Typography implies the creative design of the text. Typography comprehends typefaces and their style aspects such as letter arranging, size, colour, and other qualities. Setting the appearance and structure of text to evoke certain emotions and convey a defined message is the starting point in designing typography. Today’s post is dedicated to leading in establishing visual and readable efficient typography. Our Chicago website redesign company will guide you through principles of good typography and setting the right fundaments for your project. Successful typography combines content with typography that encourages users and enables effective communication with visitors, regarding visual cues that bring the text to life.
1. Typographic hierarchy
Typographic hierarchy establishes page structure and drives the user through content. Without clear hierarchy text appears chaotic, therefore hard to scan and read. Inferior typographic hierarchy weight down the text hardening to distinguishment text elements, and the difference between headings and body text.
2. Appropriate typeface and font
Although creative typeface might appear attractive, keep in mind that legibility is an important aspect. An aesthetic factor of fonts contributes to the design, but a standard typeface ensures readability. Choose a typeface that will be appropriate for body text while supplying head text with a more unique design. After determining the proper typeface, the font variations should also be suitable. Size and font style (bold, italic, regular) need to be fitting.
Google fonts and Typekit services, provide thousands of various typefaces to choose from. Usage of multiple different typefaces can have a distractive impact on users and appear disharmonious. To achieve visual continuity avoid using more than two to three typefaces per page. The dissimilarity of fonts leaves the impression of unrelated content.
A combination of serif and sans-serif fonts is welcomed but decorative and bold fonts should be kept for the main title or to distinguish two sections. Mixing two serifs or two sans-serif fonts is not recommended.
A diverse typeface and font design heighten the exclusive look however can easily dismiss page unity.
3. Examine the font size
Apprise the fact that not everybody has the same quality vision. Creating text that is comfortable for reading implies a font size of not less than 14 pixels. Thus, use larger-size fonts to highlight headings to invite and navigate readers.
4. Provide white space
Don’t overcrowd the text, provide enough white space between each line. This space will donate readability to the text. Landing (the space between lines of text), kerning (the space between two fonts), and tracking (the space among words in the group) should all work together to ensure the best legibility. However, the white space should be fitting and not overdone as it can also negatively affect clarity and split text. For example, adding two spaces between sentences is outdated and unnecessary.
5. Don’t use all capital letters
Besides the fact that users are not comfortable reading all capital letters, all capitals leave the impression of aggression and shouting. Thus, all caps are usually used in spam which you want to avoid. Words set with all upper cases are less recognizable because of the resemblance of the word’s height and baseline.
6. Consider the number of characters per paragraph
Users tend to gradually decrease focus and concentration if the lines appear too long. Similarly, if the lines are too short they disrupt the reading rhythm causing visitors’ eyes to move back too often. The optimal line length usually is recommended for 40 to 60 characters.
7. Use centered text for justified reasons
Centered text alignment has each line with a different starting point which makes it difficult to read. Uneven text blocks and edges are harder to scan. Use a centred text style moderated, exclusively for quotes or emphasizing parts of the text, while left aligning the rest of the text.
8. Contrast background and text
Enough contrast between the text and the background is required for readability. Poor contrast can diminish legibility no matter the style and size of fonts. Therefore, the background and the text should be polarized. Divergence is scored when placing dark font colour on a light background. Opposite to this example is placing light fonts on dark background and, although it seems to have the same effect, this contrast is less efficient.
9. Emphasize relevant text parts
Highlight important text information with underlining and bolding or italic style. A substitute for such highlighting is the insertion of hyperlinks, mouse hover, or border-bottom shorthand property.
Final Thoughts
Superior typography quickly glides users to a certain fragment of information, guides users to easily understand wider text segments, and reinforces the meaning of the text. Hence, the consistency of visual hierarchy and style is crucial. Besides its functional properties, typography contributes to brand identity by providing user interface design and website experience.
