Typogaphic errors to be avoided.
Dowload the Typographic Sins PDF for visual examples of each rule!
- Two spaces between sentences.
Repent of this sin by using only one space. - Prime marks instead of quotation marks.
Evil: "Thou shalt not misuse type" § Good: “Thou shalt not misuse type” - Prime mark instead of an apostrophe.
Profane: Don't use prime marks § Sacred: Don’t use prime marks
By the way, apostrophes always face this way: Pot o’ gold.
They never face this way: Pot ‘o gold. - Failing to tuck punctuation inside quotes.
Immoral: “I love type so much”, she confessed.
Chaste: “I love type so much,” she testified. - Failing to kern display type.
Unseemly gaps can impede readability and be distracting to the reader.
Adjusting the spacing between letters will assuage your guilt. - Using a hyphen instead of an en dash.
Use an en dash to indicate a duration of time instead of the word “to”: the 8–10 commandments, not 8-10 commandments. - Using two hyphens instead of an em dash.
An em dash signifies a change in thought—or a parenthetical phrase—within
a sentence. - Too many consecutive hyphens.
It is sinful to have more than two hyphens on consecutive lines of type, and even that should be avoided. - Large amounts of bodytext in uppercase letters.
IT BECOMES REALLY DIFFICULT TO READ. - Large amounts of reversed type
ARE HARDER TO READ. Type on a busy background is also unreadable. - Using process colors for body text.
It is harder to read, but more importantly, it is hell to register on press. - Underlining titles instead of italicizing them.
Thou Shalt Not: The Holy Bible Thou Shalt: The Korán - Failing to eliminate widows.
A widow is a word that sits on a line by itself at the end of a paragraph.
Avoid this or risk being cast into a lake of fire and brimstone. - Failing to eliminate orphans.
An orphan is the last line of a paragraph that sits alone at the top of a
column or page. Type does not like to be alone - Rivers in justified text.
Unsightly large spaces between words occur if the line length is too short or the point size of the text too small. - Inconsistent leading.
Paragraphs should have the same leading for each line. - Indenting the first paragraph.
The first paragraph is never indented, subsequent paragraphs are. - Indenting a paragraph too far.
The standard indent for a paragraph is 1 em, not ½ inch. (Identing and adding empty space require penance. Save your soul by using one or the other, not both.) - Failing to hang punctuation into the margin.
Punctuation has less visual weight than letters or numbers. Compensate for this in display text by hanging the punctuation into the margin. - Failing to use or create fractions.
Wicked: 1/2 § Righteous: ½ - Incorrectly abbreviating AM and PM.
Unclean: a.m., am, A.M., a.m. § Clean: am (small caps, no periods) - Failing to provide margins for type in a box.
ugly beautiful - Faux italic or oblique type.
Impure: Italic § Pure: Italic - Faux bold type.
Sinful: Bold § Virtuous: Bold - Faux small caps.
Unkosher: SMALLCAPS § Kosher: smallcaps - Horizontally scaled type.
Unrepentant: Scaled § Penitent: A condensed typeface - Vertically scaled type.
Purgatory: Scaled § Heaven: An extended typeface - Negative letterspacing.
Not very readable. - Bad line breaks in headlines and body text.
If you don’t break lines for
sense, they can be harder to read. - Stacking lowercase letters.
Vertical baselines are celestial. - Failing to indent bulleted lists.
• Bulleted lists look better when the second line aligns flush
with the first letter of the line above it, instead of with the bullet. - Failing to use accent marks.
Sinner: No esta aqui § Saint: No está aquí. - Failing to align baselines of type in adjacent columns of body text.
Baselines of all columns of text on a page should align.
This creates a pleasing margin of pure white space. - Failing to correct bad rags.
For centered or non-justified text, avoid obvious shapes (like pyramids,
steps, angles and overly short or long lines). - Failing to use ligatures.
unholy: finish § holy: finish
