This thesis project explores how emerging (AI) technologies might transform how we shape and interact with typography. I will create three computational design directions, focusing on different facets of the type design practice. Using pose estimation, generative visual AI models, and large language models that operate on text, I aim to explore whether typographic shapes can be created and manipulated more intuitively and with different modes of expression. The goal is to offer computational, experimental, and playful alternatives to approach type creation and manipulation and to consider how creativity might evolve in the future.
I will explore several facets of the practice of type design: As the nature of what we consider "computation" changes, how will typographic design change? What does it mean to be an “author” in a world where models create with a high degree of sophistication? How will the role of “designers” change in the coming decade?
The history of typographic design is tightly connected to the restrictions of the present technology, which has strongly defined how visual information is produced and distributed. From the printing press to the first Apple desktop computer, they all had their own impact on the way typography looked. Currently, a new generation of technology that is developing more rapidly than imaginable is raising the question of how typographic design might change. This set into effect a paradigm shift that will impact the designer's role: the nature of computation is changing and makes us redefine authorship.