Chapter 7
Chapter 7: Styling It Your Way .....................................................................................
In This Chapter
Spacing text with kerning
Adjusting line spacing
Adjusting pacing between words
Aligning text
Adding textures
Creating custom backgrounds
I
f CSS did nothing other than give you powerful control over how your Web
pages look, it would still be a tremendous improvement over HTML. In this
chapter, you explore various ways to enhance the appearance of your Web
pages using special tools and techniques. You start by kerning— adjusting
the space between text characters. Later on in the chapter, you discover how
to align text for effect, add textures, and create custom backgrounds.Kerning for Better Headlines .....................................................................
Kerning — adjusting the space between letters — is sometimes wrongly used
for emphasis. Some Web page designers try to add e m p h a s i s by kerning
to get extra space between letters. But then, poor text design includes many
other ugly forms of “emphasis” in addition to kerning, such as boldface, bright
colors, all caps, and so on. These visual tricks should be avoided as a way of
emphasizing a word or phrase. For emphasis, use italics. And italics only.Widely spaced letters are sometimes used in headlines though, particularly
with single-word heads, such as a letters-to-the-editor column like this:L E T T E R S
Kerning to tighten letter spacing comes into its own in headlines. You
decrease the space between the letters to squeeze the words together and
improve the headline’s appearance. Most typefaces (except monospaced