OUGD403
Anatomy of Type & Typographic terminology Lecture

Typeface - A typeface is a set of one or more fonts, for example Helvetica is a typeface but within Helvetica you have light and bold etc which are fonts. A typeface may include letters, numerals, puncatation and various symbols.

Fonts - Font is the particular size,weight and style of a typeface.

Lettering - Its the design of each letter. Another way of describing it is the customisation of each letter, numbers or any other character.

Anatomy of Type 

Cap height - The height from the baseline to the top of the uppercase letters.

X height - The height of the lowercase letters, disregarding ascenders and descenders, typically exemplified by the letter 'x. The reliationship of the x height to the body defines the perceived type size. A typeface with a large X height looks much bigger than a typeface with a small X height at the same size.

Baseline - The imaginary line the letters appear to rest.

Serif - A serif is the little extra stroke found at the end of letters.

Sans Serif - Sans Serif means 'without' in French. Sans Serif are without the stroke.

Terminal - The end of a letter that doesn't have a stroke.

Italic - A mostly slanted type which takes its basic shapes from a stylised form of handwriting, used for emphasis in text. Mostly found in Serif designs.

Oblique - Slanted and skewed slightly.

Descender - Any part in a lowercase that extends below the baseline, for example b,d,f,h and k.

Diacritic - A mark or sign added to the letter, it is used to change the sound value of a letter. An example of this is one of my favourite music producers âme, a circumflex is above 'A' to pronounce the word like 'arm'.

Uppercase - The capitals in a typeface

Superscript -  A letter, figure or symbol that is placed or printed above the normal line of type.

Strikethrough - A line through the center of a word or combination of words. Used to signify mistakes or recently deleted information. Of late it has been used as a trend in Graphic Design. I found an example of this when I was recently looking through of one of the LCA Graphic Design yearbooks.

Counter - The enclosed or particularly enclosed circular or curved negative space.

Eye - Negative space in a 'e'

Bowl - The curved part of the letter

Aperture - Particulary enclosed, rounded negative space in some characters 'C' and 'S'.

Crossbar - Horizontal line found on a 'H' and 'A'.

Colophon - Typographic or production specifications usually listed at the end of a publication. The specifications usually contain information about typeface used, the publisher, place and the date of the publication.

Working with Type

Kerning - Refers to the process of adding or subtracting space between specific letters or characters.

Tracking - Refers to the process of loosening or tightening a block of text, not individual letters. Can be used to fit orphan letters into a block of text.

Massimo Vignelli Six Basic Typefaces


"Out of thousands of typefaces, all we need is a few basic ones, and trash the rest"

Vignelli believed we can get away with six typefaces which are Garamond,Bodoni,Century Expanded,Futura,Times Roman and Helvetica.