Def. - An ambigram, also sometimes known as an inversion, is a graphical figure that spells out a word not only in its form as presented, but also in another direction or orientation.
- a word or words that can be read in more than one way or from more than a single vantage point. (from the Latin: ambi=both + gram=letter)
Douglas R. Hofstadter describes an ambigram as a “calligraphic design that manages to squeeze two different readings into the selfsame set of curves.” The first published reference to the term was by Hofstadter, who attributes the origin of the word to a friend. The 1999 edition of Hofstadter’s Gödel, Escher, Bach features a 3-D ambigram on the cover.
Ambigram Types
Ambigram’s fall into the following categories.
Rotational
A design that presents several instances of words when rotated through a fixed angle. This is usually 180 degrees, but rotational ambigrams of other angles exist, for example 90 or 45 degrees. The word spelled out from the alternative direction(s) is often the same, but may be a different word to the initially presented form. A simple example is the lower-case abbreviation for “Down”, dn, which looks like the lower-case word up when rotated 180 degrees.
Mirror
A design that can be read when reflected in a mirror, usually as the same word or phrase both ways. Ambigrams that form different words when viewed in the mirror are also known as glass door ambigrams, because they can be printed on a glass door to be read differently when entering or exiting.
Figure-ground
A design in which the spaces between the letters of one word form another word.
Chain
A design where a word (or sometimes words) are interlinked, forming a repeating chain. Letters are usually overlapped meaning that a word will start partway through another word. Sometimes chain ambigrams are presented in the form of a circle.
Space-filling
Similar to chain ambigrams, but tile to fill the 2-dimensional plane.
Fractal
A version of space-filling ambigrams where the tiled word branches from itself and then shrinks in a self-similar manner, forming a fractal. See Scott Kim’s fractal of the word TREE for an animated example.
3-dimensional
A design where an object is presented that will appear to read several letters or words when viewed from different angles. Such designs can be generated using constructive solid geometry.
Perceptual shift
A design with no symmetry but can be read as two different words depending on how the curves of the letters are interpreted.
Natural
A natural ambigram is a word that possesses one or more of the above symmetries when written in its natural state, requiring no typographic styling. For example, the words “dollop” and “suns” are natural rotational ambigrams. The word “bud” forms a natural mirror ambigram when reflected over a vertical axis. The words “CHOICE” and “OXIDE”, in all capitals, form a natural mirror ambigram when reflected over a horizontal axis. The word “TOOTH”, in all capitals, forms a natural mirror ambigram when its letters are stacked vertically and reflected over a vertical axis.
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