October 2014 - Video Tutorial -Typography: Part 2 of Page Layout

[Gare]

@stygg, Rik, and Mike...

Seeing as I just posted the video two days ago...

1.) I'm absolutely thrilled at the YouTube hits and the number of great efforts here so quickly. and

2.) I usually go into a semi-coma after burning myself out to get the video to market, and take a few days off to get other paying gigs done, do laundry, eat, sleep, and practice my theremin, something Barbara has regretted buying me for almost 20 years.

Let me gather my thoughts because I have several things to share to improve everyone's work, I bit off far more than I or you people could chew this month because I didn't even get into traditional font heights, tradition margins and how to manually do this stuff so it looks more personal, but through feedback and probably a written tutorial next month, I can fill in some of the holes in the tute that I felt were there.

Q: Who writes the crappiest outline for tutorials before writing them?

A: Gary David Bouton

I have email from book publishers that can attest to this.

I'll be back with critiqués and sound advice soon.

And Rik? Shortly you're going to become my co-moderator on the Xone. Barb cannot do this in addition to Administrative duties like deleting 40,000 spams from the Pacific Rim... so you volunteered, your wish is her command, and all that tripe.

My Best,

Gary

[Big Frank]

Loved watching the video and following the tutorial. An excellent video production, once again, very watchable as always.

[Gare]

Thank you, Big Frank. Enjoyment and (dubious) production values aside, did you find any nuggets of DTP I came up with that you didn't know about?

So I can say I'm doing my job?

My Best,
Count Gary von Bouton

[Big Frank]

Here's my effort to be both individual whilst sticking to the broad concepts of the project. In short, I didn't have time to do more than this!

[Gare]

I like it!

Sparing use of text repell, the callout is very well used and placed, nice, focused use of color in the text.

You almost get a 100, Frank. I think the headline text is too bold. Need a Demi or a medium weight, but Frankly, it's usually too expensive to collect a whole family of font weights. They want freaking $475 for the entire 40 member Helvetica family!

Sans serif is much more acceptable at heavier weights than Roman fonts, by the way.

Well, Cleopatra knew some Romans, right?

;0

Gare

[Big Frank]

Thanks Gary. Cleopatra knew some Romans and Roman Capitals, she was that well versed!

I agree with the headline, it takes a second pair of eyes to see the faults that are staring us in the eye!

The theme of the composition is 19th century and ancient Egypt, so I wanted to stay away from modern block sans serif fonts, so in this revised version I have used a compromise font for both the headline text and for the sub-headers, CopperPlate Gothic Heavy. It's not a sans serif in any way, but as a solid Victorian newsprint headline font, it aspires to it!



I had plenty of problems setting the Cleopatra statue against the header text. I think I nailed it though:



I still have much to learn so I appreciate your comments very much.

So I can say I'm doing my job?

Anybody who says you're not is an idiot. Let them come forward and be counted.



Yeah, I thought so...

[Big Frank]

Thank you, Big Frank. Enjoyment and (dubious) production values aside,

We both know that production is the key, and yours are extremey entertaining, slick and polished. Kudos to the Count.

did you find any nuggets of DTP I came up with that you didn't know about?

Yes, I did actually. It's a completely obvious solution to a visual wart on the page, but I had never thought of simply using kerning to get rid of masses of white space in fully justified text. For some reason I had always thought it incorrect or open to breaking the page or something. When you did it, it struck me as the completely obvious and functional solution to the problem and generated a facepalm moment.

it's usually too expensive to collect a whole family of font weights. They want freaking $475 for the entire 40 member Helvetica family!

You can get an entire Syrian family for free in Dover or Calais...

[Big Frank]

Great tutorial, Gary.

I thought I would try and take in your instructions and see how things work out.

I did my best to put together a page (layout).

I went for fully justify, for all the body text on the page.
Whether that's a good idea, or not, I'll let experts, such as yourself, advise on that.

I like the size and position of both the headline text and the image, it says it all. What I don't like is the squareness of the page. There are no contours at all anywhere, it seems to me, except in the "G" of Gandhi. It needs a little softening?

Also, your use of purple/violet is illogical, Jim...

[Rik]

Also, your use of purple/violet is illogical, Jim...

It was Gandhi's favourite colour.
So, who am I to argue with that?!

[Gare]

Great tutorial, Gary.

I thought I would try and take in your instructions and see how things work out.

I did my best to put together a page (layout).

I went for fully justify, for all the body text on the page.
Whether that's a good idea, or not, I'll let experts, such as yourself, advise on that.

Well, okay, Rik, you go first. I can't reply to everyone today, but I'll go through these guys in order of date submitted, if and only if you don't call me "teacher", and if you accept a critiqué as a neutral action: I'm appraising a body of work for its merit. I'm not being critical, I'm not out to get anyone, I'm not out to suck up to anyone, fair? This I learned from one of the greatest professors on Earth, the late Dr. John Sellers at Syracuse University.

• The use of almost even column widths is acceptable and even good because you've offset the columns with an uneven balance of the photo at right and the squatter, but more dense headline at left.

• It's interesting for you to use 2-color when you have all the colours in the world to use, Rik. It's neither a good nor bad thing. If I knew Gandhi liked purple, I might try black text on lightr sepia, or darker sepia on white paper. My reason? Sepia suggests age, and Gandhi, we have to admit, is immortal in spirit, but wasn't on the news last night.

• I'm not sure the font used for the drop cap is appropriate for the content of the article and who it is about. Morris Initials is a "light" font, storybook tale in tone, lightly humorous overly embellished. Ask yourself, "Who is Gandhi?" and I think you might find a more compatible font for this great man. You executed the drop cap perfectly, though.

• Words per line should ideally be 7 to 9, 7 a minimum, and you have several lines that are less than that, which is okay for a pro to do, because a pro will do this sparingly, understanding that it's hard to read from left to right, when a line only has four words. You can remedy a lot of this by putting the call-out quote flush right in the second paragraph causing a straddle in the lines and a slight indent in the left column.

I think the use of Benguiat is really nice here, Rik. Even after I told everyone it could ber used when the subject of an article is humorous. It's just a versatile font, Ed Benguiat is one of the modern masters of typography, he also created Ed Benguiat Roman which looks like Latino but it's better, and Ed Benguiat Gothic, which looks like Helvetica Condensed but the parallels are off so it has a touch of humor. Also he revamped Bookman for International Type Foundry (ITC), created Tiffany, helped create Avant Garde, about 600 fonts in his career, and additionally reworked several magazine logos, including Playboy and Sports Illustrated.

Overall, a very nice first outing into the nuisances and glory of page layout, and your diligence shows in your work.

A gold star for you, man.

P.S. At the end of the month, I will try to collect all the nuggets of wisdom I and others have contributed here and create a spacial PDF file for all at tg to learn from. Mike, you want to play Spock to my Captain Kirk on this endeavor?

I really think next month's tips and tricks tutorial should be on fonts and font spacing, because Xara has the features to alter them, and font spacing on lines and the space between lines is very important. And you have more control over it than in HTML layouts.

My Best,

Gary