Ready to increase your graphic design knowledge? In our next two blog posts, we’ll be discussing two design terms that relate to typography. When you are developing presentation media, these elements of typography can help you to make your visuals look more professional.
Today, we’ll talk about leading and then check out our discussion about tracking and kerning later in the week.
Leading
First, let’s get the pronunciation right. When we talk about leading in typography and design, the word rhymes with “sledding.” It dates back to when typesetters used an actual strip of lead to keep the line spacing consistent. So leading is the amount of space between the lines of text.
Each line of text sits on an invisible line. You can adjust the spacing between those lines to create more or less white space. How you adjust the leading depends on what design or presentation media program you are using. But a quick search for “line spacing” or “leading” in the program you are using will provide instructions on how to adjust it. Take some time to play around with line spacing in your next design project. And use the following information for whether to increase or decrease the leading.
When to Use Less Line Spacing
Tight leading is mostly used in newspapers and logo design. You generally don’t want to use tight light spacing if your readers are pouring through pages of text. But if you want to make your page or text appear darker and heavier, you might tighten up the line spacing a bit. It will give the appearance of denser text.
You might also try decreasing the leading if you are working with a logo. Because there isn’t much text to a logo, you can feel free to play around with the spacing a bit more. A good example of a logo with tight leading is the National Geographic logo.
When to Use More Line Spacing
There are also times when spacing out your lines will work better. In Design Skills says, “Increasing the leading allows the text to breathe and makes it appear instantly more attractive. For readers it has practical advantages too—increasing leading makes text easier to read, and it’s also kinder on reader’s eyes over longer periods of reading.” They also recommend using slightly larger line spacing when setting text against a colored or dark background so that it makes the text easier to read. And writer Jason Walsh recommends using more leading when using bold face or sans serif fonts.
When it comes time to develop your presentation media, make sure it’s not an afterthought. The visuals that accompany your spoken message are critically important. Research has proven that we remember information better when both visual and spoken means are used to convey that information.
So keep increasing both your design vocabulary and knowledge so that you can make your presentation media as effective and powerful as possible.
And if you are ready to hire a designer to help make your presentation graphics amazing, get in touch with one of our experts now.
