Space Before and After?

Subject: Space Before and After?
From: Geoff Hart <ghart -at- videotron -dot- ca>
To: "TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com>
Date: Tue, 25 Jan 2005 09:52:15 -0500


Alan Quirt wondered: <<I have always used Space After each body text paragraph style, and both Space Before and Space After for headings, choosing the amount by eye. As a technical person whose documents were a by-product, that was good enough.>>

And as a professional, it's also probably good enough. The thing about "choosing by eye" is that it's not nearly as arbitrary as it might sound, at least not if you also engage your brain: design should always be about _both_ form and function. The eye tells you about form; the mind tells you about function.

<<Can you offer advice on how to choose good values for paragraph spacing? Should it be based mostly on font size? Should it be greater when margins are wider? Do particular kinds of document need special treatment?>>

Books have been written on this subject, but to honor my frequent claim that there's no subject that can't be _summarized_ in 200 words (plus or minus), here's a shot at each of your questions, in semi-logical order:

Spacing depends first and foremost on the nature of what you're producing: something intended primarily to be read needs much less spacing than something intended to be admired from a distance. This is why type in ads and graphic designs tend to be much more open (more white space) than novels, for example. Let's assume that you're talking ***technical writing*** (the "particular kinds of document" you wondered about) and move on from there.

The first principle of spacing is that things that belong together and that are intended to work as a unit should be closer together than things that belong apart and that are intended to work as separate units. This is also true in writing designed to be gazed at (e.g., ads and graphic designs), but with different definitions of visual unity.

Thus, headings are typically at least as far from paragraphs (they relate to all paragraphs under that heading) as the distance between paragraphs, and sentences in a paragraph are no farther apart than the space between paragraphs. Sentences come close together because they serve as a single unit (the paragraph), paragraphs come close together because they serve as a single unit (a section), and headings come close to paragraphs because they also serve as a single unit (the section).

This is why, for example, paragraphs with initial indents are typically set without additional space (the space between paragraphs is provided solely by the leading of each line of type) and why paragraphs separated by blank lines (instead of using initial indents) are usually separated by a single blank line with leading identical to that of the paragraphs.

As you can see, this rule of thumb suggests that font size (not to mention line width and leading) determines the spacing. Depending on the font, and thus on leading and (in a well-designed document) line length (your question re. margins), spacing above and below headings and paragraphs will also vary, usually in more or less direct proportion to the font size.

All of this is complicated by the fact that some things "just look right" to the eye accustomed to reading them. If you were brought up in a culture with 1-inch gaps below all headings, this would look normal to you and any smaller spacing would feel uncomfortable. The "by eye" spacing that you currently use will have been conditioned by the kinds of things you're used to reading.

Are there absolute rules? No. I'm sure you could find studies that provide general recommendations, but all studies of typography must accept a tradeoff between two states: one in which factors are so carefully controlled that the results relate only to the specific study conditions, and factors so loosely controlled that the results don't apply to any specific condition. Typography is a multidimensional art, and it's difficult (probably impossible) to simplify those multiple dimensions simultaneously into a single all-encompassing rule.

Pant pant. Okay, 200 words, plus or minus. <g>

--Geoff Hart ghart -at- videotron -dot- ca
(try geoffhart -at- mac -dot- com if you don't get a reply)
www.geoff-hart.com


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References:
Space Before and After?: From: Alan Quirt

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