Artes Gráficas (Tipografía)

Baseline

Invisible line on which letters sit.

X-height

Height of lowercase “x”; sets main body of lowercase.

Cap height

Height of capitals measured from the baseline.

Ascender

Part of a lowercase that rises above the x-height.

Descender

Part of a lowercase that falls below the baseline.

Stem/ Asta

Primary vertical/diagonal stroke of a letter.

Stroke

Any line forming a letter.

Serif

Small finishing strokes at stroke ends.

Terminal

Stroke end that doesn’t end in a serif.

Counter

Enclosed or partially enclosed negative space.

Aperture

Opening of a partially enclosed counter (e.g., “c”, “e”).

Bowl

Curved stroke enclosing a counter (e.g., “o”, “d”).

Eye (of e)

Small counter of lowercase “e”.

Crossbar

Horizontal stroke connecting two sides.

Cross stroke

Horizontal stroke crossing a stem.

Arm

Horizontal/upward stroke free at one end.

Leg

descending stroke, often diagonal (R, K).

Tail

Descending, often decorative stroke.

Link

Stroke connecting bowl and loop in double-storey “g”.

Loop

Lower enclosed counter of double-storey “g”.

Spine (of s)

Main curved stroke of “s”.

Apex

Upper point where two strokes meet.

Vertex

Lower point where two strokes meet.

Tittle/ Punto (de i/j)

Dot above lowercase i/j.

Diacritic

Mark added to alter sound/function (á, ñ, ü…).

Axis/Stress

Angle of contrast; direction of stroke weight.

Contrast

Difference between thick/thin strokes.

Serif (Oldstyle/Garalde)

Low contrast, diagonal stress (e.g., Garamond).

Serif (Transitional)

More contrast, more vertical stress (e.g., Baskerville).

Serif (Modern/Didone)

High contrast, hairline serifs (e.g., Didot, Bodoni).

Slab serif (Egyptian)

Heavy, rectangular serifs (e.g., Rockwell).

Sans serif (Grotesque)

Early sans, irregular details (e.g., Franklin Gothic).

Sans serif (Neo-grotesque)

Neutral, low contrast (e.g., Helvetica).

Sans serif (Humanist)

Calligraphic influence, open apertures (e.g., Frutiger).

Sans serif (Geometric)

Based on geometric forms (e.g., Futura).

Script/ Manuscrita

Designed to emulate handwriting/calligraphy.

Blackletter/ Gótica

Dense, angular medieval-derived forms. (eg. Fraktur).

Display

For large sizes and impact, not body text.

Monospace

All characters share the same width.

Superfamily

System spanning multiple styles (serif/sans/script).

Variable font

Single file with adjustable axes (e.g., weight, width, opsz).

Point size/ Cuerpo pt

Size of type in points.

Leading

Vertical space between baselines.

Tracking

Uniform letter-spacing applied to a range of text.

Kerning

Space adjustment between specific pairs.

Measure

Line length; often 45–75 chars for body text.

Alignment

Left, right, centered, justified.

Rag/ Bandera

Uneven edge of ragged text.

Hyphenation/ Silabeo

Breaking words at line ends with hyphens.

Widow

Last line of a paragraph alone at top of column/page.

Orphan

First line of a paragraph alone at bottom of column/page.

Hierarchy

Visual ranking via size, weight, spacing, etc.

Grid

Structure guiding alignment and rhythm.

Margin

Whitespace framing the text block.

Gutter/ Canal

Inner space between facing pages/columns.

Legibility

Ease of distinguishing characters.

Readability

Ease of reading extended text.

Ligature

Combined glyph for pairs (e.g., fi, fl).

Small caps/ Versalitas

Short capitals matching x-height.

Oldstyle figures

Numerals with ascenders/descenders for text harmony.

Lining figures/ Cifras modernas

Uniform-height numerals aligning to cap height/baseline.

Tabular vs Proportional

Fixed-width vs variable-width numerals.

OpenType features

Features like ligatures, small caps, stylistic sets, oldstyle figures.

Glyph

Specific visual form of a character.

Character

Abstract textual unit (e.g., “a”).

Typeface vs Font

Typeface = design; Font = file/style instance.

Foundry

Company/studio releasing typefaces.

Specimen

Document showing characters and use.

Pangram

Sentence using every letter of the alphabet.

Variable axes

Common axes: weight, width, optical size, slant, italic.