The following paragraphs summarize chapter two of the book “Arabic for Designers: An inspirational guide to Arabic culture and creativity” by Mourad Boutros.
Latin vs. Arabic typography
Latin: written from left to right
Arabic: written from right to left
Latin: letters stand alone (exception: ligatures)
Arabic: combination of connected and single letters
Latin: stretching the letters destroys them
Arabic: stretching is decorative and creates an interesting visual effect (not all letterforms may be stretched, rules exist)
Latin: upper and lower case letters, both can be italicized
Arabic: no upper case letters, italics may look skewed if not executed properly
Latin: baselines from which the heights of ascenders and descenders are established
Arabic: complex system of measurements per basic letter shape, letters hardly sit on the same baseline and the ascenders and descenders vary in length
Latin: each letters has its own shape, ligatures are included in the character set; 52 letters (26 uppercase and 26 lowercase)
Arabic: 7 letters have two shapes, 22 letters have four shapes (start, middle and end of the word, as well as free standing); 18 letters are free standing (cf. Boutros, 2017, p. 44-45)
The role of technology in typeface development
For nearly 400 years after Gutenberg invented printing, type was set by hand. Only in the 19th century typesetting machines were developed to automate the process of composing metal type. Linotype, Intertype, and Ludlow machines cast slugs in fully spaced lines, whereas Monotype machines cast individual pieces of type in justified lines.
In 1949 the next major development came with photographic typesetting. The direct image composition, the ability to combine type and images and the reduced number of steps during the process was a great luxury.
In 1961 Letraset Instant Lettering was developed and considered the most innovative typographic process since hot-metal composition. One sheet measure 9 3/4 by 15 inches, making it easy to store and manage. Within two years, a large variation of typefaces existed in more than four sizes, some even being available in ten sizes. The transfer sheets were manufactured by printing letters in reverse onto one side of a polythene sheet, then overprinting the whole sheet with a low-tack adhesive. After it dried, the sheet would be turned over and the letters are rubbed down onto paper, glass or plastic with a soft-edged tool. At the end, the letters are burnished using a wax-coated interleaver to remove any remains of the adhesive and fixing the letters in position. In 1976 Letraset entered the field of Arabic typography and created more than 50 styles, as well as Arabic decorations (illuminated typefaces, borders, ornaments). Due to the collaboration with experts, the typefaces were renowned for their harmony and versatility. (cf. Boutros, 2017, p. 48-51)
Arabic typesetting
In 1938 the first Monotype keyboard and caster were released for Arabic. A reverse delivery mechanism allowed for the right to left character order. A die case with double-size matrices for deep characters and two-piece matrices for wide characters could deal with the extremes of character shapes. The keyboard was composed of over 200 keyes with four alphabets (separate, initial, medial, final). The typeface used was provided from Monotype’s office in India and had Farsi/Urdu origin. By 1948 a more traditional Naksh from Egypt was used. At that time further technical developments also allowed for the addition of vocalization marks and aesthetic ligatures.
The transition from hot-metal to phototypesetter was the next major development. It abolished the necessity for the complex interlocking of overhanging characters and accents. The phototypesetter used 400 characters, sufficient for complete, regular, and bold character sets, including all accents and ligatures. Three more typefaces were developed: Solloss (traditional Thuluth style), Mudir (semi-bold display face of Farsi origin), and Monotype Kufi Bold.
In 1976 Lasercomp marked the beginning of digital typesetting. By the end of the 70s, the existing five Arabic typefaces were in digital form and two new typefaces, Akhbar and Lakhdar Ghazal, were added.
DecoType tackled Arabic typography in a completely different manner. It used algorithms to arrange glyphs into letter shapes. In 1985 DecoType invented the compact Dynamic Font, which was licensed by Microsoft ten years later (in the form of an OLE server). This was the first smart font on any platform and pioneer in the emerging OpenType technology. The DecoType Advanced Composition Engine (ACE) used 70 typographic primitives (glyphlets) to cover the Riq’a script. Today, the DecoType Nastaleeq Press only needs 422 glyphlets to cover every Arabic-scripted language, without sacrificing kashida (elongating connections) and kerning.
Unicode deals with multilingual texts and is a new dimension of typography. It is a protocol, which facilitates information interchange in all scripts of mankind. Computer typography is confronted with conflicting requirements: minimal size for fast speed on the internet versus a large size for comprehensive language coverage and typographic precision. Nastaliq or Farsi script are used to test type technology due to its huge number of ligatures. Mainstream typographic technology can not handle all the requirements of Arabic script, only the ACE by DecoType covers all aspects of the script. (cf. Boutros, 2017, p. 52-54)
References
Boutros, Mourad (2017): Arabic for Designers. An Inspirational Guide to Arabic Culture and Creativity. London: Thames & Hudson Ltd
