Thoughts/critique/ advice needed on typography for this illustration 🤔

[TessaW]

Hi everyone! I'm kind of clueless when it comes to typography, text, titles- whatever the correct terminology is. I'm working on this piece that's supposed to be a chapter title, and I would greatly appreciate some feedback on it. The text currently is in a sketch phase and would need to be refined and tweaked.

1. Does it generally look ok? Thoughts on anything like colors, spacing, size, and style?

2. For those who are more graphic design savvy, do you recommend making it into a vector, so it's crisp and clean, or treating it as painted letters so it looks a little more "humble"?

Help please?

[EliaMurrayArt]

Though I will admit I do not often work with words/typography. My initial response is that I'd develop one of the top two.

Just with a cursory glance, I had a tough time seeing the lighter colored font on the bottom.

Personally I lean towards the top left. I find it to be the easiest to read.

I'll let a more experienced typographical artist remark on whether vectors are necessary or not

[TessaW]

Thank you @EliaMurrayArt for your thoughts!

[Tracy McCusker]

I agree with @EliaMurrayArt -- the top two are the most appealing! I also find the top left to be the easiest to read. The contrast with the white "the" and the green "Last Book" is a much more nuanced approach to the lettering than making it either fully green, or fully light/white-gray gradient.

This is a really appealing type treatment, overall! I think the only thing that stands out to me is that the stem of the uppercase B in Book looks too crowded against the framing doorway. The K has a lot more room to breathe and is much easier to recognize at a glance. You might want to try a thumbnail where "Book" is shifted to the left to give it more space & make the word look slightly less crowded.

(I fully understand that shifting the Book will probably also require you to shift "Last" over as well in order to keep the bottom of the S from running into the O. So I apologize if this suggestion triggers a cascade of extra work!)

[demotlj]

I'm with the others on one of the top two. They are easier to read. The whole composition is really nice.

[Coley]

Top left is my favourite. Easy to read but incorporates the web into the text. Pretty cool

[TessaW]

@Tracy-McCusker Thanks for your feedback! I'm willing to change anything and everything with the text, so I really appreciate the notes you gave me.

@demotlj Thank you! It helps to get a consensus.

@Coley Awesome, thanks!

[Nyrryl Cadiz]

@TessaW hi! I’m not a graphic designer nor do I know anything about text but I think you may be using one too many font styles? I think 1 or 2 would do but then again, I’m no expert so take this comment with a huge grain of salt.

[TessaW]

@Nyrryl-Cadiz Thank you! I'll try it out with a more unified text style too see how it looks.

[baileyvidler]

Hi @TessaW! This looks really nice! I agree with @Nyrryl-Cadiz that maybe the styles could be unified. I love how you did "Book" and my vote is to make "The Last" match in style to "Book." I might also suggest adding a tiny bit more contrast between the text and background.

Regarding your vector question, I'm not sure. Normally, my impulse is to always vector type. But I'm concerned it wouldn't match the painterly style of the rest of the image...

Your composition here is fantastic! The shadow on the floor is such a nice touch.

[jdubz]

@baileymvidler said in Thoughts/critique/ advice needed on typography for this illustration :

Just a thought...

I'd even try darkening the letters even more - maybe match it to the darkest area of the curtains above. Maybe also put the spider web leading to the spider in front of the "T" of Last but keep it behind the "O". If the letters were even darker it would I think make that pop and then the line would lead the eye down into the words.

[TessaW]

@baileymvidler Thanks for your guidance!

@jdubz Love the tweaks you mentioned. Subtle, but they make a big difference.

[TessaW]

Ok, played with it a bit more using your suggestions. Any improvement? I think it's looking a bit better, eh? I would still need to clean it up, but I don't want to go too far without the design being more finalized.

[Nyrryl Cadiz]

@TessaW i love it!

[A Former User]

@TessaW THE is emphasized in this when I read it. I think if you would change it to the same color as the rest and tone down the white of the web surrounding it, the whole thing would be perfect.

[TessaW]

@carolinedrawing Thanks I'll give it a try.

[A Former User]

@TessaW you know what, i just thought of another thing: all of the other letters fit within each other, and i think the 'THE' should do the same. If you move the center of the web to the top left, you can use the three web openings between the top of the A and T to fit the 'THE' in. You can also try shifting the center the opposite way to fit 'THE' closer to the L. That would unify all the words.

[Griffin McPherson]

Seems to me that the top left image is the easiest to read. The lighter letters work week in the web and the darker text below mixes well with the environment.
For the right image the dark "the" feels out of place due to the value of it and the same goes for all of the text in the lower image.

The first image looks great to me, looks very nearly finished to me so I’m eager to see the end result since you said you’re going to polish it even more.

[baileyvidler]

@TessaW Gorgeous!

[jdubz]

Yeah this is really popping. Looks great!