Mach Zero
I designed Mach Zero as a personal project to further explore the world of typography.
Rule Making and Breaking
The first thing I learned during this project was that even though I used fonts all the time, I knew almost nothing about how they were constructed. I started playing with individual letters, but each one presented inconsistencies that made me need to go back and change previous letters.
I quickly realized the font would need its own style guide if it was ever going to look cohesive. Here's what I came up with:
When possible, angles should be 45°.
All angles that can't realistically be 45° should be 25° instead (this ended up being most angles, ironically).
All intersections with angled lines should reach sharp points.
The font should feel slightly bottom-heavy, with mid-lines being only one-third up the letter instead of halfway when possible.
All base-circular letters should use perfect circles.
After having my rules set, my next discovery was that I needed to bend them just about constantly. A rule would work great on one letter, and then I'd move to the next and it broke down. English typography isn't mathematically perfect.
By the end of the project, I'd established more of a general trend than a style guide, but the iteration process was a fun way to test my organization and planning. Mach Zero ended up being one of my favorite projects I've done.