People Are Sharing Design Examples That Show How Important Proper Spacing Really Is And Here’re 30 Of The Funniest Ones

Hand lettering artist, graphic designer, and pun enthusiast Joshua Harris — aka The A Board Dude — told Bored Panda that proper spacing and kerning can be the difference between "click here" and "dick here" so it's pretty important. "This is of course a rare (and hilarious) instance of kerning gone wrong, but in day-to-day use, it's as critical as good vocabulary," Harris said.

"If you want to create optically and aesthetically pleasing logos or posters designs, each character and ligature needs to be balanced harmoniously," he explained. "Each font is pre-programmed with its own kerning which is based on the old-school method of wooden letterset printing presses with each letter sitting on its own individual block. Essentially, each digitized character has an invisible block surrounding it — that's where the issues start."

According to Harris, the tricky letters to pay attention to are A, K, V, W, Y, and F, L, T. "When paired or combined with other letters you have to ensure the negative (white) space is approximately uniform between each letter. A good rule of thumb is to imagine the gaps being filled with water — you want each 'pocket' to have the same amount to create a balanced word," he said, adding another guideline to follow when looking at lowercases, "Two straight letters (lowercase L and I, for example) need the most space; straight and round letter combinations need a bit less, and two round letters need even less than that."

"Another useful trick if there's still something off with your word — flip it upside down and review the spacing again." 

Harris acknowledged that kerning your words and phrases can quickly become a tedious and laborious job, so it's important to have fun with it. Otherwise the whole process might become a bit of a drag. "With hand lettering, you can be looser with your designs but when it comes to professional logos and products it's wise to have these skills in your toolkit."