Can You Read This?

The consideration of the legibility of text is one of the key points to consider when creating a piece of work. The situation the work is going to used in could affect what choice is made for the text. For example, is the viewer going to need to be able to see the texts clearly and quickly, like a road sign or billboard where a viewer may only get a few seconds to read it as their car goes by. Or is the viewer going to have time to be able to read the texts over a period of time, such as magazines or newspaper article, advertisements or perhaps a piece of art.
What makes something legible is dictated by certain choices made by the designer. What affects the legibility of something is:

• SIZE- It is obvious that larger texts are easier to read; small sizes are not always as easy and could cause the reader to become bored of trying to read the piece.
• COLOUR- can affect the legibility. Dark colours on light backgrounds should be easy for the eyes to read, such as black on white however certain coloured type for example red and green cause confusion to the eye. Light font colours and a light background are usually straining on the eye to read, such as yellow on white.
• ALIGNMENT- When the text is all aligned the same the eye will simply follow the sentence from line to the next. If the text is aligned differently, one line is aligned left and the next is centred and the next is aligned right, the eye might struggle to follow the lines of texts.
• TYPEFACES- simple typefaces are easier to read; sometimes certain typefaces at smaller sizes are too difficult to read.
• MEDIA- Where or how the work is going to be displayed could affect the legibility. Large media surfaces such as billboards could make the legibility easier. Small media platforms could make the type harder to read.
• BACKGROUND- Plain backgrounds allow the eye to focus purely on the text, busy backgrounds or text over the top of images make the text harder to see and therefore harder to read.

Designers consider all these points, if not more, when creating a piece of work. The designers choice can and will affect the legibility. Most work needs clear text in order to convey the message to the viewer however sometimes designers make the conscience decisions to make the legibility difficult to coincide with the message or visual look of the piece.