ABOUT THE FONT MAGAZINE
The Font magazine has been published since 1991 by the advertising and graphic agency Kafka Design. Our ambition is to present to you the world of graphics, advertising, pre press, printing and web design. The Font magazine is meant for graphics designers, photographers, employees of advertising agencies as well as for pre press studios, printer houses and publishers. The magazine has 68 pages and is printed on a coated paper.
The Font magazine publishes interviews with renowned graphic designers, photographers and other artists. It also introduces famous advertising agencies and graphic studios. Each issue contains a substantial article about corporate identity of the companies in a given field, which is followed by evaluation of their logotypes.
We also bring our readers the information about graphic and advertising competitions and awards that relate to the field of pre press. These awards are called Zlata pecka, (TheGolden stone), Nejkrasnejsi kniha (The most beautiful book) and Nejlepsi vyrocni zprava (The annual report with the best design).
We systematically publish new types of letters which are being created in the Czech Republic or abroad.
We think, the hardware and software sections of our magazine are very important, too. Tests of various hardware parts and peripherial equipment, are published here - like eg monitors, digital cameras, tablets, printers or scanners.
Very popular are our reviews of the web design graphics programs. The same goes for our step by step column in which we give our readers tips how to do various tricks in graphic programs. The Font magazine also features interviews with Czech web designers.
In addition the magazine follows the most recent trends in image and text processing as well as what's new in print technologies and signmaking.
Each volume of the magazine also features a list of companies offering pre press, digital print and digital photography services. This list became an indispensible part of every issue.
Briefly noted (Ve zkratce) section is popular for many of our readers. In this section we list the going news and interesting events from visual art and world of technology.
The Font magazine is known through its graphic design. The advertising industry and graphic design experts rated it the second best in the Czech Republic. The covers feature interesting, fancy print technologies and materials (eg holography, six colour print or metalic print, thermo engraving, cut out, embossed print, scented colours, hand made litography and others). The subscribtion includes also special sections or free CDs.
The results of the readers structure survey:
Where our readers work
The total percentage exceeds 100 per cent because it was possible to choose more then one branch in which the given company does business.
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| DTP studios | 100 | 37,6 % |
| Graphic studios | 90 | 33,8% |
| Free lance graphic designer | 79 | 29,7% |
| Advertising agencies | 60 | 22,6% |
| Web design | 52 | 19,5% |
| Signmaking | 37 | 13,9% |
| Exposure | 32 | 12,0% |
| Impression | 22 | 8,3% |
| Digital print | 21 | 7,9% |
| Photostudio | 21 | 7,9% |
| Free lance photographers | 20 | 7,5% |
| Schools | 19 | 7,1% |
| Printing works and others | 60 | 22,6% |
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Types of computers used by our readers:
The total percentage exceeds 100 per cent because the users of other computer platforms use them in combination with other options.
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| Only PC | 139 | 52,3% |
| PC and Mac | 79 | 29,7% |
| Only Mac | 47 | 17,7% |
| Others | 2 | 0,8% |
Readers per copy
Each copy of our magazine gets to three readers. (2,9 to be exact) If we compare this number to the number of copies we print, we arrive at about 10 500 readers.
Do you read the adds in the Font magazine?
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| Yes, consciously | 140 | 52,6% |
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Yes, unconsciously |
108 | 40,6% |
| No, I don't | 18 | 6,8% |
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The internet connection
The results of this question were better then we expected. In the time of our survey over 90 per cent of those who respodned were connected. The irony is that four web designers, both of whom have fixed line connection in their studios, responded by filling in a paper form.
Connected to internet:
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| Yes by a modem | 140 | 52,6% |
| Yes by a fixed line | 57 | 21,4% |
| Yes by a microwave line | 28 | 10,5% |
| Yes by ISDN | 27 | 10,2% |
| No, but considers obtaining it | 22 | 8,3% |
| No, and doesn't consider obtaining it | 3 | 1,1% |
Hardware used by the respondents of our survey:
Scanners
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| Flatbed | 211 | 79,3% |
| Flatbed high end | 45 | 16,9% |
| Rotating | 23 | 8,6% |
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Printers
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| Ink colour printer | 195 | 73,3% |
| Black and White laser printer | 188 | 70,7% |
| Laser colour printer | 56 | 21,1% |
| Black and White Ink printer | 16 | 6,0% |
| Large scale printer | 16 | 6,0% |
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Digital cameras
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| Ordinary | 73 | 27,4% |
| High-end | 28 | 10,5% |
This survey was made in 2001. You will learn more in Czech in Font No. 55.
WHAT WAS WRITTEN ABOUT FONT:
Martin Vacha, Drak (Dragon) magazine, 6/97:
"The Font magazine will show you through the world of advertising graphics and DTP. The magazine includes a number of regular sections. For example the "We introduce to you" (in which a particular advertising agency is introduced), "Interview" (with graphic designers, photographers and other artists), "History" (in this section the magazine describes how script came to existence and evolved and how typography and polygraphy evolved), "design" (this section shows unique pieces of work in design), "Review" (review contains a book review of a newly published specilized book ), "Procedures" (this is a step by step instructions book for various computer tricks), "Trends" (new technologies and procedures), "Software and hardware" (this is about programs and technical equipment for graphic designers). Also, the competitions that appear in the Font will draw your attention. The last few volumes the competition was about the "Best invitation card", for example or about the best photo montage or a test of reader's knowledge about the font types and so on. This magazine has changed a lot, during the last four months, and I have to say that it improved. The Font magazine is intended for artists, graphic designers, typograhers and for advertising agencies professionals. The price of subscribtion includes special sections or CD ROMs which have pictures that can be freely distributed. The Font magazine is printed on high quality coated paper, has interesting cover, the print is immaculate and you can see examples of partial ultraviolet coat, silk-screen printing, holography, metalic print and many other graphic techniques there.
Filip Blazek, www.typo.cz, 2000:
The Font magizine focuses mainly on the computer production process of the graphic designs and the magazine's structure corresponds to it. Most of the issues are therefore dedicated to technology. You might remember the thin, black and white copy that had a ugly design and was full of mistakes. That is how the first copies of the Font looked like in the 90's. Since then the magazine changed tremendously. Recently, the graphic design was significantly improved and the upholding of the new design is supervised by his author Pavel Hrych. The concept contitues to be conservative but for the good of the magazine: it is lucid and it reads easily. The Font magazine is the only Czech periodical which continuously informs its readers about what's new in software and hardware but also about applied graphics in the Czech Republic and abroad. It already became a tradition in the magazine to indroduce typographers and graphic design studios and since some appear there repeatedly, one can see how the evolve themselves. Somewhat of a weakness are the articles in the magazine. Some articles are superficial, some look as if just copied from foreign magazines. Pathetic are the interview with representatives of the advertising agencies. Every time I read the same kind of phrases about how Czech advertising is so outstanding ( but the printed examples prove the very opposite). Praiseworthy is the producers effort to present the untraditional print technologies, colours or paper types. A reader receives a lot of information, which he couldnšt aquire by purely reading articles. Some issues even contain a CD with up to 100 high quality photos by about ten photograhers.
Filip Blazek, www.typo.cz, 2002:
This is a quality magazine. It is dedicated to especially, computer produced printed materials: It contains reviews of software, interviews with graphic designers and shows work procedures. High attention is paid to advertising and advertising typography. You can read and see more about Font at www.kafka.cz, where you can also order this magazine. The existing graphic design is a work of Pavel Hrych, who is an employee at the Kafka Design agency.
there will be some short information about this web pages and about magazine Font.