Keymap wizardry: Typing out the Harry Potter saga
Typing out all the Harry Potter books would be crazy, right? What would be the point? Seems like a weird flex even by keyboard enthusiast standards. Yep, that's right. Typing it out once makes no sense. That's why I'm going to type out the books a few million times! For the benefit of humanity and especially of you, fellow keymap wizards. This is a demonstration of the power of alternative/custom layouts. Given the huge extent of this topic, we can barely scratch the surface here so consider this write-up a mere teaser. Imagine you are an aspiring writer with a brilliant idea, just about to start typing out your magnum opus, staring at a yet empty document on your screen. Cursor blinking, annoying orphan relatives locked up in the cupboard under the stairs. Your story, about a young boy who ends up saving the world, is quite complete. You "just" have to type out heaps of your manuscripts and notes: about 6.5 million keystrokes. Everything is prepared for the...
Jun 4, 2024
It's clear that the design for Extended 2048 (and Extended 2048 Dark, by extension) is heavily influenced by vintage Apple keyboards like the Apple Extended Keyboard and its derivatives. What is your personal history with these keyboards? Did you use old Apple computers growing up? I've always been drawn to vintage computers, especially microcomputers. They have a strong influence on my work, with an unrivaled charm that is hard to find today. For me, the AEKII is the most refined yet timeless keyboard from that era. It still exudes something contemporary today. Are there any in-progress design documents that you would be comfortable sharing, to give the reader an idea of what the process of designing a keycap set actually looks like? Extended 2048 being the first set I designed, I no longer have any sketches or the first icon files. What did your process for designing Extended 2048 look like? Both philosophically (I'm sure you didn't directly copy any iconography from Apple) as well as logistically. For example, how did you determine optimal line weights and icon sizes to fit well on the spherical MT3 keycaps while still retaining the nod to the original Extended Keyboard (off-center legends)? The idea was to keep the essence of the AEKII set, while making it more modern and compatible. Regarding the typography, I defined a grid based on the keys with the largest characters, i.e. {[ }], so that everything would fit in afterwards. The legends are, obviously, centered vertically to avoid any distortion on the MT3 profile, which is spherical, but also for aesthetic purposes (As well as echoing vintage keycap sets, it makes the captions more legible). Can you explain a little bit about the design choice to use icon modifiers instead of text mods like the original Apple boards? Icons/illustrations will always be more universal than words. They also give character to the set, making it unique. Not all modifier keys need to have an unequivocal legend, linked to their function, nor is the idea to restrict the user to one and only one way of arranging keycaps on their keyboard. The accent modifiers in both 2048 sets incorporate the classic "six colors" from the famous Apple logo. What ultimately led to you using these particular shades in the set? The colors used in the keycaps are a bit more pastel compared to the more saturated colors that Apple used. The colors are indeed inspired by the Apple rainbow logo, but I wanted this addition to make sense, give off a vintage air, and fit with the cream color of the other keycaps. I was worried that garish colors would stand out too much and break the homogeneity of the keycap set. In the years since first designing the Extended 2048 set, have any new novelty icons come to mind that you would like to add to the kit? Probably more functional icons such as: gear, eye, workspace, monitor, any tool from popular software, etc. Fittingly, some of the novelty designs included in your 2048 keycap sets draw heavy inspiration from the original Macintosh icons and logos. Has Susan Kare and the rest of the design team from that era at Apple influenced any of your other designs that we might not have picked up on immediately? Probably; I'm inspired by a lot of things. Actually, I'm careful to make each set different from the next, so you shouldn't find a direct reference to his work in any of my other sets. ____________ Thank you again to biip for taking the time to answer our questions and giving us a little peek inside the design process! Let us know if you’d like to see more designer interviews for future keycap sets.