- Typography is what brings text to life and can be described as the art of arranging letters and text in a way that makes the copy legible, clear, and visually appealing to the reader. This includes font style, appearance, and structure and aims to evoke certain emotions from the reader and convey specific messages to the reader.
There are different elements to typography, starting with fonts and typefaces. A typeface is an entire family of fonts in different weights and a font is a member of a typeface. As an example, Helvetica is a typeface, with fonts like Helvetica Regular, Helvetica Light, and Helvetica Bold Oblique.
Contrast is another important element of typography and it helps to convey to readers the message you want to emphasise in a body of text. You can create contrast using bold, light, or narrow text, for instance.
Besides typefaces and fonts, one must also focus on white space or the space between elements like lines of text.
Typography considers these various elements as they have a significant impact on how legible a text is. If the lines are placed too close to each other or there is no contrast, the text may not serve its purpose.
One of the main starting points of typography that has an impact on the rest of the process is the choice of font. Choosing a font for your text is not as easy as it may seem, because fonts have their own language and convey more than the text on the page.
Fonts can appear casual, neutral, exotic, or graphic, and should be chosen based on the message you want to convey to readers.
In order to truly understand how fonts and typography in general work, it is best to compare two samples that contain the same text and images but use fonts, contrast, and white space differently. A simple change of colour or font type can make a significant difference on how the text is presented to the reader.
By using regular, bold, and italics, you can emphasise certain parts of a text to draw a reader in, while complementary colours can be used to enhance the typefaces and fonts chosen. In addition to this, the careful use of all caps and lowercase letters can also impact the reader in different ways.
This impact can be negative or positive, which is why it is important to pay attention to your typography and its various elements. By doing so, you can easily level up your design and convey your message in an impactful, legible, and visually appealing manner.