Guidelines for Professional Typography

If you want to create a professional looking document using Adobe InDesign, Quark Xpress, or even Microsoft Word, it is important to be aware that those old typing habits you may have learned no longer apply to documents created on computers.

This tutorial is intended as a resource for students (and their supervisors) who may not know about the changes that have taken place in typography since the days of typewriters. While the tips mentioned here might contradict some of the things you learned in typing class, it is critical to remember that the PC is not a typewriter!

Only one space after sentences, not two

This is a common mistake. Many people are still unaware that it is wrong to put 2 spaces. In typing class it was practically a commandment... “Thou shalt always put two spaces after a period.“

To understand why you no longer do this on a computer, it’s important to understand why this was done on the typewriter in the first place.

Typewriters are, in a word, “dumb.” Specifically, on a typewriter, every letter must have the exact same width in order to ensure consistent line widths. Even though you and I know that that the letter “I” is skinny and the letter “M” is wide, the typewriter makes them both the same width. We call fonts that exhibit this “every-letter-is-the-same-width” behavior “monospaced.” For example, take a look at the word “Actions” below. If you put your cursor over the text, you can see an underline for each letter that underscores how the letters in the upper word are of a uniform width.

The net result of this monospaced font is the the gaps between the letters is sometimes big and sometimes small. Note the different amounts of space between the letters “ti” and “on.“ Visually, "ti" has a LOT of space while "on" seems much closer together.

The letters in the lower line, by contrast, are not a uniform width. As a rule, computer fonts make each lettr only as wide as they ought to be... the "i" is skinny, the "A" is wide, etcetera. This is called “proportional spacing.” Or more simply put, because the computer is “smart,” it knows that the “i“ is slimmer than the “A” so it assigns it less space. The result of this proportional spacing is that visually, the letters of a word are more tightly grouped. You can see that the second line doesn’t extend as far to the right even though each letter is almost the same size as the first line.

Now that we’ve agreed that monospaced text is “gappy,” and proportional text is tighter, let’s discuss how that relates to the 1 space after punctuation rule. Because monospaced “typewritten” text is so gappy, it is not always easy to distinguish between the spaces within a word, spaces between words, and spaces between sentences. Look at the first sentence below. Right now, there is only one space after the period, and the space between sentences is not so easy to detect compared to the other spaces. In order to have a clear visual break, typists were taught to press the spacebar twice after a period. You can view what 2 spaces would look like by placing your cursor on the text.

While 2 spaces may be a necessary visual cue for monospaced text, proportional text doesn’t need it. The word groups are already so tight that extra spaces after periods are unnecessary —and unprofessional. If you look at any professional publication today (magazines, newspapers, etc), you will see that they utilize is only 1 space after periods. This also holds true for spaces after colons, semi-colons, exclamation points, and so forth.

Double-spacing after periods has been so ingrained in some students that they don’t believe me when I explain this in class. If you don’t want to take my word for it, listen to Robin Williams (not that Robin Williams), professor of typography and design in Santa Rosa, CA, whose book “The PC is not a typewriter” is available from Peachpit press. If your boss or editor is still holding firm to the two space rule, you may want to give them a link to this tutorial, or better yet, a copy of the book. Good luck!

(*Note: a few computer fonts such as Monaco, Courier, and Pica mimic the monospace behavior and appearance for stylistic reasons)

Don’t underline; use bold and italics instead

Underlining is another holdover from the typewriting days of yore.

On a typewriter, you had relatively few options for emphasizing words... you couldn’t italicize or bold text, so you underlined or used all capital letters (another one to avoid). But in professional typography, underlining is really pretty much out. There may be some occasions where you must underline. If so, you can insert a “rule” instead, which is a straight line you can draw manually on the screen. Drawing the line yourself allows you to avoid bumping into the “descenders” (letters that go below the baseline, such as “j” or “g” and so forth).

While you may feel somewhat incredulous that underlining is passé if you look at professional publications, you do not see many examples of underlining. Well, now you know!

Avoid using all caps

As stated in the paragraph above, the use of all caps for emphasis is a result of typewriter limitations.

Most of us have come across the all caps typists out there in cyberspace, where it is equivalent to shouting, and considered improper “netiquette.” Not only that, but it is also simply harder to read. When we read text, it is partly the shape of a word that we use to quickly scan text... the play of the descenders and “ascenders“ (letters that go to the top of the line, like “h” and “k”). For example, look at the following two sentences quickly ...

It is much easier to read mixed case, wouldn’t you agree? This is just as true for brief headlines as well as long sentences.

Don’t use the spacebar to align elements visually: use tabs and indents

If you‘re pressing the spacebar repeatedly in order to manually align text on the page, don’t. Tabs allow you to precisely align elements on the page. If you’re not familiar with tabs, trust me, it’s worth the time spent to learn them.

This also applies to adding a line of dots on your page, such as in a table of contents (or below). Instead of pressing the period repeatedly, set a tab and use a “leader“ character character. This option is usually accessed as a part of paragraph formatting.

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Use special characters when appropriate

Special characters are characters that may not available on a regular keyboard but which you may need from time to time. This includes things like the copyright symbol ©, the degree symbol (96°), and letters with accents (”resumé“). Most fonts have these special characters available, and you can insert them using a special keyboard code. For example, in the Times New Roman font, the code for the © symbol is accessed by holding ALT and typing 0169 on the numeric keypad on the right side of the keyboard.

Don’t worry— you don’t have to memorize these keyboard shortcuts. For a complete reference to the codes for special characters in every font, go to the tutorial on the Character map.

Don’t use double hyphens; use an em dash instead

This is another holdover from typewriters. Since there was no em dash available, two hyphens were commonly used instead of one long hyphen, also called an “em dash.“

Double hyphens look like this --
An em dash looks like this —

Serif for body text, sans-serif for titles and headlines

Serif fonts are fonts that include little “feet“ (sometimes called “curly cues“) such as Times New Roman or Book Antiqua. In fact, the word “serif” actually means “foot.”

Serif fonts are generally easier on the eyes when you have a large volume of text, such as a paragraph. Serif fonts connote a more classical, formal, and business-like demeanor.

Sans-serif fonts include Arial, Helvetica, Verdana, and Impact. You can also use sans-serif fonts for body text. They connote more of a informal and modern feel when used for body text.