Laser Printer User Manual

Theo hasbeenkerned
Thefont height(24 points)is measured
closerto th-
f.
from ●scenderto descender.
I
4
A font is a complete set of
Ascender
-
characters in a particular
Descender
1
size and type[ ace.
Baseline
Uu
Proportional
Swif
spacing
L;adingis tho
baselineto baseline
m~asuremcnt.
3.1.3 Fontspacingandpitch
You probablyfirst heard the word pitch in connectionwith typewriters.
Typewntersnonnallyusemonospacedspacing:theygiveeachcharacterthe
sameamountof spaceon theline.
Abouthalfthefontsavailableforlaserprintersusemonospacedspacingtoo.
Pitch is alwaysexpressedas so many charactersper inch.Ten-pitch,for
example,meansa fontwithten charactersin eachinchof theline.
Typesetter forcenturieshaveusedtwospecialsizesof typefor mosttext.
EZitecharactersareIOpointshighand print12charactemperinch.Andpica
chararactersare 12 pointshigh and pitchedat 10 charactersto the inch.
You’lloften run acrossthesemonospacedfont sizes in the laser printing
world.
Ideallyeachcharacterinawordshouldnestleagainstitsneighbors sothey
appearevenlyspaced.Butadjacentroundcharactersareaptto looktoofar
apafi,whileflat-sidedcharactersmay appeartoo close.
Proportionalspacingtakes into accountthe differencesin widthsamong
letters(compareiiwithWW).Proportionallyspacedprintingiseasiertoread
than typewriter-styleprintingin which all characters,includingpunctua-
tion,havethe samewidth.
Realtypesettersequipcertaincharactemwithkerns,letterpans thatextend
out to overlapadjoiningletters.In this word Typethey is kernedclosely
againstthe T. Kerningseparatesgreattypefromgoodtype.
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