Avatar / Papyrus
Fucking fuck.
Above: Dan Sinclair, from an earlier post. Geotypografika readers may remember Dan’s experiment as a serious attempt to create an appropriate design/interaction given the limitations of Papyrus. A successful experiment to say the least, and also worth the debate, a good designer should be able to design something beautiful/good with Papyrus (insert any ‘limitation’). Maybe we would all agree, however, that they shouldn’t be made to.
Papyrus / I see you.
Enter Avatar, the now $1Billion plus worldwide hit (and, as entertainment, worth every penny). I am sure many have reflected on what this means to our small world of typographic and graphic interests. In my opinion, it has troublesome implications.
A 300-million-dollar movie made with cutting edge technology, which includes a new language for the film’s native speakers, stunning computer screen grid animations and more visual wizardry, fell back on fu*king Papyrus for the subtitled sequences and a thinly veiled main title. Worse still? They made it in 3D… It’s true, brothers and sisters,
I have seen it.
What did we do to deserve this insult?
The biggest blockbuster, the most famous director, blah, blah, blah… It’s fu*king Papyrus! Highly competent and intelligent people made this decision, and can one say they were wrong? Look at the numbers! Was their reasoning that it is so universally recognized they found it advantageous, aesthetics be damned? Or, did they think the aesthetics fit?! It is a fatal flaw in the film, aesthetically, clearly?! It seems to me, all of the potential variables in this situation lead to graphic and typographic seppuku.
What does all of this mean?
Simply put, despite the rich variety of contemporary graphic and typographic projections in our world, it means we still have much work to do in terms of advancing public knowledge of what graphic design and typography are. An online friend remarked, when I included a lament about this, that she loved “people who could identify fonts.” I know, I know. Geotypografika readers will also understand that there are much more important things to worry about, but c’mon y’all!
It’s fu*king Papyrus.
I mean, it’s depressing. The Star Wars of our time, and it’s Papyrus.
What does that tell you?
More on this, out there: Pr*tty Sh*tty, Gizmodo, Papyrus Watch.