American Type Founders (ATF) was created in 1892 when 23 type foundries comprising 85% of the manufactured type in the United States merged into one business. In the 1950s and 1960s, ATF ventured into photocomposition by creating the Typesetter Models A and B. The Model B became the popular of the two and comprised two units: a keyboard unit which allowed compositors to generate encoded long strips of encoded control tape which could then be fed into a photographic unit which produced the final product by reading the tape and projecting light through interchangeable discs with fonts on them.
As technology advanced, photocomposition and manual typesetting became obsolete and ATF’s assets were eventually sold off when it went bankrupt.
In 1963, a brochure was designed and published by ATF that showcased the benefits of using the Typesetter Model B with beautiful images of typestting equipment and a vibrant colorful design. This project is a reproduction of that brochure.
Reproducing the original brochure as a web page has little practical use other than serving as an entertaining design exercise. Each page of the 16-page brochure was recreated in an effort to create an online equivalent for others to enjoy that goes beyond the standard layouts of many websites and stays as true as possible to the original design.
Several posters were also made based on the striking colors and design for those that want to enjoy a their own piece of typographical history.
