Spaces
Ok, here is a pretty basic question. Is there a standard for spacing between words? I had always assumed that 3 to em was standard. The California job case puts 3 to em spaces up front and center, and digitally, I had always set 3 to em unless the aesthetics or justification called for something different.
However, when I ordered spaces and quads from M&H, there were more 4 to ems then anything else. They sell by the proportional pound, so a pound has em, en, 3/em, 4/em, and 5/em proportional to common usage.
Is 4 to em more standard in letterpress, or is it all just a matter of taste and aesthetics?
littlerubberfeet
3 to the em is a bit much. Classical typography was much, much tighter. Frederic Goudy recommended the width (visual width) of a lower case i. But, if you have ever seen his work you might discern this is far too tight, and can lead to problems. I initially set at 5 or 6 to the em (dependent upon type size) and adjust accordingly. For text. Poetry a bit wider.
Digital type is more like 4 to the em as a standard. But this is easily altered by adjusting the preferences in your page-layout program.
The main thing to look for in setting is hyphenation occurrence (minimal) and rivers (as few as possible) in the setting. If these are under control based on interword spacing, line length, type size; you are about there.
Gerald
Ahh, thank you. The past layouts I have done have mostly been letterhead and CD liner notes, all for offset and never for letterpress. On-CD screen printing becomes an adventure with closely spaced letters and objects, and the trapping can be tricky.
My formal education is in audio engineering, so I never got some basics.
In school sixty years ago we learned to set type. The 3-to-em space was the standard when setting the line. When it came time to justify the line, the effort was to move down to 4-to-em if needed rather than add spaces to the 3-to-em, or replace the 3 with a 5 and a 4.
OK purists, I have said 3-to-em and 4-to em above and agree that it is correct. Now can I say 3m and 4m as most of us probably do?
There is no pure one and only correct way. It is what the eye sees and what looks well and reads well. The reader should not see the type or spacing. Only we who set it should and it should be set to be attractive and readable to the viewer. That is why we may go to the effort of kerning some letters and even letter spacing some words. Some type faces look fine with 4m spacing and some look better with 3m. Do what looks good to you, the artist.
I hadn’t given much thought about the 3-to-em box being larger and right in the center of the California job case. I guess Mr. California thought 3m was right.
Watch out for type lice.
inky
My 2 cents on spaces and quads:
The space nomenclature in my day 50-60 years ago were 3 em spaces (California job case located left division, lower right corner). 3 em spaces were the usual spacing for text and most copy. 5 em & 4 em spaces are in the top row left division. You have en quads (1/2) and em quads just above the 2 & 3 em quads located in the lower right corner of the middle section. We never expressed spaces as 3 to em, rather 3 em, 4 em , 5 em spaces, and en, em, 2 & 3 em quads. ½ point copper and 1 point brass spaces were kept in the top row to the right of the $ sign above the Caps. Dick