Building Plain Language From the Ground Up

Part IV-Layout and Design

By Cheryl Stephens

The public prefers to read material that looks easy to read and interesting. Good design encourages people to pay attention to what you have to say.

Good page design strengthens the text and shows connections between ideas. When you need to reach the 40% of Canadians with reading problems, graphics both complement and supplement the written text.

The four main principles of good page design are:

• Simplicity
• Contrast
• Organization
• Image

Simplicity

Remove clutter
You need to reduce the visual clutter competing for readers' attention. Don't take advantage of every design feature available from your desk-top publishing program. And don't use features that fragment the page. Aim to unify it.

Use restraint
Use as few lines and boxes as possible. Practice restraint with tinted backgrounds and reverse type. Minimize your use of underlining.

Use one main visual
Keep to one main visual element on each page. This can be a graphic or large headline. Treat two adjacent pages of text as one design with only one predominant graphic element. Unless distracted, the readers' eyes will begin slightly off-centre and move in a clockwise direction around the page.

Use open space
Use white-space and openness to make reading look easy. Try to use a single column of text that is between 3 1/2 and 5 inches wide. If your space is limited, use two columns rather than one that is more than 5 inches wide. To avoid the look of cramped, dense text, use shorter paragraphs; use subheads and indentations; and indent lists of items.

Contrast

Creating visual contrast prevents grey pages that look to the reader like a mass of type without an attractive starting point.

Make your headlines and subheads stand out and draw the reader's attention to the text. Use larger type, a different typeface, surrounding white space, or bold type.

Use color for contrast
Colored type or paper makes your material more attractive. Pale yellow or cream offers good contrast to black type without glare. Green type works well on white or off-white paper. Only use bright colors in headlines or graphics.

Vary typeface for contrast
Think about the use of contrast between letters and words. Capitalize words used as headings or for emphasis, but don't overdo it. Mixing upper and lower case makes easier reading. Use italics or bolding for the initial capital in a paragraph or in single words for emphasis.

Organization

Organize with design
Find a unifying theme such as color or rhythm. Establish a visual pattern for different levels of headings or categories of information. Use design elements to set off instructions from examples or history from updates. Break text up with subheadings, white space, and minor graphic accents. Set a list apart with indenting or graphic accents like bullets, asterisks, or arrows. Only use numbers if you want to rank the items or prioritize them. Put headings and subheadings at the left margin. In a table of contents, try running the page numbers down the left side instead of the right. Align graphics along a margin.

Image

Consider the image you want to relay to the reader. Design to project that image - whether it is casual, formal, youthful, or somber.

Typestyles have personalities
Some typestyles look contemporary or friendly. Others are conservative or formal. There are two general styles of type: serifs have thin, ornamental strokes at the ends of letters; sans-serif type is simpler.

Use serif type like Times Roman or Palatino for body type because they are thought to be easier to read. Use sans-serif like Helvetica or Arial for contrast in headlines, and subheadings.

Type size counts
People expect "fine print" to be difficult and often won't tackle it. Most people are at ease reading 10 point type or larger. For seniors, 12 point type is recommended.

Ragged margins help readers
Ragged right margins make reading easier. The eye uses the variation in line endings to track down the page.

Ragged right margins also let the spacing between words and letters stay regular. Justified right margins stretch the spacing between letters and words toward the right margin and make reading more difficult.

Color also affects the message
Color communicates without words. Some reactions to color are innate; others are learned. Some are international while others are cultural.

Reds, oranges and yellows give a feeling of warmth while greens, blues and violet s are cooler colors. Younger audiences like warmer colors. The colors you choose affect the image you project.

Different professions have learned responses to color. Red excites moviegoers, but is negative to accountants. Red is healthy to doctors but danger to engineers. Yellow represents happiness to moviegoers, importance to financiers, jaundice to medicos, and caution for engineers. Green represents calm, subdued repose.

The best advice about colors is to test your color choices on potential readers. In our next column we'll explain the general value of testing your content and design for reader feed-back.