I have finished designing a new poster and just finalized preparations for letterpressing it in early January at Rowley Press. I thought I’d share a peek of it with you. I’ll post more info after Christmas. Happy Holidays.

:: The UVU Parking Classic (poking fun at how hard it is to park on campus)
:: Love Will Conquer the Rawest of Seafood

The latter won $10,000 as the top entry in the Comedy category. It is witty, clever and features some wonderful typography and motion. Judges including some Emmy and Academy award winners, as well as Rich Silverstein from Goodby Silverstein and Partners. Congrats to Will.

Click on the links above to watch the videos.

1 – Adjust the letterspacing: This is almost always the first thing I try. Small adjustments are less perceptible to the eye when the type is less than 14 points in size. So I might enter a -5 value in the Tracking field of InDesign (see Figures 1 and 2). If that doesn’t work, I try increments of -5 (-10, -15) until I get to -20. Then I stop. The human eye starts to notice type with letterspacing tighter than -20. By the way, InDesign measures tracking in 1,000ths of an em. So -5 = -5/1000 of an em. What’s an em? It is a relative unit equal to the current point size of the type (1 em of 12 point type = 12 points, 1 em of 8 point type = 8 points, etc.). If there is a line with some big rivers in it (space between the words), sometimes I’ll select the line and change the tracking to 20. This spreads the letterspacing, causing smaller wordspacing.

Figure 1: Adjust the tracking field in InDesign. Negative values decrease the space between letters, positive values increase it.

Figure 2: Entering a value of -20 in the tracking field in InDesign allows the word “only” to move up a line, eliminating the widow.

2 – Add a line break after a word: Sometimes, to get rid of a widow, I’ll look at the lines of type within a paragraph and see if I can add a line break by using a soft return (shift-return) to push one word to the next line. This can create a domino effect that pushes a word on each of the subsequent lines to the next line, giving the last line of the paragraph more than one word (see Figure 3).

Figure 3: Adding a soft return (holding down Shift when you press the Return key) re-flows the text and pushes part of “comparison” onto the last line, eliminating a widow. Perhaps not the most elegant solution; you could finesse the other lines of text. Also, InDesign has what’s called a Paragraph Composer which tries to optimize the length of each line within a paragraph. This works well sometimes, but if you start to add soft returns manually, I would turn this feature off (see Figure 4).

Figure 4: Before you start adding your own hard returns, you may want to go to the Paragraph Panel. In the upper right hand corner click on the icon to see the pop-up menu and, if there is a check beside “Adobe Paragraph Composer,” select “Adobe Single-Line Composer” underneath it instead. This helps you to re-flow the text without having InDesign adjust the other lines in the paragraph for you.

3 – Hyphenate words: To create fewer lines of text in a paragraph (or to pull a widow up to the next line), hyphenating a word can buy you just enough space to eliminate the widow or a line of text.

4 – Edit the text: This can be particularly effective in making text fit into the space you’ve allotted IF you have a good-natured copywriter who doesn’t mind massaging his text. (I say massaging, a copywriter might say “taking a hatchet to my text.”)

5 – Modify the horizontal scale: If you’ve seen the Typographic Sin poster, you know this is a no-no. BUT if you condense the text 3% in either direction, it should go unnoticed. I usually do this to the entire paragraph, as opposed to one line of text or one word. By 3% either way, I mean you could horizontally scale the text 97%, 98%, 99% or 101%, 102%, 103% (see Figure 5).

Figure 5: Open the Character Panel and click in the upper right hand corner of the gray bar to see the pop-up menu, then select “Show Options.” The horizontal scale field has been set to 97%.

Figure 6: The text on the right has a horizontal scale of 97%, hardly distinguishable from the original text on the left.

6 – Make the column width wider: If you find that the text won’t fit, or that there are a lot of widows or hyphenated words in your paragraphs, you might try extending the width of the columns of text. Of course, you may need to do this for all of the columns, unless you’re widening it less than a sixteenth of an inch.

7 – Make the point size smaller: This can help a lot, but you’ll need to do it with all of the text so one paragraph doesn’t look out of place. And, of course, you’ll want to make sure the text is still readable.

8 – Change the alignment: If you have a lot of rivers in your justified text, you could just align all of the text flush left and ragged right. (Rivers are the large spaces in between words.)

9 – Change the typeface: Try a slightly condensed typeface to fit more words in a space. Or, if you are running short, try a typeface with a slightly wider em width. I once took a brochure that was set in Officina Sans and picked a new typeface for the body text. It took me forever to fit the copy because Officina Sans is a condensed typeface that allows many words per line.

There you have it, 9 things to try. Maybe you have some other secrets you use. If so, post a comment below and share. It could help save us all some time.

The annual typography issue (July issue) of HOW Magazine will feature an article I wrote based on the 34 Typographic Sins poster. It hits the newsstands on June 22nd. I’m excited to be a part of the issue and to have the sins reach a larger audience. The poster is still available for purchase on this site.

After a month-long wait, the second edition of the Typographic Sins poster is complete. Rowley Press finished letterpressing a second edition of 200 posters.

Size: 11 inches x 17 inches
Paper: Crane Lettra 110 lb. 100% Cotton Paper in Ecru color (fancy for cream)
Colors: Black + Pantone 234 (a red with a hint of purple)
Typefaces used: Primarily Cochin LT Std, Stuyvesant ICG and ITC New Baskerville Italic.
Price: $65/each plus shipping (and tax for Utah residents)
Total Production: 200 posters. Each poster is numbered and signed by Jim Godfrey.

I accept the cards shown below. The cost of shipping is $10 for the U.S. and $30 for anywhere outside of the U.S. Please allow 4-10 days for your poster to arrive if it is shipped in the U.S. Outside the U.S. takes 3 to 4 weeks. The posters are rolled and shipped in a heavy duty cardboard tube.

Here is a little background on the poster.
Before we all started using computers to do our typesetting, there were professional typesetters who knew a lot about type and some rules for setting it appropriately. Much of this information is taught in typography courses at colleges and universities. As I taught students in my own typography class, I felt the need to have some sort of concise resource that would remind them of some of these typesetting conventions. You know, something that would lead them in typographic righteousness and keep them out of sin.

Many of the sins have been mentioned in a canon of typography books such as Robin Williams’s The Mac Is Not A Typewriter and Ellen Lupton’s Thinking with Type, Robert Bringhursts The Elements of Typographic Style. I am sure they also exist in other texts as well (like the Chicago Manual of Style, which I also consulted). It is also important to note that some of the sins are based on typesetting practices in the United States. For instance, it is more common in the UK not to tuck periods inside quotation marks (although I still think they should avoid this sin). As with all “rules” there are some sins that are worth committing under certain circumstances and others that one should never commit. For example, I hate seeing dumbquotes anywhere. Conversely, sometimes large amounts of reversed body text work aesthetically and conceptually with the design of the entire piece. True to life, we all have little sins we commit, I guess.

Here is a list of the 34 sins.

34 Typographic Sins

Two spaces between sentences.
Repent of this sin by using only one space.

Dumb quotes instead of smart quotes.
Evil: “Thou shalt not misuse type”
Good: “Thou shalt not misuse type”

Dumb apostrophe instead of a smart 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 periods/commas inside quotes marks.
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 large.

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. Most software has default tabs set for ½ inch, so adjust the tabs.

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: am, AM, A.M.
Relatively Clean: a.m. (this is in small caps on the poster)
Clean: a.m. or AM

Failing to provide margins for type in a box.
ugly (poster has a keyline around the word with no margin)
beautiful (poster has a keyline around the word with a margin)

Faux italic/oblique, bold and small cap type.
Impure: Italic (faux italic on poster) | Pure: Italic
Sinful: Bold (faux bold on poster) | Virtuous: Bold
Unkosher: SMALLCAPS (faux smallcaps on poster) | Kosher: Smallcaps (smallcaps text on poster)

Strokes that encroach upon letterforms.
Hellacious (heavily stroked word on poster) | Heavenly

Horizontally scaled type.
Unrepentant: Scaled (stretched text on poster) | Penitent: A condensed typeface

Vertically scaled type.
Purgatory: Scaled (squished text on poster) | 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.
eyesore (each letter is stacked on top of another on poster) Vertical baselines are celestial. (basline for this text is rotated 90 degrees)

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, wedges, angles and overly short or long lines).

Failing to use ligatures.
unholy: finish (f and i aren’t connected by a ligature) | holy: finish

Here is a pdf of the poster that you are welcome to download.

A little background behind the poster
As a typography teacher, I frequently found myself irritated when beginning students would do things like putting two spaces between sentences instead of one space or using dumb quotes instead of smart quotes. After consulting with my colleague, Patrick Wilkey, I came up with 34 unprofessional ways to set type. The poster identifies each sin and explains how to avoid it.

Size: 11 inches x 17 inches
Paper: Crane Lettra 110 lb. 100% Cotton Paper in Ecru color (fancy for cream)
Colors: Black + Pantone 234 (a red with a hint of purple)
Typefaces used: Primarily Cochin LT Std, Stuyvesant ICG and ITC New Baskerville Italic.
Price: $65 plus shipping and tax
Quantity: 200 posters. Each poster is numbered and signed by Jim Godfrey.

How to buy
I accept the cards shown below. The cost of shipping is $30 for almost anywhere in the world. Please allow 4-10 days for your poster to arrive if it is shipped in the U.S. Outside the U.S. takes 2 to 3 weeks. The posters are rolled and shipped in a heavy duty cardboard tube.

There is nothing quite like an empty sheet of paper. It is full of possibilities. Its potential lies in giving birth to an amazing idea. Its trepidation lies in the fear of birthing no ideas at all.

It can hold what is in my brain. It can give physical form to what I am thinking. I can draw, redraw, emphasize, erase. Often not refined, it is a container for rough and unpolished, yet often times powerful, communication. It is the seed or kernel of something that may become great.

Yet the page is also empty, devoid, blank. Will an idea come? Will it be worthy of the page? Will it blemish it, instead of enlivening it? I don’t know.

I love an empty page. I love to think, to write, to sketch with my hands.
I hate the empty page. I hate the uncertainty, the hesitancy to tarnish the page.

Long live the empty page. May it be filled with greatness. If it is not, I can always just turn the page.

1 Do you recognize the typeface for the opening credit sequence of a movie and then whisper it to your date, thinking (mistakenly) that you’ll impress him/her?

2 Speaking of movies, do you secretly theorize that Congress passed a law in 2002 mandating that Trajan must be used on three-fourths of all movie posters (and Bank Gothic on the remaining one-fourth)?

3 Do you think it’s a travesty that Copperplate Gothic is the typeface on the front of Seattle’s modern, state-of-the-art Qwest Field, home of the Seattle Seahawks?

4 When you make your children’s lunch in the morning, do you comp the type on their lunch bags?

5 Did you feel like it was Christmas/Hannukah/Holiday-of-your-choice when Emigre announced the release of Mr Eaves?

If you answered yes to all 5 of these questions, you’re a type junkie, just like me.

(Yes, I know the above typefaces are kinda lame, but so are these two terms.) While I am sure these words are fine to use in general circles, I would submit that they be outlawed when referring to graphic design. Every self-respecting graphic designer I know would cringe when “complimented” that his/her logo for a brand identity is “cute.” Equally, nothing says “I am not classy” quite like using the word “classy.” I am not sure how it has come to effectively undermine its own meaning. Perhaps it has been tossed around so much to describe things that obviously are not classy that it insinuates shallowness upon its use.

What adjectives, then, are we to use when describing design? The key lies not so much in finding the “it” words of the time (that is “sick,” that is “dope,” that is “all that and a bag of chips”) but in thinking about something in-depth and not glibly combing the surface. By contemplating and evaluating elements about a design that cause it to resonate with oneself, I am confident we will find more specific and appropriate vocabulary to express ourselves. For instance: “That design with the flower appeals to me because it is [not cute, but] reminiscent of a joyful summer day.” Yes, I know that is a lame example; but in all its lameness, it still excels calling it cute. As we become more prone to thinking before praising, we will not only provide observations with more of the proverbial meat and potatoes, but we will also increase our vocabulary. And rely less upon that romantic, yet overused couple: cute and classy, the Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie of graphic design vocabulary.

For the uninitiated, Claude Garamond was a punchcutter in 15th-16th century France. (Punchcutters developed the physical forms of a typeface by cutting letters into metal.) He created a beautiful typeface that bears his name. Although some argue it should bear Jean Jannon’s name, a fellow punchcutter in France. There are many different versions of Garamond today, including ITC Garamond (a condensed style of this family was ubiquitous in the late 1970s and early 1980s; in fact, use that cut today and your design will feel old-fashioned). Garamond 3 is another version, along with Stempel Garamond, ATF Garamond and many others. To my eyes, the ultimate cut is Adobe Garamond Pro. It is beautiful, versatile and comes with a large set of glyphs. It is also, interestingly enough, based on Claude Garamond’s designs and not on Jannon’s. Robert Slimbach finished designing it in 1989 for Adobe.

But let’s get back to how Garamond is like ketchup. Students use Garamond all of the time, perhaps a little too much. This is because it seems to go with anything. When trying to mix typefaces, choose a bold san serif and Garamond will serve as a nice compliment. ITC Franklin Demi? Garamond works quite nicely. Futura Bold? Garamond matches it. DIN 1451 Mittelschrift? Yep. Even Rosewood, for the past 3 years the most ubiquitous typeface since, uh, Garamond, is a good match to Garamond. The list goes on. And on. And on.

This isn’t really an essay for or against Garamond, but somewhat of a backhanded compliment to it for being so versatile. I’ve heard it said (and I agree) that if you choose Garamond no one will applaud your choice, but no one will disagree with it either. So, here’s to a typeface that has lasted 500 years. May it last 500 more. Now its lunchtime and I’m ready for a hamburger. Pass the Garamond, I mean the ketchup, please.

For more about the history of Garamond, log onto typophile.com. For more about the history of ketchup try wikipedia.