The Basics of Typography

Years of study as a universities are one reason why graphic designers are an important tool for communication. When it comes to typesetting—there is more than meets the eye. Too much for a non-designer, really. However, there are a few basics that can get everyone on the right, and more legible, track.

SPACING
Forget what you’ve been taught. Only one space is needed after sentences, not two. Double spacing after a period is a lost cause from the monospaced fonts from the typewriter age. The digital fonts we use today compensate for the needed space. Adding two spaces creates a mess of problems including gaps in text. Plus, designers end up having to remove all the double spacing before creating a layout.

DASHES & HYPHENS
The long em-dash represents a break in thought—never use several hyphens in a row to represent an em-dash. Most word processors make this change automatically as you type. The shorter en-dash can be translated as to or through. For example, 11:30 AM to 3:00 PM is the same as 11:30 AM–3:00 PM. The tiny hyphens are only used when hyphenating words, e.g. first-class or goody-two-shoes.

For clarity, here is what each looks like, notice the difference in length:

• Em-dash —
• En-dash –
• Hyphen -

PUNCTUATION
Quotation marks are where one of the biggest type faux pas takes place. When writing a quote one should use smart quotes instead of dumb quotes. Dumb quotes are the equivalant of inch-marks. Smart quotes are their curly cousins. They have an open and closing mark whereas dumb quotes are identically vertical on both sides. Like dashes, many word processors take care of this problem and make the change automatically as you type.

BOLD, ITALIC & UNDERLINE
When should you use bold, italic and underlining for emphasis? By the books, bold is for highlighting important points and to help in aid of skimming an instructional text. Italic is mainly for creating stress on a single word of a sentence, book titles and for foreign words. Also, never use bold and italic together, it actually ends up de-emphasising your text. Underlining comes from the typewriter era when there were no options for bold or italic. In printed form, never underline text. In web form, only underline if your text is actually a link, unless you want to confuse your visitors.

These basic rules will accomplish most day-to-day needs, and since many word processors automatically make most of the changes for you—life is a lot easier.