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The o has been kerned
The font height (24 points) is measured
closer to the f.
from
scender to descender.
I
4
A font is a complete
set of
~ characters in a particular
~~~~~~~
t
size and type~ace.
B.ss@line
Uu
Proportional
Serif
spacing
L;ading is the
baseline to bas-line
measurement.
Font spacingand pitch
You probablyfirst heard the word pitch in comection with typewriters.
Typewritersnormallyusemonospacedspacing: t heygiveeachcharacterthe
same amountof spaceon the line.
Abouthalfthefontsavailableforlaserprintersusemonospacedspacingtoo.
Pitch is always expressedas so many charactemper inch. Ten-pitch,for
example,meansa font with ten charactersin each inch of the line.
Typesetter for centurieshaveused two specialsizesof type for mosttext.
Efitecharactersare IOpointshighand print12charactersperinch.Andpica
chararactersare 12 points high and pitched at 10 charactersto the inch.
You'll, o ften run across thesemonospacedfont sizes in the laser printing
world.
Ideallyeachcharacterin a wordshouldnestleagainstitsncighboursso they
appearevenlyspaced.But adjacentroundcharactersare aptto look 100far
apart, whileflat-sidedcharactersmay appeartoo close.
Proportionalspacingtakes into accountthe differencesin widths among
letters(compareiiwithWW).Proportionally spacedprintingiseasierto read
than typewriter-styleprintingin which all characters,includingpunctua-
tion, have the same width.
Realtypesettersequipcertaincharactemwith kerns,letterpartsthatextend
out to overlap adjoiningletters.In this word Type they is kerned closely
againstthe T. Kerningseparatesgreattype from good type.
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