 2009).

“Gotham - Barack Obamaʼs typography choice” Cartel Agency Inc. http://blog.cartelagency.com/2008/04/03/gotham-barack-obamas-typography-choice/ (accessed October 23, 2009).

“The Origin of Gotham” Hoefler & Frere-Jones. http://typography.com/fonts/font_history.php?historyItemID=1&productLineID=100008 (accessed October 20, 2009).

“Scott Thomas: Designing the Obama Campaign” The 99 percent. http://the99percent.com/videos/5821/scott-thomas-designing-the-obama-campaign (accessed October 15, 2009).

Willen, Bruce and Nolen Strals. Lettering and Type. New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 2009.

Appendix (for reference only)

1. Descriptive StatisticsHelvetica Neue 95 Gotham Black

Mean 70.12269231 μ1 Mean 64.97923077 μ2

Standard Error 2.212248599 Standard Error 2.301971725

Median 70.83 Median 66.2

Standard Deviation 11.28029878 Standard Deviation 11.73779875

Sample Variance 127.2451405 Sample Variance 137.7759194

Kurtosis 0.344231093 Kurtosis 0.736044753

Skewness 0.230889204 Skewness 0.329053294

Range 50.27 Range 53.05

Minimum 47.8 Minimum 43.31

Maximum 98.07 Maximum 96.36

Sum 1823.19 Sum 1689.46

Count 26 Count 26

2. Hypothesis Test

A two-tailed hypothesis test was conducted, where:# H0: μ1 = μ2# Hi: μ1 ≠ μ2

Formal Decision Rule: at the 5% level of significance reject H0 if |T-Stat| > t(alpha/2), n-1 (n=26 and alpha=0.05). That is, if T-Stat > t(alpha/2), n-1 or if T-Stat < -t(alpha/2), n-1.

t(alpha/2), n-1 = 2.056-t(alpha/2), n-1 = -2.056

t-Test: Paired Two Sample for Means

Helvetica Neue 95 Gotham Black

Mean 70.12269231 64.97923077

Variance 127.2451405 137.7759194

Observations 26 26

Pearson Correlation 0.980366773

Hypothesized Mean Difference

0

df 25

t Stat 11.27735222

P(T<=t) one-tail 1.34E-11

t Critical one-tail 1.708140745

P(T<=t) two-tail 2.69E-11

t Critical two-tail 2.059538536

Since the absolute value of our test statistic (t Stat) is greater than 2.056, we reject the null hypothesis (H0) in favor of the alternative hypothesis. We are 95% confident that the average percentage of black area to total area (figure/ground) for Helvetica Neue 95 is statistically different from Gotham Black.