Non-Designer’s Type Book, The, Second Edition

Chapter 7. Shift that Baseline

Ahhh, so you have surely by now read The Mac is not a typewriter or The PC is not a typewriter, as well as the previous chapters in this book, and you have been diligently typing one space after periods, using real apostrophes and quotation marks, putting the apostrophes in the right places, and creating true fractions. Right? Now that you’re feeling sassy, it’s time to move on to a more sophisticated matter: baseline shift.

First, let’s clarify the term baseline. The baseline is the invisible line upon which all the characters sit, as shown below. Some characters, such as j, p, g, and y, have strokes that hang below the baseline; these strokes are called the “descenders.” The term “baseline shift” refers to moving ...