PRIMARY TOOLS & MATERIALS:
LEAVES, DIE CUTTING MACHINE

Additional Tools & Materials: die cutting software, tape, camera, scanner, small pane of glass

This was a matchup under the nature + digital cutting column that I thought wasn't going to work. I'd never tried cutting leaves on my die cutter before, but I figured since they were similar in texture to vinyl, it would probably work. 

I chose several existing typefaces that I thought would contrast well with the leaves, then narrowed it down to three: Futura, and Freak Show (the circus style font) and Hobo. Not only did the leaves cut very well, they did much better than the test sheet of paper I sent through the cutter first to figure out where to tape down the leaves. Whew!

This study yielded letters that are bumpy, textured, and asymmetrical. The edges sometimes turn brown where they've been cut. When the letters are turned over, the reverse side of the leaves allows you to see the veins of the leaf much more clearly. This could make an interesting typeface for display - for the cover of some book about nature. Or I could see making this a vectorized, "flat" font, with some of the veins worked into their form.