Text 5 Type measurement

V. Write a short summary of the text.

IV. Compare different types of software for DTP.

Type is measured in points, picas, and units. In desk top publishing it is sometimes measured in millimetres, These measurements can be confusing, in that the Anglo-American system is different from the European one, although both use the term 'point', The reason for these different systems lies in the fact that metal type foundries in Europe were casting type that was incompatible in size with that from other foundries. It was not until the early eighteenth century that an attempt was made to standardize a system of type measurement, a line of type each have their own equalities. This happened in France, when Pierre Fournier proposed a standard unit of measurement, which he called the 'point'. The innovations made by Fournier were developed by another Frenchman, Firmin Didot, to produce a European standard, but neither the UK nor the USA adopted this, although their system was based on points. But the European, or Didot, point is slightly larger than the point used in the US and the UK. An inch contains approximately 67.5 European points and 72 Anglo-American points. Letters are measured from the top of the ascenders to the bottom of the descenders of the lower case letters. The point size is thus based on a 'strip' holding all the letters in a sentence. In the metric system, type size is described by the height of the capital letters, or 'cap height' (CH). The spaces between lines of type is called 'line feed' (IF) — both are in millimetres. The spaces between lines are also measured m points. A line of, say, 12 point type directly followed by another line of 12 point type said to be 12 point solid, or 12 'on' 12 point. Point spaces inserted between the lines make type more legible.

The point or body size of type is the distance from the top of the ascender to the bottom of the descender. This distance varies from typeface to typeface as well as from one point size to another If there is no leading, type can be measured from base line to base line to establish the point size. Some of these are called: apex, counter, bar, serif, arm, beak, ascender, ear, bowl, spine, cross-spur, bracket, tail, link, loop, descender, ascender line, capital, x-height (or mean line), base line, descender line.

In the design of typefaces, each character is given a fixed amount of space known as the set width or set, which is measured in units, The set width of a character controls the amount of space between itself and the next character, and can be varied for special purposes - either increased, to allow greater space, or decreased, to allow less. The latter is possible only in phototypesetting systems and obviously has limited scope. Beyond a certain stage, characters lose legibility.

Since different founts vary considerably in their character­istics, the set widths of characters will also vary from typeface to typeface so that a condensed typeface, for instance, will have a narrow set width relative to its body size.

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