Q. Kerning is a black art I have yet to get my head around. How much is too much? Is it purely visual or can it be mathematical?
Figure 1. The upper image has inconsistent spatial relationships between like combinations (po and og, ph and ic), as well as very open spacing between the Ty and the yp. I improved all of those in the lower image. The yp combo overlaps, which is acceptable with diagonal strokes such as the y.
A. In part 1 of this series on kerning, I discussed the principles of good kerning. This week, let’s look at examples that illustrate how to apply those principles. Keep in mind that while there’s tasteful kerning and poor kerning, there’s also a range of solutions within each category.
Figure 3. All-cap settings can present spacing challenges, as illustrated in the upper image. Don’t over-kern diagonals, as you see in the upper image. Keep their negative spaces balanced with the rest of the word, as shown in the lower image. Note the overlapping diagonals with neighboring serifs (HA and AN).
Figure 4. A well-designed connecting script, such as ITC Edwardian Script, shouldn’t need custom kerning. Beware additional kerning (or tracking, for that matter) that will disconnect intentionally overlapping strokes, as shown on the lower image.
Figure 5. You can adjust uneven word spacing, as well as punctuation, with the kerning feature, as shown on the lower image. To kern a word space, place the curser between the character and the word space (or vice versa) and kern as you would two letters.
Note that I altered the default kerning in some of the before examples shown above to better illustrate the points I made in the captions.
This article was last modified on July 1, 2022
This article was first published on October 15, 2008
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