Rules for Typographers

The following rules have been developed in practice and have established a list of rules for working with American English. These points address both visual and grammatical topics, both of which have been devised with the same goal: To clarify readability and provide a more efficient and accurate means for written communication.

Some of these rules are accompanied with techniques and keyboard shortcuts for Adobe Illustrator. Illustrator will be used in this class – along with InDesign – to manage larger bodies of text and more complex scenarios.

Handout

Printable: rulesoftype.pdf

Fundamental Controls of Type

Kerning

Kerning is the spacing between individual letters. It is controlled in Illustrator and Indesign in the Character Palatte.

See: Thinking With Type: Kerning

Letter Spacing/Tracking

Tracking is the spacing across a word, or group of words.

See: Thinking With Type: Tracking

Line Spacing/Leading

Leading is distance between lines of type. More specifically it is measured by the distance between baselines. Relationships between type size – measured in pt. size – and leading is crucial for readability and layout composition.

See: Thinking With Type: Line Spacing

Alignment

Alignment is the organization of a block or columns of type via a vertical axis. Different alignments alter the readability of text, as well as the composition of the information. Types of alignment include left alignment, right alignment, and force justified (as shown).

See: Thinking With Type: Alignment

Stacked Type

Roman letters are meant to be used in a horizontal order. When displayed in a vertical alignment, letters work best as uppercase, allowing even spacing between characters.

See: Thinking With Type: Stacked Type

Other Methods of Controlling Type

Monospace After Periods

Use only ONE space after periods, colons, exclamation points, question marks, quotation marks—any punctuation that separates two sentences. Characters on a typewriter are given the same amount of space. On a Mac, the characters are proportionally spaced, so an m doesn’t take up the same space as an i or e.

Quotation Marks

Use real quotation marks—never those grotesque generic marks that actually symbolize inch or foot marks: “ and “, not ” and ”.

Using Illustrator, do one of the following:

1) Go to File > Document Setup > under Artboard go to Type. In Type make sure Typographer’s Quotes is checked.

2) Choose Type > Glyphs, and then insert the straight quotation mark.

Apostrophes

These belong with singular and plural possessives and contractions. Plural possessives: s’ Singular possessives: ’s Dates: ‘80

Dashes

Do not use hyphens to substitute as dashes. Use en and em dashes instead. Hyphens ( – ) are used for hyphenating words only. No more than two lines in a row should be hyphenated. Avoid using too many hyphens. Never hyphenate a word in a headline.

En dashes ( – ) are used for any indication of duration (Monday –Friday, 7 – 9 p.m., 2006 – 2007) and for compound adjectives (pre – Vietnam, Spanish–American War).On the keyboard, this is OPTION + –
Em dashes ( — ) are used in a manner similar to a colon or parentheses, for a change of thought or where a period is too strong and a comma is too weak. On the keyboard, this is OPTION + SHIFT + –

* When using some fonts like New York and Geneva, the keyboard commands for en and em dashes are reversed.

Underlining

Do not underline for emphasis or for books and periodicals. Use italics for publications, and bold, italics, CAPITAL LETTERS or larger print to denote emphasis.

Capital Letters

Never use all caps for body copy. They are almost impossible to read. Never use script fonts in all caps for display or body text.

Kerning

Kerning is adjusting the space between letters according to your visual perception so that a word appears unified. Kerning should always be done to capital letters in displaytext, and to lowercase letters in display text which appear to be “floating away” from other letters.

Tracking

Tracking is the uniform adjustment of letter spacing between letters over a range of text (a line, a text block, and so on).

Tabs and Indents

Never use the spacebar to align text! Instead, use tabs and indents to align text. It is cleaner and much less of a hassle. “Tabs” can be found under the Type menu in Illustrator or by typing SHIFT +  + T

Leading/Linespacing

Leading is the vertical space between two or more lines of type.

Text: Depending upon the font used and your design, leading for body text should be about two point sizes more than the type size.

Headlines: For headlines with few descenders, leading should be two points less than the type size.\par All Caps: Leading should be two points less than the type size.

To adjust the space between paragraphs, see the “Formats” window under the Style menu, and adjust the spaces before and spaces after the paragraphs.

Widows and Orphans

A widow is one word, or part of a word, left on the last line at the end of a paragraph. An orphan is a short line left over from a paragraph from a previous column or page which appears at the top of the following column or page of text. Neither of these are desirable in typesetting. You can get rid of them in several ways: re-write or edit the text, use the text tracking controls, or use the widow and orphan controls under “Formats” window under the Style menu.

Font Usage

Generally, you can use up to three different fonts which compliment one another in a document. Don’t go overboard. Outlandish font usages is a key sign of the work of an amateur. Less is always more.

For more Advice and Tips, read: Erik Spiekermann’s Typo Tips, from The Font Feed.