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

Typography Part Two of Page Layout October 2014

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This month Gary shows you how to design using type as creatively as putting pictures together. From the ongoing "Page Layout Series" on Xara Xone.com, this video is bound to spark some ideas and more clever designs of things everyone reads.

See how it is done and then show us your take on fabulous type-centric layout.

An you also might want to revisit Part One of this series, the tutorial on Xaraxone.com and the discussion for it here on Talkgraphics.

Hey, Thanks Gary & Barbara!

The PDF only has page 2. Though I did change the couple fonts on the ice cream page. And though I have Benguiat, I used something else for the body copy.

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Thanks Gare, great tutorial showing the various approaches you can take to realizing the layout. I also watched part 1 again and enjoyed that one as well.

Thank you, Boy. I think we need more of this stuff because I had to skip over a lot of the finer points of typography and layout. And still the sucker came in at 14 minutes! I was aiming for 6, my bad...

Mike, you did terrific. I love the unequal column—I should have mentioned that two uneven columns helps ward off the dreaded, trite, and boring "tombstone" effect. Your page color is good (I'll cover this at another time), there are no rivers I really can see (I'll cover that too, I did just a little by expanding the character spacing. Nice dividers, that's something we should get into for separating paragraphs.

By the way, if you'd like a free font that only has dividers, Fonts that have pictures of text dividers at FontSpace. I cannot vouch for the site, but I did a quick search and no one bought up piracy so I guess they are cool. I looked around and didn't see any commercial fonts I recognize.

Mike, my only question to you is why you chose such a cold, authoritarian typeface for the headline, although the call to make it in color was a good one. Republika from FontYou might just be a little too serious...I chose Benguiat because it's quirky yet legible, in the same tone as the text article, which is strange but interesting. You must have strange but interesting fonts that don't go over the top.

Can you share why you did what you did overall, and share?

Me, I give your layout a 91 out of 100. I like the innovations, the riffs on execution I explained, and I know you are already a pro at page layout so that's for demonstrating the power of text in a page layout.

My Best,

Gary

Hah...didn't catch the even page number on a right-hand page, did ya! Right after I uploaded I saw it. Fixed it but by the time I actually came back I couldn't edit it. But, that's why there are editors.

Respublika. I like the font. I recently used it for the heads/sub-heads in a directory in two weights. I was originally going to use Antique Olive LT Bold Condensed, which I also recently used on something (size not adjusted for the space):

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Point is, I wanted the head to be a sans. I like Benguiat, but like Optima and Antique Olive, I used those fonts for a company from 1989 through 2002.

Unequal columns. As the lead page for the article, it simply provides a bit of interest. Causes the eye to slow down to see why.

Quote block. Quotes like this are great for adding white-space to otherwise dense text. The dividers were chosen over rules because...well, I had already added the double-tapered line for separating the footer. The actual divider was chosen based upon mimicking the flower in the dropcap.

Lead-in paragraph. One method of "connecting" the first line of text following a dropcap of any style is to make the type larger and if the drop is also colored, use the same color. I think this is especially true of drops that have other visual interest (the flower) as it grounds the two "permanently" together in the mind.

Rivers. Those were a little more difficult to deal with. Tracking in XDP is coarse but is needed as a first step. But getting it tight enough caused kerning issues, so the kerning was dealt with after a happy medium was obtained with tracking. I then loosened up some of the letter pairs using the kerning. (So here's where I implore Xara to make tracking/kerning in single-step increments and perhaps add the ctrl modifier key for making it jump in 10s.)

Colors. Obviously I too the color from the provided image and used it for the dropcap and lead line of text following it, the quote and footer. The red-orange is roughly a compliment (OK, it is off but interesting) and with its close proximity to the blue-gray of the "M" of the dropcap, stands out in the flower detail.

Time for lunch...

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.

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Originally Posted by Gare

Thank you, Boy. I think we need more of this stuff because I had to skip over a lot of the finer points of typography and layout. And still the sucker came in at 14 minutes! I was aiming for 6, my bad...

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Yes, keep them coming. Love layout and typography. The 14 minutes are not a problem at all because your videos are fast paced and instructional. Sometimes they even go a bit too fast. Looking forward to Parts 3 to 10!

Here's my first attempt, worked on another, not to clear the first one so uploaded a second, png. this time.

Stygg

Tried this but Right click on the imported text, Columns remains stubbornly greyed out.
Mind you, have had a lot of problems with X9.

Welcome to the Xara Xone area of TalkGraphics, Richard, and I’m sorry your first post was about something going wrong so you couldn’t follow the video tutorial.

I think fortunately, I know what the problem is. Version 9 sees the RTF file as column text, and not “area” text (Xara’s nomenclature), so this messes up the tutorial but here’s a quick fix:

First of all, text comes in three different types depending on the way you enter it. If you just click and insertion point on the page and type, this is called “Simple Text Lines”, which to me equals “headline fonts”. If you click and drag perfectly horizontally, and then type, this is called “Column text”. Now wait: you’re creating column text aren’t you in this example? Well, yes and no, and I think Xara should change the name of this sort of text if it’s going to offer auto-columns out of the third type of text. When toy marquee drag, you’ve created an “Area Text” box, which normal, well-adjusted graphics professionals (!) usually call a “Paragraph Text Box”.

Follow these steps to make the right-click “Columns” entry work:

1. With the Text tool, marquee-drag an area text placeholder green outline box, you’ll use later.

2. Import the RTF text. Regardless of whether you use the Selector tool or the Text tool, the imported text will land on the center of the page, something TPTB really need to work on, IMO. Now my RTF text is indeed paragraph (Area) text, but version 9 doesn’t see it that way; it sees it as column text, and you can only use the Columns command with area text.

3. You place the Text too cursor inside the imported text, press Ctrl+A to select all, and thebn Ctrl+X to cut all the imported text.

4. You place your cursor at the top left of the green outline Area Text empty box, zooming in will ensure you’re inside and not outside the box, click the insertion point, and then Ctrl+P to paste.

Chances are good you’ll have dimmed out overflow text at the bottom of the area box, but you know how to fix that, and in this instance, it’s irrelevant right now. Now…you right-click the Text tool cursor inside the box and “Columns” is an available command.

Do something great with this knowledge and post it here, eh?

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Kind Regards,

Gary

@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

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

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

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!

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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

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! :thx

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

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

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Originally Posted by Gare

So I can say I'm doing my job? :)

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

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Yeah, I thought so...

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Originally Posted by Gare

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

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

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Originally Posted by Gare

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

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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.

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Originally Posted by Gare

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

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

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Originally Posted by Rik

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.

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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...
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Originally Posted by Big Frank

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

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

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Originally Posted by Rik

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.

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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

Teacher? No.
Coach? Most definitely.

I take all your points on board. And one or two, I was already aware of.
I fully understood the part in your video that mentined '7 to 9 words per line'. So, I knew that part on my page would get picked up. I did think about reducing the size of the quote. I've found that personally I don't really see how things look, until I print out the page. Maybe that's just me.

I didn't have to use Gandhi's favourite purple colour, and could have gone with just black. But, I wanted to try it.
I like the suggestion that the use of sepia background might have worked better.
I find that use of any or particular colours can be quite personal, but, I will keep your suggestions in mind.

And I definitely wanted to have a go at this tutorial, particularly because I don't do much page layout like this.
I do plenty of manuals, but, I never have to use columns.
So, that part is definitely a learning curve.
Also, when I do manuals for work, the colours are already pretty much defined.

Thanks, indeed.

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Originally Posted by Rik

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

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If his favourite font had been Comic Sans MS, would you have written the article in that font??? ;)

Thought I'd try a something slightly different. Font is probaly wrong one to use but I liked it. :D

Stygg

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Originally Posted by Big Frank

If his favourite font had been Comic Sans MS, would you have written the article in that font??? ;)

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I would (consider it) for at least any drop quotes.

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Originally Posted by Big Frank

If his favourite font had been Comic Sans MS, would you have written the article in that font??? ;)

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YES.
The customer is always right! ;)

Give the customer what they want, you then get paid.

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Originally Posted by Rik

YES.
The customer is always right! ;)

Give the customer what they want, you then get paid.

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And when their friends and associates laugh at them, you get shot at because you didn't tell them their idea was ill-considered, poorly designed and, frankly, stupid (as is often the case when clients hire a designer and then dictate the design). I've been there, done that, bought the t-shirt and paid the price. What you do is you say "I think your idea of using WingDings and Comic Sans in Purple is simply fantastic, it's personal, it speaks to you, it says everything you want it to say. But I'm worried other people won't see it the same passionate way that you do. Do you still want to go ahead?". And you get that in writing. Because clients who hire a designer and then dictate the design are never wrong. But if you can convince that client he was totally right not in his design but in hiring you, then you may have won a client for life. An existing, loyal client is so much easier to keep than acquiring new clients. Which is why I would only use Comic Sans in an article to ridicule Comic Sans.

Frank, I understand the whole CYA thing when it comes to clients who insist on shredding your work (and then crediting you for the mess), and for that reason I’ve attached a downloadable PDF for you and others who find themselves engaged in a commercial endeavor with an idiot.

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We’ve all been there, and education is our only salvation. In a polite way, you guide the client through the areas of your profession that they are ignorant of, try to learn as much as you can about the product so you have leverage or are at least on a level playing field when it comes to promoting the product.

I’m currently entering what could be a lucrative long-term business relationship with the head of a business of which I am fairly ignorant. So I spend my time listening, and then it’s the client’s turn to listen to why I chose a font, a color, and other stuff, always proving that I listen to them and have a basic understanding of their business and the tone of the ad or animation or print piece that casts the client’s business in an appropriate tone.

I rarely turn down a gig; I guess I’m blessed to attract the “right client” through my own advertising and portfolio. When I do decline, it’s usually because the money is unrealistically low or the potential client has this idée fixe that ripping off a Michael Jackson video would be a perfect way to promote an SEO startup.

—g

AKKKK!

Out of all the layouts back to this month (I'm writing this almost two months after the fact), I failed to point out the brilliance of Big Frank's page layout.

A Thousand apologies, Big Frank (I'll copy and paste them until I reach 1,000):

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1. B.F. has made the typically "tombstone" ish two column layout and made it asymmetrical in an innovative way. Several ways, actually: the column divider between columns, the use or an ornamental drop cap, and the sparing use of call-out quotes make the page look inviting, and compelling to actually read.

2. The oversized quote marks are very stylish and the use of color was unexpected, but pleasant to the eye.

3. The use of color was sparing, the the result is a sophisticated and self-confident look.

Frank, the only place I'd fault you, and I didn't cover this so you aren't at fault really, is the "color" of the page. Page color actually means "page coverage"; how dense the overall look of the pager is at arm's length. for example if you typed a while page in Cooper Black it would look ridiculously dense. At the other extreme, if you used Premier Lightline or Kabel light, the page would look dirty, not full of text.

I think you could have gone lighter on the sub head at the top of the page, and don't know, can't tell what the body font is just about right.

Were I to pick a winner in this month's venture, on the first try, Big Frank's arrow came closest to hitting the bull's eye.

My Best,

Gary

Glad you referred back to B.F.'s page layout Gary, I thought it was brilliant and filed it for reference along with the new tips in #28 you pointed out.

Stygg