CGMB113 MULTIMEDIA TECHNOLOGY

1. CGMB113MULTIMEDIA TECHNOLOGY CHAPTER FIVE MULTIMEDIA BUILDING BLOCKS I TEXT Eze Manzura Mohd Mahidin Adapted from Notes Prepared by: T.J Iskandar Abd. Aziz Noor Fardela Zainal Abidin Revised on Sept 2012

2. Objectives 2 2 2 2 At the end of this chapter, students should be able to: • Understand the history and development of text • Understand the importance and significance of text in multimedia • Identify the terms and concept related to text • Describe the application of text in multimedia systems

3. Text in History • Text came into use about 6,000 years ago • It was mainly used for vital information at the time (politics, taxes etc.) Ramesses the IVth offering Maat to Amon and Khonsou

4. Text in History • Originated from Mesopotamia, Egypt, Sumeria and Babylonia • Initially text was written in symbols such as pictographic signs and cuneiforms • Johann Gensfleisch zum Gutenberg’s printing press revolutionized text in the 15th century

5. Importance of Text in a Multimedia Presentation • Words and symbols in any form, spoken or written, are the most common means of communication. • Text is a vital element of multimedia menus, navigation systems, and content. • Factors affecting legibility of text: • Size • Background and foreground color • Style • Leading

6. The power of meaning… • Word must be chosen carefully • Precise and accurate meaning to describe what you mean • Word must be chosen to illustrate to a few meaning • Word appears in titles, menus and navigational aids. • Test the words that you plan to use on several users and observe their reaction.

7. Understanding Fonts and Typefaces • Typeface: a family of similar characters that may include many sizes and styles • ARIAL • Courier • Times • Font: characters of a single size and style, which are part of the same font face family • Arial – Arial Italic– Arial size 28 • Arial Narrow • Times – Times extra – Times bold • Style: attributes of a font, such as italic, bold, underline, shadow etc.

8. Understanding Fonts and Typefaces • The study of fonts and typefaces includes the following: • Font styles • Font sizes • Cases. • Serif versus Sans Serif • Font styles include: • Boldface • Italic • Underlining • Outlining

9. Leading Understanding Fonts and Typefaces • Kerning is the spacing between character pairs. • Leading is the space between lines. Line 1 Line 2

10. Understanding Fonts and Typefaces • Cases • A capitalized letter is referred to as 'uppercase', while a small letter is referred to as 'lowercase.' • Placing an uppercase letter in the middle of a word is referred to as intercap.

11. Understanding Fonts and Typefaces • Serif Vs Sans Serif • Serif is the little decoration at the end of a letter stroke. • Serif fonts are used for body text. • Sans serif fonts do not have a serif at the end of a letter stroke. • These fonts are used for headlines and bold statements.

12. Understanding Fonts and Typefaces • Verdana is a sans serif type • Times Roman is a serif type E E Verdana Times New Romans Serif Sans serif

13. Monospaced vs propotional fonts. • In a monospacedfont, every character occupies the same amount of space horizontally, regardless of its shape. • Text in monospaced font looks as if it was produced on a typewriter. • Lucida typewrite is an example for monospaced font. • In a proportional font, the space each letter occupies depends on the width of the letter shape. • This produce a more even appearance, and you can fit more words in one line. • Tahoma is an example for proportional font.

15. Measurement of Type • The height of characters in a font is measured in points. One • point being approximately 1/72 inch. • The width is measured by pitch, which refers to how many • characters can fit in an inch. Common pitch values are 10 and • 12.

16. Issues when designing with text • Distinguish between display fontsand text fonts • Display fonts: • are designed for short pieces of text, such as headings, slogan or signs. They are not intended for use in lengthy passages. • Are designed in fancy style. ( This is the example )

17. Issues when designing with text • Text fonts: • must be unobtrusive, so they do not intrude on the reader and interfere with the primary message of the text. • Must be easy to read, so they do not cause fatigue when they are read for hours at a time. • Usually are fonts which are familiar to the users. • (This is the example)

18. Issues when designing with text • Boldface is intrusive, so reserve it for headings or similar use. • Italic text, because of its slant, often render badly at low resolution, making it hard to read • Consider legibility when choosing font can you read this?Or this word ? Is this too small? Or is this readable ? • Avoid too manydifferent faces

19. Issues when designing with text • Strike the density balance • Minimize lines of centered text • Distinguish text link with colours and underlining • Explore text colours and backgrounds • Use distorted layout to grab attention

20. Issues when designing with text • Adjust leading and kerning for readability. • In text blocks, adjust the leading for the most pleasing spacing. Lines too tightly packed are difficult to read. • Vary the size of the font in proportion to the importance of the message you are delivering. • Remember that long continuous texts covering multiple pages are tiring to read. • Always breakdown information into smaller chunk, and summaries them.

21. Issues when designing with text • Use anti-aliased text: • anti-aliasing blends the colours along the edges of the letters (called dithering) to create a soft transition between letter and its background. • Anti-aliasing also smoothes jaggies at the edge of characters.

22. Issues when designing with text • True type font: the same font will be used on the printer and the screen (as oppose to scalable printer resident font) • True type : Arial, Times New Roman • Scalable printer resident: Antique olive, CG Omega

23. Issues when designing with text • Font compatibility: not all font is available on every operating system. • Choose regularly used fonts such as Arial, Times New Roman, Courier • If you want to use your own font, that font must be first installed.

24. Designing menu and icon • Menu: choose word with precise meaning • Icon/symbols : choose icon which has very few meaning for interpretation, or go for something which is globally understood. • Can be useful if language barrier is an issue • Consider using text label together with icons.

25. Animating text • Animated text can grab attention • Do not overdo it. • Too many animation and attention grabbers will distract users attention. Who wants to get an A ?

26. Hypertext and Hypermedia • Hypermedia provides a structure of links through which a user can navigate and interact. • Hypermedia structure: • Hypermedia elements are called nodes • Nodes are connected using links • A linked points is called an anchor • Hypertext words are linked to other elements • Hypertext is usually searchable.

27. The final rule… • Experiment your work by try and error. • Test your work with users – accept critique and improvise.

28. Reference • Vaughan Tay, Multimedia: Making It work. 7th Edition. McGraw Hill