4 ms·

While the tips presented are fine if you actually need to kern something, in realty the only time you would ever need to do this is if you're using a font that

While the tips presented are fine if you actually need to kern something, in realty the only time you would ever need to do this is if you're using a font that is poorly made, or if you're designing your own typeface. If you've paid for a decent typeface, it more than likely works as it should and has all of the common kern pairs already defined. If you're typesetting a language that is less common, you may run into combinations of letter that haven't been kerned, in which case any designer worth their salt would be happy to get an email showing the issue (so they can amend their font files in this and other typefaces they have produced). In the end kerning is a very very time consuming process, and you can save yourself a lot of time just by starting with a decent typeface in the first place.

rangibaby 11y ago
It will be less of a problem in the future, but a lot of the versions of classic fonts floating around have funky kerning. Neue Haas Grotesk is the first properly digitized version of Helvetica, for example.
- jack_jennings 11y ago
  I agree, and there will always be bad digitizations or just bad fonts. My practical advice is mostly that if you find yourself having to kern more than one or two pairs you're better off finding a better typeface.
hammock 11y ago
>in realty the only time you would ever need to do this is if you're using a font that is poorly made, or if you're designing your own typeface. Or logo design. A few examples: FedEx http://dab1nmslvvntp.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/FedEx.png http://dab1nmslvvntp.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/... USA Network http://dab1nmslvvntp.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/usa.png http://dab1nmslvvntp.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/... ebay http://www.howdesign.com/wp-content/uploads/i-also-find-this-to-be-acceptable-13454-1347576021-1.jpeg http://www.howdesign.com/wp-content/uploads/i-also-find-this...
- jack_jennings 11y ago
  To be pedantic (though I imagine that's acceptable in this venue) I'd say this is not kerning. Kerning is an optical adjustment between individual letter pairs to correct a deficiency in a historically evolved system, somewhat separate from tracking; tracking being an even application of positive or negative space applied to all characters in a sequence to stylistic effect. I'd also go so far as to say kerning doesn't exist in these applications because the typeface has been significantly redrawn to create the desired shape. Even the FedEx logo, which appears to be an off the shelf font, had the be redrawn in order to make the letters line up to produce the hidden arrow. Usually optical corrections would have made the x not produce an exact right angle nor would it align precisely with the top of the E crossbar. At some point you're just drawing a logo, which can is not the same as a typeface.
  - dietrichepp 11y ago
    If I recall correctly, the FedEx logo is an amalgam of two fonts to begin with.
    - rangibaby 11y ago
      It looks like Helvetica with a lot of modifications to make the arrow look correct.
    - jack_jennings 11y ago
      I was intrigued by this comment and went searching for this. From this FastCompany article it's inspired by Futura and Univers though sounds like it's more or less a custom job: > At the time, Lindon was "in love with two bold fonts" known as Univers 67, which is a condensed bold type, and Futura Bold. He takes me through how he started playing with the two typefaces and the letter spacing, from extremely wide to locked together, uppercase and lowercase, mixing and tinkering. One iteration had a capital E and a lowercase x: "I started squeezing the letter spacing, I saw a white arrow start to appear between the E and the x. I thought, ‘There’s something there.’ I tried both fonts, but I didn’t like how much I had to distort either typeface to make the arrow look good. I thought, ‘Would it be possible to blend the best features of both?’ I took the high x of Univers and mixed it with the stroke of Futura Bold. The x rose to the crossbar of a lowered E. I kept tweaking, and eventually not only did the arrow look natural and unforced, but I ended up with a whole new letterform." http://www.fastcodesign.com/1671067/the-story-behind-the-famous-fedex-logo-and-why-it-works http://www.fastcodesign.com/1671067/the-story-behind-the-fam...
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
thristian 11y ago
I wouldn't go that far; in The Elements of Typographic Style Robert Bringhurst mentions having to tweak the kerning of just about every typeface he's ever worked with, and he's professionally associated with Adobe's typography department, so it's not like he's never worked with professionally-made typefaces. To make a software development analogy, manual kerning is a bit like writing your own HTTP client library from scratch. Any language you use probably already has a pretty good or a great one, so it's probably not worth your time unless you have a very specialist use-case, you want to learn how to do it yourself, or you're legitimately that much better than the original implementor.
- jack_jennings 11y ago
  I think that your analogy is slightly off, though true enough. I'd say that writing a low level library is more akin to actually drawing a typeface than it is to mucking with the spacing of an existing one. You won't learn a lot about what goes into properly spacing a typeface just through kerning, as you would by examining a lower level protocol and writing an implementation.
- Chris_Newton 11y ago
  Perhaps a more direct analogy would be that manual kerning is like hand-optimising code at a low level. You can improve almost anything to some degree, and an expert would be able to detect even quite small differences on close inspection. However, an isolated minor deviation would not make a significant difference in normal use, and the effort to hand-optimise everything is prohibitive. However, a user could notice either the cumulative effect of many suboptimal areas (poor built-in kerning in a font, careless inefficiency in frequently run code) or a single major problem (not tidying up a large logo or hero graphic, not optimising the body of a loop running many times causing a delay in UI response). In these cases, the benefit of manual refinement may be amplified enough to justify the effort.

rangibaby 11y ago

It will be less of a problem in the future, but a lot of the versions of classic fonts floating around have funky kerning. Neue Haas Grotesk is the first properly digitized version of Helvetica, for example.

jack_jennings 11y ago
I agree, and there will always be bad digitizations or just bad fonts. My practical advice is mostly that if you find yourself having to kern more than one or two pairs you're better off finding a better typeface.

hammock 11y ago

>in realty the only time you would ever need to do this is if you're using a font that is poorly made, or if you're designing your own typeface. Or logo design. A few examples: FedEx http://dab1nmslvvntp.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/FedEx.png http://dab1nmslvvntp.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/... USA Network http://dab1nmslvvntp.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/usa.png http://dab1nmslvvntp.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/... ebay http://www.howdesign.com/wp-content/uploads/i-also-find-this-to-be-acceptable-13454-1347576021-1.jpeg http://www.howdesign.com/wp-content/uploads/i-also-find-this...

jack_jennings 11y ago
To be pedantic (though I imagine that's acceptable in this venue) I'd say this is not kerning. Kerning is an optical adjustment between individual letter pairs to correct a deficiency in a historically evolved system, somewhat separate from tracking; tracking being an even application of positive or negative space applied to all characters in a sequence to stylistic effect. I'd also go so far as to say kerning doesn't exist in these applications because the typeface has been significantly redrawn to create the desired shape. Even the FedEx logo, which appears to be an off the shelf font, had the be redrawn in order to make the letters line up to produce the hidden arrow. Usually optical corrections would have made the x not produce an exact right angle nor would it align precisely with the top of the E crossbar. At some point you're just drawing a logo, which can is not the same as a typeface.
- dietrichepp 11y ago
  If I recall correctly, the FedEx logo is an amalgam of two fonts to begin with.
  - rangibaby 11y ago
    It looks like Helvetica with a lot of modifications to make the arrow look correct.
  - jack_jennings 11y ago
    I was intrigued by this comment and went searching for this. From this FastCompany article it's inspired by Futura and Univers though sounds like it's more or less a custom job: > At the time, Lindon was "in love with two bold fonts" known as Univers 67, which is a condensed bold type, and Futura Bold. He takes me through how he started playing with the two typefaces and the letter spacing, from extremely wide to locked together, uppercase and lowercase, mixing and tinkering. One iteration had a capital E and a lowercase x: "I started squeezing the letter spacing, I saw a white arrow start to appear between the E and the x. I thought, ‘There’s something there.’ I tried both fonts, but I didn’t like how much I had to distort either typeface to make the arrow look good. I thought, ‘Would it be possible to blend the best features of both?’ I took the high x of Univers and mixed it with the stroke of Futura Bold. The x rose to the crossbar of a lowered E. I kept tweaking, and eventually not only did the arrow look natural and unforced, but I ended up with a whole new letterform." http://www.fastcodesign.com/1671067/the-story-behind-the-famous-fedex-logo-and-why-it-works http://www.fastcodesign.com/1671067/the-story-behind-the-fam...

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

thristian 11y ago

I wouldn't go that far; in The Elements of Typographic Style Robert Bringhurst mentions having to tweak the kerning of just about every typeface he's ever worked with, and he's professionally associated with Adobe's typography department, so it's not like he's never worked with professionally-made typefaces. To make a software development analogy, manual kerning is a bit like writing your own HTTP client library from scratch. Any language you use probably already has a pretty good or a great one, so it's probably not worth your time unless you have a very specialist use-case, you want to learn how to do it yourself, or you're legitimately that much better than the original implementor.

jack_jennings 11y ago
I think that your analogy is slightly off, though true enough. I'd say that writing a low level library is more akin to actually drawing a typeface than it is to mucking with the spacing of an existing one. You won't learn a lot about what goes into properly spacing a typeface just through kerning, as you would by examining a lower level protocol and writing an implementation.
Chris_Newton 11y ago
Perhaps a more direct analogy would be that manual kerning is like hand-optimising code at a low level. You can improve almost anything to some degree, and an expert would be able to detect even quite small differences on close inspection. However, an isolated minor deviation would not make a significant difference in normal use, and the effort to hand-optimise everything is prohibitive. However, a user could notice either the cumulative effect of many suboptimal areas (poor built-in kerning in a font, careless inefficiency in frequently run code) or a single major problem (not tidying up a large logo or hero graphic, not optimising the body of a loop running many times causing a delay in UI response). In these cases, the benefit of manual refinement may be amplified enough to justify the effort.