DESIGN PRACTICE: TYPE DAY WORKSHOP

KERNING - makes the word more inviting to read, easier, softer - makes the word sit comfortably on the page. Its only really relevant when used for a single word e.g. logo / business. It makes it more anonymous.

Technique - look at the word then find the biggest space between the characters. You never negatively kern, you add spaces to between the other characters to evenly space it out. The serifs in the word can confuse your eye when looking at them. Lower case is also a lot harder. A product / company name are generally in upper case. You want to get the quality of the product across. It is very subtle. There is always at least 1 space that you wont change. It 'slows' down what the word is saying.

Breaking a sentence - read it out and break the sentence into two lines where you breathe. If the break is put in the wrong place it can completely change the meaning of what is being said.

Type Hierarchy - look at it then see what you are reading. If you engage your brain you will see. Fast blink and see what you see first. Then see where your eye goes to next.

To get you to read 3 words in the right order is quite difficult. Look at magazine adverts - your eyes are forced on the page. Adverts are designed to make your eye go to them. Good adverts are the ones that irritate you the most. Designers are manipulating the way you see.

WORKING WITH PARAGRAPHS

You can change the point size and the ledding to change the readability

LEDDING - the space between the lines of type. Never use negative ledding

In ARIAL font - the exercise is to get the text to fit in the 1 column by changing the point size and the ledding.
First column is 12.7 and no change to the ledding. The second is 1 point size then with edited ledding etc.

One of the most fundamental things to know is that EVERYTHING LOOKS DIFFERENT ON SCREEN TO WHEN IT IS PRINTED. Print it out to check what it really looks like. Put it in context on screen. Also stand back from it and see if you can still read it.

We chose the 2nd or 3rd column to be the easiest and most comfortable to read. The first column is the default setting but none of us chose that. It just shows that a bit of ledding added increases the readability but if you add too much it doesn't work.

You need to start understanding HOW the amount of ledding increases the readability.

Another way of increasing the readability is by changing the font. The X height - a font with a bigger X height will feel more crowded so you need to chose a font with a small X then you can reduce the amount of space. A smaller X height will naturally give you more ledding.

Get a favourite low and large X height font

ARIAL has a big X height. Even though the type is the same size as other fonts...because of the X height you will need to add more ledding.

With a big book job you can spend up to a day getting the ledding right.

10 point type with automatic ledding is 12 point etc....there is always 2 point size added, when you get to 18 point size then with ledding it is nearer to 21 point.

COLUMN WIDTH

The aim is to make the text as easy to read as possible, to make people want to read it, to make it comfortable to read.

People wont read something that is too narrow or too wide. The min number of words in a line is 6 (average word is 5 letters plus the letter space, average 36 characters). Tabloid newspaper is more narrow than a broadsheet newspaper. Broadsheets tends to use little words but in the Guardian they use language which is more precise and more engaging in debate.

A book is has 11 - 12 words per line...the 4th column has more than that...its too large. If you are stuck with a large column width then chose a font with a large X size to fill it out more.

RULE - NEVER LESS THAN 6 WORDS AND NEVER MORE THAN 12 WORDS on a line

POINT SIZE in books are between 8 and 9 point (in a novel), magazines can get away with 8 (for young audience with good eye sight)

14 point is the standard point size for the nation.

It depends on the audience. If your type is bigger than 9 point then there needs to be a reason but remember that it also depends on

Dont use ariel 12 point - it doesn't endagde. Consider; typeface, point size and ledding, margins, headings. You can control how people see things and it is about engaging them in this process.

If you want to increase the point size but keep the text in the same sized area then you can change then size of the spaces between paragraphs

If you want someone to read something, include spaces between paragraphs because it makes it friendly to read.

Here you cant see where paragraphs here. You have 2 forms of breaking them up; indentation and spaces between paragraphs

You should never use them at the same time - FUNDAMENTAL - it acts as 2 pauses

TAB SPACE - 1 cm indentation into the page. It was initially used in typewriters to have even spacing throughout the information e.g. spreadsheets

The min you will get that will end a paragraph is 3 characters...the last 2 letters of the word and the full stop. So the tab should be 3 characters long in relation to the rest of the document

Even with the intendations you still want to read the column with the paragraph spacing

There should never be less than 2 point sizes between the point size and the leading size

NEW EXERCISE

Including the picture within the page without changing the set up of the page and so that the text fits with the image and fills the page.

The first thing you do when you approach a document with type and image is address the TYPE (concentrate it) - make it readable with the size, ledding and font. When you have done that then you can get an idea where your image can go.

Think like a designer