Typography in Graphic Design
Typography is one of the most important elements in graphic design. Using text in design is one of the obvious ways to convey the message to the viewer. In order to achieve a clarity in message and aesthetic beauty of design requires understanding of Typography.
Typography: the art and techniques of arranging type, type design, and modifying type glyphs.The choice of Typography is a skill which takes many years to build and perfect. Combination of fonts, their positioning, the spacing are some of the parts in Typography.
The Terminology of Typography
There are some terms often used in Typography. Maybe you are familiar with some of them. But it won’t hurt to review a little bit of these terms.
Typeface and Fonts
Some people treat them as the same thing, but a designer is better to understand the difference between them. Typeface(Font Family) is a collection of type with similar characteristic like Arial Black, Arial, Arial Regular,etc. While fonts are the specific size and style of type within a font family, in this case we call Arial alone as font.
Serif and Sans Serif
The most heard terms are these two. What is Serif and Sans Serif? Serif is a short line at the end of the main strokes of a character. As for Sans Serif is the character that doesn’t carry short line at the end of strokes. You can distinguish them once you understand the difference.
Line-Height/Leading
Leading or Line-Height is the amount of vertical spacing between lines of type. Most of time, designer add extra 2 points from the original font-size to the body text.
Paragraph Width
Paragraph width is one of the factor determining how comfort the reading is. Long paragraph width requires more effort in reading and increase the difficulties for the reader to jump to the next line.
Typeface Classification
Typeface can be classified into 2 major categories which are Serif and Sans-serif. Beside those 2 categories, we can break down into sub-categories like Humanist, Garalde, Didone, etc. Jacob Cass has written an typeface classification e-book for you to get it for free with some courtesy. I’ll show some of the example of what the e-book contents are.
Humanist
Humanist (Venetian) faces are like a handwritten italic form - named after the first roman type faces that appeared in Venice in 1470. Humanist type faces were initially designed to imitate the handwriting of Italian Renaissance scholars. These types are characterised by their strong, bracketed serifs.
The letters are in general wide and heavy in colour. Other characteristic letters are the wide lower case with a diagonal bar to the eye. A noticeable feature of true Humanist types is the square full point. These types have a small x-height, moderate contrast between strokes, and an acute `angle of stress’ and do not lend themselves to modern design treatments of type such as reverse or stipple. The style prints best on a unsized stock in black or brown ink.
Points Form Summary :- Handwritten italic form
- Strong, bracketed serifs.
- Wide and heavy letters in colour.
- Square full point.
- Small x-height,
- Moderate contrast between strokes
- An acute ‘angle of stress’
- Prints best on a unsized stock in black or brown ink.
- Humanist fonts include: Centaur, Stemple Schneidler, Italia, ITC Berkeley
Lineal
Though the first sans serif (sans meaning without) type face was issued in 1816, another hundred years passed before this style gained popularity. Then, in the 1920s, when typography was heavily influenced by the ‘less is more’ philosophy of German’s ‘Bauhaus’ school of design, designers began creating type faces without serifs.
A popular type face for all classes of publicity and advertising work due to the large variety of weight and styles available and because their structure suggests newness and attention-awakening appeal to a remarkable degree. They possess simplicity and neatness since there is little variation in the thickness and weight of the letter strokes.
One of the main reasons for the popularity of the Lineales in display work is because of the ease with which the thickness of the strokes can be increased and the design of the letters expanded or condensed. These modifications are much easier to perform than with serifed types. However, because of the absence of serifs, they are not recommended for large areas of solid text setting but can be used for headlines without any problems.
Points Form Summary :- Without serifs.
- Influenced by the less is more philosophy of Bauhaus.
- Suitable for all types of publicity and advertising work.
- Large range of weight and styles available.
- Suggests new and attention awakening appeal.
- Simplicity and neatness.
- Not recommended for large areas of solid text.
Choosing Typeface and Size
When we are talking about choosing typeface, we’re talking about what kind of feeling we want to present. You can randomly pick any fonts and combine it to see if it represent the idea. Once you understand how a different categories of type can represent the feeling, you’ll have a better idea in picking fonts for your project.
Display Type: Large and/or decorative type used for headlines and as graphic elements in display pieces. Common sizes range between 14 and 72 point.Beside the message and feeling, some of the factors you need to remember are:
- The size of a type can be different although they carry the same size-point, it is caused by factors like x-height, stem stroke, etc.
- Some sources state that the body text font-size should be around 9-12 point
- Display Type’s font size should be higher than 14 point.
- Font-size that is lower than 9 point is the size for caption
Determining Letter Spacing, Word Spacing and Leading
If the font-size is small, you can increase the letter spacing to make it easier to read. Word spacing should follow the letter spacing in term of point. As for the leading, make sure that the ascender doesn’t hit the descender.
Actually I wish to cover the grids and layout too, but I think it’ll be better to cover the grids and layout in a different post. If you’re looking for more reading related to Typography, you can check out some of the posts below:
