Compose to a Vertical Rhythm “Space in typography is like time in music. It is infinitely divisible, but a few proportional intervals can be much more useful than a limitless choice of arbitrary quantities.” So says the typographer Robert Bringhurst, and just as regular use of time provides rhythm in music, so regular use of space provides rhythm in typography, and without rhythm the listener, or the reader, becomes disorientated and lost. On the Web, vertical rhythm – the spacing and arrangement of text as the reader descends the page – is contributed to by three factors: font size, line height and margin or padding. The basic unit of vertical space is line height. Establishing a suitable line height The easiest place to begin determining a basic line height unit is with the font size of the body copy. There are many ways to size text in CSS and the above approach provides and accessible method of achieving the pixel-precision solid typography requires. Spacing between paragraphs Variations in text size Headings
Five Simple Steps To Better Typography – April 13th, 2005 – Typography, I find, is still a bit of mystery to a lot of designers. The kind of typography I’m talking about is not your typical “What font should I use” typography but rather your “knowing your hanging punctuation from your em-dash” typography. Call me a little bit purist but this bothers me. So, in an attempt to spread the word here’s the first of five simple steps to better typography. Measure the Measure. The Measure is the name given to the width of a body of type. One point = 1/72 of an inchOne pica = 12 pointsOne em = The distance horizontally equal to the type size, in points, you are using. But, with the advent of DTP packages and the website design the following are also now used: MillimetresPixels There is an optimum width for a Measure and that is defined by the amount of characters are in the line. CSS and fluid? What is interesting here is fluid designs on the web. The Measure and leading. Reversing out? Tracking Your responsibility The series Further reading
Contrast through Scale « Back to Blog on Friday 19th of October 2012 Typographic contrast is a deft and powerful weapon in your design arsenal. Its presence and impact typically goes unnoticed by readers, but its absence can ruin a site. In this series of posts, Christopher Murphy of The Standardistas takes a look at a number of techniques you can use to establish harmonious contrast in your designs. A typographic scale. by CHRISTOPHER MURPHY Contrast defines hierarchy, creates emphasis, suggests the relationship and relative importance of content, and can control how quickly text is read. You can create contrast through thoughtful use of: scaleweightclassificationcasecolor. Used individually, each can be hugely effective. In this first article, I’ll focus on scale, offer some tips on setting a scale, and share some sites that I feel have used scale particularly well. What is scale? Scale refers to the range of values at which type is sized. By setting a typographic scale, you can: Newspapers are masters at this.
The Creative Way To Maximize Design Ideas With Type Advertisement As with most designers, being sure that we explore and select the most successful, memorable and stimulating designs is a vital aspect that underpins every project we undertake. For us, the beginning of a new challenge has never been as simple as asking ourselves what might be the best avenue to take and then sitting down at a computer and attempting to fulfill that idea. After researching the subject matter, we will almost always begin with a sheet of paper and pencil and draw out a variety of design options to help bring together and develop the breadth of ideas that are maturing in our minds. In this article, we will explore the use of drawing and mark-making as an integral part of the creative process. An example of mark-making that helps to formulate design ideas for working with type and image. Why Textural And Tonal Qualities Of Type Should Be Addressed In Drawing Finding The Right Marking Tools And Paper Developing Your Own Design Shorthand Useful Ressources (al)
85 Amazing Typography Tutorials The web is brimming with typography tutorials, but many are low quality and others are very out of date. So we’ve trawled the internet to uncover the diamonds in the rough, in the form of 50 top-quality typography tutorials, to bring your knowledge and skills up to speed. Get Creative Cloud Perhaps you’re looking for a good introduction to the fundamentals of typography? Or perhaps you want to develop and push your type abilities further? We’ll be adding to this list as time moves on, so make sure you bookmark this fantastic resource, and come back from time to time to see what’s new in the world of typography tutorials. We'll start by looking at tutorials to help you with mastering the fundamentals of typography – skip through to another page if you're after something more advanced. 01. Not sure exactly what typography terms mean? Six further terms (tracking, widows and orphans, serif fonts, sans-serif fonts and script & cursive fonts) are explained in part two, which you can watch here.
The Great Discontent (TGD) Make use of grids for typographical layouts. Good typography skills are essential for any graphic designer - and those of us who work with text every day know how difficult it can be at times. A well-planned grid is key to creating a good typographical layout, as having a strong foundation to work with is a great way to keep a text-heavy document looking clean, consistent and easy to navigate. InDesign has some great features to make this process simple, enabling you to achieve some impressive results with minimal time and effort. As designers, we're always experimenting and pushing the boundaries of design, at times creating very complicated layouts. However, I believe a clean, simple and well-structured approach can be just as effective. Click here to download the tutorial for free Daily design news, reviews, how-tos and more, as picked by the editors.
10 Principles For Readable Web Typography - Smashing Magazine Advertisement by Matt Cronin Readability is one of the more important aspects of Web design usability. Readable text affects how users process the information in the content. In this post, we’ll explain some Web typography terms and how they play into readability; we’ll present numerous tips to help improve the readability of your content; and we’ll showcase very readable websites, layouts and articles. You may also be interested in the following related posts: The Terms, And What Each Means For Readability There are many factors that play into the readability of text. Hierarchy Every typographic layout needs the essential element of hierarchy. UXBooth5 uses a very clean hierarchy to achieve readable Web typography. Contrast Contrast is the core factor in whether or not text is easy to read. As shown in the following illustration, black on white is very readable. This one, however, pink on blue, is nearly impossible to read. The Keys to Readable Typography 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. (al)
Adobe® Edge Web Fonts "What Font Should I Use?": Five Principles for Choosing and Using Typefaces - Smashing Magazine Advertisement For many beginners, the task of picking fonts is a mystifying process. There seem to be endless choices — from normal, conventional-looking fonts to novelty candy cane fonts and bunny fonts — with no way of understanding the options, only never-ending lists of categories and recommendations. Selecting the right typeface is a mixture of firm rules and loose intuition, and takes years of experience to develop a feeling for. 1. Many of my beginning students go about picking a font as though they were searching for new music to listen to: they assess the personality of each face and look for something unique and distinctive that expresses their particular aesthetic taste, perspective and personal history. The most appropriate analogy for picking type. For better or for worse, picking a typeface is more like getting dressed in the morning. A large type family like Helvetica Neue can be used to express a range of voices and emotions. 2. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 3. 4. So far, so good. 5.
Plugin Try FontShop fonts in Adobe® Creative Suite® The free FontShop Plugin lets you preview any of our 150,000+ fonts, in the context of your own artwork in Adobe® Photoshop®, Adobe® Illustrator®, Adobe® InDesign®, or Adobe® Fireworks® (CS5, CS5.5 and CS6). This is a great new way to find the perfect typographic fit for your project. Features: Supports Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign & Fireworks Preview fonts in your document Search by name, designer or foundry Collect and tag favorite fonts Watch the introductory video and read on for details on how to download, install and use the FontShop Plugin. Free Download This is the beta version. Installation First download the latest version of the plugin. Double-click on the downloaded file to install the extension using the CS5, CS5.5 or CS6 Adobe Extension Manager (AEM). That’s it! Note: Windows Users, if double-clicking does not work, you may need to right-click on the downloaded file and then choose “Run as Admin”. Getting Started Finding Fonts
The Basics of Typography Typography is a central component of design. It gives us an understanding of the heritage behind our craft. It’s one of the primary ways we, as a society, pass on information to others. Imagine a website, a magazine or even TV without text. What Is Typography? From a descriptive and simplistic point-of-view, typography is the arrangement of type. For me, how typography is used in a design is deeply rooted in its overall theme, tone and message. Your choice of typefaces and your technique of setting type give your composition its character, pace and style. A simple illustration of how influential typography can be is to look at the same text with different typefaces. It’s this level of integration with a design theme that makes typography one of the most powerful tools in the designer’s toolbox. Next, let’s go through a few basic typography terms and concepts. Lines A line of characters has at least five lines that it can be aligned to. Here are the five lines: Leading Leading is powerful.
Download the 70 best free fonts | Typography The best free fonts offer plenty of options for your designs without costing anything. Whether you're looking for a classy serif, a clean sans-serif, vintage fonts or something completely different, there's no shortage of choice. In fact there, are so many free fonts out there that it can be hard to know where to start looking. To make it easier for you to find what you're looking for, we've gathered together the best free fonts that we've found in our regular searches of the web. One good resource for fonts, including free fonts, is MyFonts. The best free fonts Serif fonts 01. Kicking off our top picks of the best free fonts is this stunning serif by Craft Supply Co. 02. Carena is a beautiful minimalistic typeface perfect for that rustic yet elevated look. 03. Harmony is available for download from Behance. 04. This is a great offering from Pangram and Pangram. Daily design news, reviews, how-tos and more, as picked by the editors. 05. 06. 07. Looking to design your own book cover? 08.
Just don't do it: 14 type crimes to stop committing Getting your typography correct is not an easy thing to do. Like graphic design as a whole, is has to be both aesthetically pleasing and functional. Just like you do in a logo, when you’re working with big blocks of text in a print or web design, you have to put a lot of thought into how the type is working. We’ve assembled 13 crimes against type you need to avoid. It’s not an exhaustive list — there are other things that can trip you up as well (oh, the difficulties of being a designer), but it’s a good place to start. An example of creative management for a lot of text, by Atelier Martino&Jaña for the European Capital of Culture. 1. Yes, this one is subjective. Comic Sans is almost always disdained, and Helvetica is so frequently a top choice, that it’s overused in popular culture. When making your design put thought into the font you choose. 2. There are SO MANY font faces out there. You only need 2 or 3 — one for the title (maybe subtitle), and one for the body. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9.