I created a font as part of my capstone project for my Master of Graphic Design degree at OCA, University of the Creative Arts.
I named the font "Bawal", which means "forbidden in Tagalog. It was inspired by a sign that was posted on someone's fence in the Philippines.
This typeface looked great on the artworks I made and was a key component in conveying the Filipino culture. The development of this typeface is detailed below.
When I visited the Philippines the last time, I made it a point to shoot numerous photographs. The above pictures display a variety of signs that can be found in both urban and rural settings. Most of them are written by hand, however stencils are often utilized if the writer really wants to save time. And if it can be afforded, it gets printed by professionals.
This sign (below photo) was on the garage of someone’s property. It translates to “Reminder: it is forbidden to throw garbage here. Thank you.”
In this particular one, the owner seemed to have had written the whole thing by hand and followed some rules to his lettering style. There were some inconsistencies which I enjoy. For example the width of the letters and the unbalanced left and right indents. I like the distressed effect that was caused by the tropical weather of the Philippines. All these imperfections was used to inspired the creation of the Bawal font.
I used Procreate to create the letters. With Procreate, I was able to give the font a “handmade” feel. For letters that were not included in the photo, I had to take elements from different letters and apply it to the missing ones such as: C,V,X,Y,Z
I decided to call this font “Bawal”, which means “not allowed”.
At the end, I created a font family which included 3 typefaces.
When the vectors for each font were done, I imported them into Font Forge to make any necessary adjustments to the individual letters.
The typeface was never fully finished, but it did serve its purpose. It was still functional, and when incorporated into my artwork, the results met my expectations.
This font is still under development, but I still offer it here for download for those who want to give it a try.
There are a few fonts out there that are inspired by the Filipino culture created by amazing Filipino designers. Here is my contribution!
