ANATOMY OF TYPEFACE

FA T R IS H A MOH AMED YUS S OF

 ANATOMY?

A study of the structure or

internal workings of
something.
Anatomy of body
ANATOMY OF TYPEFACE?

A
THE ANATOMY OF TYPOGRAPHY

• The anatomy of typography is an area of study that gives you

basic knowledge of letters and their integral parts. It helps to
educate your eye to recognize the underlying structure of
various designs.

• Understanding the fundamental principles and concepts of

typography is the first step to being a successful typographer. The
most basic component of typography is the letter, and each letter
of the alphabet is distinguished by its unique shape or letterform.
The most basic component of typography is the letter, and each letter of the
alphabet is distinguished by its unique shape, or letterform.
HAVE YOU EVER SEEN
THIS WHEN YOU
WERE IN PRIMARY
SCHOOL?
INVISIBLE LINES IN WRITING
Ascent Line
The invisible line marking the height of ascenders in a font.
Mean line
The mean line better known as midline is another imaginary
horizontal line that marks the top edges of the lower case
letters.
Baseline
Majority of the characters sit on this imaginary horizontal
line.
Descent Line
The invisible line marking the lowest point of the descenders
within a font.
CHARACTER OF TYPEFACE
Uppercase
A letter or group of letters of the size and form generally used to
begin sentences and proper nouns. Also known as “capital
letters”.

Lowercase
The smaller form of letters in a typeface. The little letters or non-
capital letters of the alphabet are lowercase glyphs.
CHARACTER HEIGHT
Cap height
The capline or cap height is another
imaginary line wherein the heights of all
the capital letters are marked in a
typeface.
X-height
The space that exists in the vertical
direction for the lowercase “x” in any
typeface is known as X-Height. It is the
distance the baseline and mean line of the
body of characters in lowercase form.
Body Height

Descender happens to be the bottom part of the lowercase

letter (like “g”, “j”, “p”, “q”, “y”etc) that usually goes below
the baseline of a typeface. Some other features that
particularly extend below this baseline comprise of the old
style numerals typefaces. These specific numerals were
basically thought to mix appropriately with the lowercase
roman numbers. If used within the body of the text they really
look good and beautiful.
 THE ANATOMY

Bowl
It is nothing but the rounded curve that
covers the negative space in a letter
form. Consider for example, it can be
easily viewed in the following
letters “e”, “D”, “o” and“g”.

Crossbar
Crossbar is a stroke that connects 2
lines in capital letterforms
of “A” and _________. BUT a cross
stroke implies a horizontal stroke that
does not connect two lines for example
the lower case of “f” and _________.
Counter
Counter refers to the negative space within a letter,
particularly if you consider letters like “A”,
“o” and “P” etc where the counter is fully enclosed. In
letters like “G”, “u” and “c”the non enclosed negative
space is reflected and they are also called counters.

Stem
The main vertical or diagonal stroke depicted in a
letterform is known as Stem. They consists of the vertical
parts of the letters like “I” and “H” and also
simultaneously all the strokes in the letter “W”.
Spine
The main curved stroke of a lowercase or
capital S. Definition: The spine is the main left
to right curving stroke in S and s. The spine
may be almost vertical or mostly horizontal,
depending on the typeface.

Swash
A flourish addition replacing a terminal or
serif. A swash is a typographical flourish on a
glyph, like an exaggerated serif. Capital
swash characters, which extended to the
left, were historically often used to begin
sentences.
Leg
Legs are the lower angled strokes which you
can see in the letters “K”, “R”.

Tail
A descending stroke, often decorative.
Definition: In typography, the descending,
often decorative stroke on the letter Q or the
descending, often curved diagonal stroke on
K or R is the tail. The descender on g, j, p, q,
and y are also called tails. The back, last,
lower, or inferior part of something.

Shoulder
The curved stroke aiming downward from a
stem. The curve at the beginning of a leg of a
character, such as in an “m.”
ANATOMY OF TYPEFACES
Serif

It is the name assigned to the finishing strokes at the tops and bottoms of
some typefaces. There is a lot to discuss about serifs when we would
learn about typeface distinctions.
Tittle
Title is defined as the dot above the
lowercase “j” and “i”.

Terminal
Terminal is the culmination point of the
stroke or stem that has no serif.
 S
R M
TE
N G
T I
E T
E S
P
TY
TYPESETTING ?

Definition: Typesetting is the digital or physical arrangement of text in the

fields of publishing and graphic design. Below introduces this unique art of
organizing and fine tuning document titles and content.
 BRIEF HISTORY OF TYPESETTING
• The ancient bookmakers copied the
text and the pictures in book down by
hand. however, the practice of hand-
copying books produced books at a
very slow rate.

• Johannes Gutenberg brought

moveable type to the European
Continent in 1440 that a true printing
revolution took place for Europe and
most of the rest of the world. The way
Gutenberg’s invention sped up book
production was nearly beyond
comprehension.
• At the time, a person who copied a book by hand could produce
about 40 hand-printed pages a day. The Gutenberg press made it
possible to print nearly 4,000 pages a day. Before Gutenberg
invented his press, only about 30,000 books existed in the world.
• Today, the moveable type press
has been replaced by computer
graphics software. This software
allows a graphic designer to
produce even more pages per
day than the printing press
operator ever could. Block-type
and moveable-type printing
became obsolete.
TYPESETTING GLOSSARY
Baseline
If you look at most typefaces you will notice all letters seem to rest or sit
(much like handwriting in a lined notebook) on an invisible line, this is
called the baseline. Although some elements do extend beyond it for
example, the bottom parts of letters like ‘p’ or ‘q’ the baseline is the
point from which other elements of type are measured including x-height
and leading.

Cap Height
The cap height of a typeface is the distance between its baseline and the
top of a flat capital letter (best exemplified by H, I, X). Note this does not
account for the overshoot of pointed or rounded letters. These are often
slightly taller – to compensate for the visual illusion of being shorter.
Counter
Have you ever coloured in the empty spaces in letters like ‘d’, ‘e’, ‘g’ etc.? If yes, you
applied colour to counters (albeit closed ones). A counter is the space enclosed
(‘b’, ‘d’, ‘o’ etc.) or partially enclosed (‘c’, ‘h’, ‘s’ etc.) within a letter, glyph or
figure. Pay attention to this space if you’re designing a typeface: it greatly affects
legibility.
Drop Caps
The use of drop caps spans almost two thousand years. You may have spotted these
elements in books, where they often embellish the first page of a chapter. A drop
cap is simply the first character of the text, enlarged to span several lines of the
first paragraph. The letter can keep the same font as the body, although
decorative typefaces add a bit of magic when suitably used. I’m not sure about
their use in digital mediums though, but that’s just me.
Glyph
A glyph is a graphical unit, a specific part of a written element. Glyphs differ with the
language, but largely serve the same purpose: they compose readable characters.
Languages based on the Latin alphabet don’t illustrate the notion as well as, for
example, Japanese does. Note the distinction between glyphs and ligatures: not all
ligatures are glyphs.
Kerning
A term that came from the laborious task of metal typesetting, kerning in the digital world
refers to the distance between two adjacent characters. Graphic designers often
employ manual kerning to achieve high-quality typesetting, where the negative space
between letters may otherwise be visually unappealing.
Leading
Leading is the amount of space between text lines in a paragraph. More precisely, it
measures the distance from one baseline to another. As is the case with most spatial
adjustments in typography, leading can make a great difference in the overall aspect
and readability of your text. Use it wisely!
Ligature
A ligature is a glyph obtained from joining two or more letters. You can easily notice
ligatures in script or calligraphy fonts, where the letters flow smoothly, or serif fonts.
Increasing in popularity are ligatures for sans-serif fonts, particularly useful in clean-
looking typography logos or graphics.
Monospace
Monospace fonts will remind you of typewriters, and that’s because they were created for
typewriters. Their most notable feature is that each character spans the same width.
This allowed them to remain popular in programming and text editing, due to the
enhanced readability of source code.
Point Size
You use this measurement every time you set the text dimension in any writing and editing
software. When adjusting the size of your font, bear in mind that different fonts at the
same point size may have different sizes on the page. The size required will also vary
between digital and print formats.
Script
The term ‘script’ refers, in typography, to the typefaces composed of handwriting
strokes. Script typefaces are quite versatile and have gained popularity partly due
to the fluid aspect that comes with the curvy ligatures. No worries though, quills
won’t be necessary – computer software kept up with the trend!
Swash
A swash, in typography, is a flourish present in script, calligraphy or old-style
typefaces, often in italic forms. The whimsical look is among favourites for book
typesetting. Always use a swash character or typeface in suitable locations, where
they won’t hinder the text flow.
Tracking
Not to be confused with kerning, tracking defines a uniform increase or decrease of space
between letters, affecting the density of the entire block of text (as opposed to the
space between two specific letters). You will find the letter-spacing largely depends on
the context, so adjust it to match your design.
Typeface
While this may seem the posh way to say ‘font’, there is a slight difference between the two
words. ‘Font’ encompasses the function (see the font file you install on your machine),
as well as the aspect – the typeface. In other words, the typeface is what the font looks
like. They are, however, used interchangeably nowadays, so don’t worry about getting it
wrong!
Vector Fonts
Also known as outline fonts, these show their best qualities when used for large scale print.
The vector format ensures the font is fully scalable with no pixellated edges. The
result? Clean, precise rendering that requires no further processing.
PRINTING TERMINOLOGY

Bleed
While not a life-threatening condition, a picture will ‘bleed’ when it touches one or
more edges of the page. This no-margin approach is often used for sleek, modern
publications, although it comes at a higher printing cost.
Chromaticity
The term refers to the quality of a colour based on the parameters of hue and what is
known as purity, saturation, or colourfulness. It is part of wide research in the
field of colour theory, with practical applications such as colour matching and
determining colour appearance.
Cover Proof
Also known as ‘jacket proof’, it is an early print of a book cover. You may include this
in a marketing strategy, as its main purpose is publicity.
Crop Marks
Because printers can’t cover the edge of the paper, certain publication formats
require printing on larger sheets, which then need trimming. Crop marks, also
very suggestively known as trim marks, indicate where your publication’s sheets
should be trimmed.
DPI & PPI
These two terms and their meaning can often be confused, but they actually mean
very different things.
DPI refers to the number of printed dots per one inch in printed images – it
describes the resolution of printed image.
PPI refers to the number of pixels per inch in an image displayed on a computer
screen – it describes the resolution of a digital image.
Full Measure
Type that is ‘full measure’ spans the entire width of the page, column or frame it’s set
in, without any indentation. The text is, therefore, ‘justified’. Keep an eye out for
severely widened gaps between words – this is a common typesetting issue.
Gutter
The gutter usually defines the empty space between facing pages of a book (inner
margins). A less common use refers to the gap between two columns.
Jacket
Perhaps better known as ‘dust cover’, it wraps around the cover of a hardback printed
book. Along the title and author of the book, it can feature illustrations,
bibliographical information, a blurb and reviews from industry authorities.
Natural Spread (Centerfold)
You probably noticed a centrefold in magazines or other multi-page publications.
Thanks to saddle-stitch binding, the two pages in the middle can accommodate a
large image without significant interruptions. Magazines can use portraits,
posters, graphics or high-quality photos.
Registration Mark
Often depicted as a cross, the registration mark is printed outside the boundaries of
the publication. It is a system employed in colour printing to correlate overlapping
colours on an image. This ensures the outcome is printed cleanly, without fuzzy or
blurred images.
PUBLISHING TERMINOLOGY

Copy
The main use of the word may be to define a duplicate, but the publishing industry
added another meaning: the typeset written material of a publication (and not
photos, graphics, or other layout elements).
Epub
A digital publishing format which you may have already used on your computer, tablet,
smartphone, or e-reader. It supports reflowable text, particularly convenient for
different device sizes. Because it uses HTML and CSS for styling, this format
takes the shape of a packaged website.
Folio
It most commonly defines the printed page number in a book. It can, however, refer to
a folded sheet (two leaves) on which four pages are printed, or a booklet made of
such ‘folio sheets’.
Format (file)
This is the digital file format a designer would use for the typeset document. You may
encounter Adobe Illustrator files, Quarkxpress files, Microsoft Word files, TeX files
etc.
Format (layout)
When describing the layout of a page or publication, the term ‘format’ defines the
collection of characteristics that construct the appearance. From basic settings
like page size and margins, to indents, leading and crop marks, these details are
the key to a flawless look.
PROOFREADING TERMINOLOGY

Block Quote (Extract)

Long quotations (four lines of text or more) are sometimes placed in a single block without
quotation marks. You can magnify the visual impact of a blockquote through the use of
indentation, italic typefaces, or different type sizes. Additionally, you can separate the
block quote from the body text through a line (or half a line) of white space.
Dagger
Not a deadly weapon, but a critical mark first used by Greek scholars, as a single line ‘–’ or
‘†’. In modern typography, it is used as a footnote marker if an asterisk has already
been used. A variation of the symbol is the double dagger, which has two handles ‘‡’.
Dingbats
Dingbats, also known as printer’s characters, are simple, decorative characters, such as
arrows, asterisks, stars or flowers. Modern dingbat fonts may also include symbols of
everyday devices or logos such as smartphones, Facebook, LinkedIn or Instagram. If
you employ dingbats as bullet points, make sure you use them consistently throughout
the text.
Front and back matter
The title page, dedication, preface, abstract, table of contents and other lists are all
pages that can be included in the front matter. These are often numbered with
lower case Roman numbers. The back matter may contain appendices, indices,
the bibliography and a list of acronyms used in the publication. These are usually
numbered with Arabic numbers.
Hyphen, Em Dash, En Dash
The Em dash is a long, horizontal line that spans the width of the letter M. It is used in
pairs to enclose a word or phrase, or alone to indicate a break in a sentence. The
En dash is slightly shorter, covering the width of the letter N, mostly used to define
ranges (such as June–July or 18–21). The hyphen joins words or indicates the
division of a word at the end of a line.
Mark-up
This is the collection of typographical instructions, corrections, deletions or insertions
added to a manuscript in the form of notes or marks. Modern PDF readers and
word processors allow for notes to be added directly to the digital document.
Oxford Comma (serial comma)
In lists containing three or more items, the Oxford comma is added after the
penultimate item in the list, before “and”/“or”. Although its use before “and” has
been much debated, there certainly are instances where it can add clarity to the
text.
Parenthesis
This is an explanatory word or a phrase used inside a text fragment. It is usually
separated from the text by a pair of parentheses, commas or dashes. The text
fragment may still be grammatically correct even if the parenthesis is omitted.
Style Sheet
The style sheet contains all the technical information that renders the layout of a
publication. It specifies precise measurements and attributes of styling elements.
Widows and Orphans
While there is some disagreement over the meaning of the words (in the industry), a
widow is the last line of a paragraph standing alone at the start of the page. An
orphan is the first line of a paragraph when it stands alone at the bottom of the
page. The negative perception of these occurrences is diminished if they are full
measure.
VISUAL DESIGN

Branding
If you have a business, you must have gone, at some point, through this process. Branding,
or creating a brand, is a process that defines the image of a company and how it will be
perceived on the market. Used along with the company’s mission statement, it
encompasses finding a unique name and creating graphic design elements upon
which all subsequent marketing efforts will be based.
CMYK vs. RGB
Cyan-Magenta-Yellow-Black is the current printing standard. You might notice that black
does not match the K at the end. That is because when every colour had its own
printing plate, black was referred to as the “Key” plate. Red-Green-Blue is used for
display colours. The main difference between the two is the colour you would obtain
when mixing them. CMYK are subtractive and mixing them gives black. RGB are
additive and mixing them gives white.
Copy Block
A copy block is a fragment of text treated as an independent element in the layout design. It
usually contains more than one line of text often justified in its frame.
Flush vs. Ragged
In typesetting, text can be aligned (flush) to a margin, frame, photo or other elements. If perfectly
aligned on both sides (an effect achieved by adjusting the space between words), the text is
‘justified’. If only one side falls flush with the edge, the other is called ‘ragged’. Ragged text is
a standard in Arabic and Hebrew typography (right-aligned) and on the World Wide Web (left-
aligned).
Negative Space
Negative space is the extra bit of white space around your text. Adjusting the spacing comes in
handy when you want to add emphasis to your subheadings, or to make your text light and
open for your readers. It is intrinsically linked to the leading: more space means improved
readability. Don’t exaggerate though – it can become visually unappealing.
Optical Centre
The optical centre is the point your eyes will be naturally drawn to when looking at a page, photo,
graphic element etc. Because this is the focal point of the layout, it is best to position here
the item that you want emphasized. There are different proportions for different layouts, so
it’s good to do a little research for your own projects.
Palette
A palette is the set of colours you would use to define the appearance of your
publication. Choose wisely, because there is a fine line between a neatly
emphasized text and a messy colourful blob that would send the printing price
through the roof or leave your readers scratching their heads in confusion.
Pantone
Pantone is a colour matching system used mainly in commercial printing. It was
widely adopted by designers (especially for branding) because it ensures a
specific colour will be printed, regardless of production stage or type of machinery
used.
Rule of Thirds
The rule of thirds is a principle applied to design and photography to create more
interest in the subject of the graphical element. Because the focal points are
offset from the centre of the frame, the subject appears better integrated with a
flowing, balanced image.
Texture
Typographic texture is rendered through the spacing of elements – symbols, letters,
words, paragraphs etc. Consistency in spacing produces high-quality typesetting.
Another type of texture designers often use is the application of a recognizable
visual of a textured surface (wood, for example) to a flat element to make it pop.