Typography: Text

Design has become a ______ enterprise?

"transmedia"

Metric Kerning

*Designer programming the pairs of letters (better for large texts), built into the typeface* Uses the kerning tables that are built into the typeface. When you select metric kerning in your page layout program, you are using the spacing that was intended by the type designer. Metric kerning usually looks good, especially at small sizes. Cheap novelty fonts often have little or no built- in kerning and will need to be optically kerned.

Optical Kerning

*Layout program doing it (better for small texts)* Is executed automatically by the page layout program. Rather than using the pairs addressed in the font's kerning table, optical kerning assesses the shapes of all characters and adjusts the spacing wherever needed. Some graphic designers apply optical kerning to headlines and metric kerning to text. You can make this process efficient and consistent by setting kerning as part of your character styles.

What are the two ways in which text can be viewed?

*Solid:* a sound and sturdy object *Fluid:* poured into the containers of page or screen

Justified Dangers

- Bad Rag - *Rivers* - Stacking (words or punctuation)

Left Aligned Dangers

- Bad Rag - Rivers - Widows - Orphans - Stacking (words or punctuation)

Right Aligned Dangers

- Bad Rag - Rivers - Widows - Orphans - Stacking (words or punctuation)

What are the three types of Dashes?

- Dash -- En Dash —- Em Dash

What does shifting do?

- Shifting increases spacing (use baseline shift instead)

What are the benefits of mass production in type?

- The cost of manufacturing (setting type, insuring its correctness, and running a press) drops - Labor and capital are invested int cooling and preparing technology, instead of in making the actual unit - Proofs

Centered Dangers

- Widows and orphans - Stacking (punctuation) - Bad rag - Rivers

When did graphic designers embrace the idea of the readerly text?

1980s

What is the baseline shift?

A baseline shift is a manual adjustment of the horizontal position of one or more characters. Baseline shifts are often used when mixing different sizes or styles of type. The baseline shift tool can be found in the Type tool bar of standard software applications.

What does a highlighted link signal?

A jump to another location

Em Space/Quad

A typical indent is an em space, or a quad, a fixed unit of space roughly the width of the letter's cap height. An em is thus proportional to the size of the type; if you change the point size or column width, the indents will remain appropriately scaled.

Letter Spacing

AKA Kerning

Good Kerning Pairs

AV AW IL NR UN ZR

Tracking

Adjusting the overall spacing of a group of letters Adding additional space between each letter (the same amount of space in each letter, a standard spacing)

What does Open spacing do?

Allows designers to play with the space between the lines, while tight spacing creates intriguing, sometimes uncomfortable, collisions.

Kerning

An adjustment of the space between two letters Spacing between letters in a word (different for each letter pair)

What does an indent signal?

An entrance to a new idea

What is "text" defined as?

An ongoing sequence of words, distinct from shorter headlines or captions

What is branding?

Branding is a powerful variant of literacy that revolves around symbols, icons, and typographic standards, leaving its marks on buildings, packages, album covers, websites, store displays, and countless other surfaces and spaces.

Em Dash

CONNECTING THOUGHTS, kind of like a semicolon A punctuation symbol used to indicate an explanation or emphasis.

What are the four modes of Alignment?

Choosing to align text in justified, centered, or ragged columns is a fundamental typographic act. Each mode of alignment carries unique formal qualities, cultural associations, and aesthetic risks. (centered, justified, flush left, and flush right)

What does reducing the standard distance do?

Creates a denser typographic color, while risking collisions between ascenders and descenders. Expanding the line spacing creates a lighter, more open text block. As leading increases, lines of type become independent graphic elements rather than parts of an overall visual shape and texture.

How to designers create distinctive typographic textures?

Designers experiment with extreme line spacing to create distinctive typographic textures

Why do designers sometimes use the archetypal modes of alignment?

Designers sometimes use the archetypal modes of alignment in ways that emphasize their visual qualities. Combining different types of alignment can yield dynamic and surprising layouts.

EULA

End User License Agreement

What is a *versal*?

Enlarged capitals, also called versals, commonly mark the entrance to a chapter in a book or an article in a magazine.

Letterpress Printing

Every space is constructed by a physical object, a blank piece of metal or wood with no raised image. The faceless slugs of lead and slivers of copper inserted as spaces between words or letters are as physical as the relief characters around them. Thin strips of lead (called "leading") divide the horizontal lines of type; wider blocks of "furniture" hold the margins of the page.

What is the GUI?

Graphical user interfaces (it routinely connects users with computers)

When do designers most commonly apply tracking?

Headlines and Logos Also as text gets bigger, the space between letters expands, and some designers use tracking to diminish overall spacing in large-scale text. Loose or open tracking is commonly applied to capitals and small capitals, which appear more regal standing slightly apart.

What do typographers do?

Help the readers navigate the flow of content. But really to help readers *avoid* reading

What happens with kerning in digital fonts?

In digital fonts, the space between letter pairs is controlled by a kerning table created by the type designer, which specifies spaces between problematic letter combinations.

What happens with kerning in metal type?

In metal type, a kerned letter extends past the lead slug that supports it, allowing two letters to fit more closely together.

When was Typography invented?

In the Renaissance

When were copyright laws first written to protect the author's right to this property?

In the early eighteenth century

Where is the dissolution of writing most extreme?

In the realm of the web

How to mark paragraphs

Indents have been common since the seventeenth century. Adding space between paragraphs (paragraph spacing) is another standard device. On the web, a paragraph is a semantic unit (the <p> tag in html) that is typically displayed on screen with space inserted after it.

En Dash

Indicates SPAN OF TIME a line the width of a capital N in whichever font is being used; is used to connect ranges of numbers, dates, letters

Who devised the theory of deconstruction in the 1960s"

Jacques Derrida

Difficult Kerning Pairs

LL XY TT LA

Justified

Left and right edges are both even Justified text makes a clean shape on the page. Its efficient use of space makes it the norm for newspapers and books. Ugly gaps can occur, however, as text is forced into lines of even measure. Avoid this by using a line length that is long enough in relation to the size of type. As type gets smaller, more words will fit on each line.

Flush Left/Ragged Right

Left edge is hard; right edge is soft Flush left text respects the organic flow of language and avoids the uneven spacing that plagues justified type. A bad rag can ruin the relaxed, organic appearance of a flush left column. Designers must strive vigilantly to create the illusion of a random, natural edge without resorting to excessive hyphenation.

What is a tracking typography crime?

Lightly tracked text Letters are tracked too close for comfort

Dash

Like hyphenation Hyphens' main purpose is to glue words together. They notify the reader that two or more elements in a sentence are linked

What dominates many commercial software applications?

Linearity

Centered

Lines of ueven length on a central axis Centered text is formal and classical. It invites the designer to break a text for sense and create elegant, organic shapes. Centering is often the simplest and most intuitive way to place a typographic element. Used without care, centered text can look staid and mournful, like a tombstone.

What did Barthe do?

Made the model of the text as an open web of references, rather than a closed and perfect work

What is left/right justified?

NO SUCH THING

Why do we have Paragraphs?

Paragraphs do not occur in nature (made to create a break in a body of text, to give the reader rests between groups of information)

What was the first system of mass production?

Printing with movable type

What did Katherine McCoy do?

Redefine typography as "discourse"

Flush Right/Ragged Left

Right edge is hard; left edge is soft Flush right text can be a welcome departure from the familiar. Used for captions, side bars, and other marginalia, it can suggest affinities among elements. Because flush right text is unusual, it can annoy cautious readers. Bad rags threaten flush right text just as they afflict flush left, and punctuation can weaken the hard right edge.

Word Spacing

Space between words

Typography is an interface to what?

The alphabet

The Latin alphabet

The characters of the Latin alphabet emerged over time; they were never designed with mechanical or automated spacing in mind.

What does a classic typographic page emphasize?

The completeness and closure of a work, its authority as a finished product

What is unique about the computer display?

The computer display is more hospitable to text than the screens of film or television because it offers physical proximity, user control, and a scale appropriate to the body.

Line Spacing

The distance from the baseline of one line of type to another Also known as leading. Designers play with line spacing in order to create distinctive typographic arrangements. AKA LEADING

Hypertext means what?

The end of the death of literature

What is the "body"?

The main block, comprising the principle mass of content. Also known as "running text"

Captions

The placement and styling of captions affect the reader's experience as well as the visual economy and impact of page layouts. Some readers are primarily attracted to pictures and captions, while others prefer to follow a dominant written narrative, consulting illustrations in support of the text. From a reader's perspective, close proximity of captions and images is a welcome convenience. Placing captions adjacent to pictures is not always an efficient use of space, however. Designers should approach such problems editorially. If captions are essential to understanding the visual content, keep them close to the pictures. If their function is merely documentary, adjacency is more easily sacrificed.

Leading

The space between lines of text (can influence typographic color) - Leading is too dark/intense when ascenders and descenders crash into each other - Too loose when it looks lighter, hard to read

Kerning Headlines

The subtle differences between metric and optical kerning become more apparent at larger sizes. Most problems occur between capital and lowercase letters. The spacing between H/a, T/a, and T/o improves with optical kerning. The optical kerning applied here in InDesign has created tighter spacing for large text and looser spacing for small text. Look at both effects before choosing a kerning method.

Why was spacing invented?

To make words intelligible as distinct units

Good Rag

Toothy, in and out repeated, no shapes

Vertical text

Usually don't do it, better policy is flipping the type on its side to it reads vertically (Roman letters have strong base lines and cap heights so they are not meant to be read up and down, even worse with lowercase letters)

What is the *user*?

a figure conceived as a bundle of needs and impairments—cognitive, physical, emotional. Like a patient or child, the user is a figure to be protected and cared for but also scrutinized and controlled, submitted to research and testing.

When to track

caps and small caps (adds elegance)

What is a kerning hack?

look at it upside down if you are having trouble because it reduces subconscious reading and makes it shapes

When not to track

lowercase, script font, blackletter

Typographic Color

the overall density or tonal quality of a mass of type on a field—page or screen—usually referring to the mass of text shades of gray when you squint

What is the goal of Kerning?

to make the area between letters feel balanced

"work" vs "text"

work: closed, fixed, tidy, neatly packaged object text: open, unstable, impossible to contain (woven entities)