Format: Dressing Documents for Success

Abstract

When you create a document on a computer, you are faced with many formatting decisions, from choosing a typeface to selecting the amount of white space that precedes a heading. In making these decisions, you want to choose a format that is easy to read, that is in character with the kind of document you have written, and that presents the work in such a way that the most important details stand out. Because of the wide selection of typography and layouts, the best thing to do is to consult a graphic designer. Most graphic designers have spent years studying different designs and can tailor a format to meet your needs.

Printing should be invisible. Type well-used is invisible as type. The mental eye focuses through type and not upon it, so that any type which has an excess in design, anything that gets in the way of the mental picture to be conveyed, is bad type.

—Beatrice Warde