Essential Type Terms You Should Know As Well As the Do’S and Don’Ts of Typography
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Essential Type Terms you should know as well as the Do’s and Don’ts of Typography. Vocabulary leading the space between lines of type measured from baseline to baseline. The term comes from thin lead spacers used in letterpress printing. kerning adjusting (usually tightening) the space between individual characters in a headline so that they appear visually correct. tracking the function on computers that determines the character- to-character spacing, as well as the word spacing. Can be tightened for a closer fit. ligatures a combination of two or more letters that are joined to make one form; originally cast as one piece of lead designed to simulate hand lettering in manuscripts. Essential Type hanging punctuation the punctuation set outside the margins of the type, so that the type aligns vertically. word spacing the distance between words on a line of type (generally 1/3 an em space for lowercase body copy and 1 en space for capital text). letterspacing horizontal space between letters in a word or line. serif a line crossing the terminal of a character that extends beyond the main stroke (believed to be residuals of chisel-cut letters from Ancient Rome). sans serif letterforms without serifs. widow the last line of a paragraph positioned at the top of the next page or column; a short word (less than four letters) or the tail end of a hyphenated word as the last line of a paragraph. orphan the first line of a paragraph positioned at the end of a page or column. river a series of white spaces running through several consecutive lines of type creating a vertical white “river.” Occurs most often in justified copy. flush left/ragged right type set with an aligned left margin and an uneven right margin. flush right/ragged left type set with an aligned right margin and an uneven left margin. Not advisable for large amounts of text, difficult to read. Vocabulary (Cont’d) justified text type that is aligned vertically along both the left and right margins. baseline the imaginary horizontal line upon which all typeset letters stand or rest. x-height the vertical distance from the baseline to the mean line (or waistline). mean line imaginary horizontal line that denotes the top of the lowercase letter x for a given font. cap height measured from the baseline to the top of the capital letters in a font. Essential Type ascender the part of lowercase letters that extend above the mean line (or x-height). descender the part of lowercase letters that extend below the baseline. alley the space between two columns of set type (also called gutter). nameplate/banner the type design of the name of a repetitive publication (newspaper or magazine). masthead the editorial credit box of a regular publication. body copy the textual matter set in one face and point size with a common leading and column width. caption small amount of copy placed near an illustration or photo describing the image or identifying people. colophon inscription at the end of a manuscript or book that includes facts about its production; artists, printers, and specs on typefaces and papers used. counter a negative space within a character of type; it can be either fully or partially enclosed. ellipsis a sequence of three periods set as a single character, that indicates the omission of a word or words from quoted material or the trailing off of a thought. em dash (also mutt dash or long dash) is the width of an em space; used for attributing a quote to an author, or a break in thought (option + shift + dash). Don’ts (ever, ever, ever) Don’t double space after a period. Don’t use a dash in place of an em dash. Don’t track a line of body copy more than 5–10 points more than the rest of the body copy in order to fit a widow or orphan in. Don’t ever use three periods in a row to make an ellipsis. To make a proper ellipsis type opt + ;. Don’t use dumb quotes (or punctuation), or prime marks for quotes. Make sure the “smart punctuation” option is turned on (either in the preferences or the type menu). Essential Type Don’t leave widows or orphans. Adjust the tracking, point size, or column width first. Do not have any typos! Don’t use more than two type families on one design (this is a rule of thumb, only to be broken in extreme circumstances). Don’t use auto bold or italics. Find the bold and italic version of your typeface. Don’t underline any body copy or titles. Use italics to empha- size or denote a title of a publication. Legibility Considerations Legibility is the ease with which a reader can discern type of the page. Guidelines, concerns with legibility: • The eye jumps from one group of • Generally use 3-4 pts of leading be- letters (words) to another and tends to yond the pt size of your type. recognize the top halves of the letters. • Bold and heavy sans serif faces may • If an x-height is too small, or large, it need extra leading and word spacing. can be difficult to discern the letters. • Too long a line is tiring to reader, too • Some letters in script faces are difficult short is jumpy, and tiring. to differentiate. • Optimal line length is between 13-26 • Some display faces have poor legibility picas wide. Don’t go less than 9 picas Essential Type and should not be used in body copy. wide. • Serif faces tend to be the easiest to • The longer the line length, the more read (for body), as well as splayed sans leading needed. serifs. • Flush left (or ragged right) is easiest to • The most legible type sizes are 8, 9, 10, read, justified comes in second. & 11 point> this depends on x-height; if your font has small x-height, use 10- • Justification can cause rivers and exces- 11pt, if large x-height, 8-9pt. sive hyphens. • You want to create an even tone of gray on the page for readability. • Type in all-caps can slow down reader (and takes up 50% more space). • Script or italic can also slow the reader. Allow plenty of leading. • Letterspacing helps reader differenti- ate words. Generally, you don’t need to adjust letterspace in body copy, just display. • Increased leading improves legibility. Vocabulary (Cont’d) en dash (also nut dash) dash that is the length of an en space; used to replace “to” in text, as in 6–9pm (option + dash). folio the page number; can also include any type, date or flourish that is placed with the page number on each page. greeking nonsense type; used to indicate body copy for a client on a comp. subscript small numerals placed below the baseline for chemical formulas; also known as inferior characters. superscript an undersized numeral placed so it hangs above the x-height; used for footnote reference and exponents. Essential Type pica 1/6 of an inch, 12 points, or 0.013837 inches. point 1/72 of an inch or 1/12 of a pica. rule a typeset line; comes in varying thicknesses specified by point sizes. running head a headline or title that is repeated on every page, usually at the top; may include folio; can be chapter names or book title. running foot a title, design element, rule, etc., repeated on every page; usually includes the folio; usually at the bottom of the page. font all the letters, numbers, and punctuation marks of one size of one specific typeface, for example, 12-point Minion Semibold. typeface the distinctive, visually unifying design of an alphabet and its accompanying punctuation marks and numbers. It includes all point sizes of a typeface. type family all stylistic variations of a single typeface, such as light, medium, bold, extra bold, and italic..