Creative Tips #17: Capital Offenses

Of course, no-one who reads these newsletters would ever TYPE A LETTER USING ALL CAPITAL LETTERS, otherwise known as "all caps." In Internet etiquette this is considered, deservedly, the equivalent of shouting. Etiquette aside, there are practical reasons why you should not use all caps except for the occasional headline (and even then, with caution). There are rules about when to use caps and when not to use them, even in ordinary text, and a few points that can lend a subtly professional polish to your documents.

Upper Case is Hard to Read

The first reason you should never create text in all caps is that uppercase letters are more difficult to read than a mixture of upper and lower case. When every letter is the same height, every word has the same shape, and that sameness makes words just a little harder to recognize. Compare the words METAPHYSICAL and metaphysical, for example. Or just type your name, or a line or two with the Caps Lock key on, then without, and compare the two. The eye has a much easier time with the lowercase letters, so the text is more inviting and quicker to read. [Historical note: The terms "upper case" and "lower case" come from the days when type was set by hand, using individual metal letters and spaces. The various letters, figures, punctuation marks and spaces were sorted into two large trays, or "cases." The upper one contained capital letters, while the lower case held the small letters and punctuation.]

Capitals do have their uses, but let's look at some common misuses.

To Add Emphasis, Use Italics

If you want to emphasize a word or phrase, use italics or bold rather than underlining. Don't use ALL CAPS, and especially don't use a combination such as BOLD CAPS or bold italics, or you will tend to come across as sarcastic or pushy: probably not the effect you were trying to create.

Underlining text for emphasis comes from the days of typewriters. It was a not-very-elegant solution to the fact that typewriters only had one kind of type. In a typewritten manuscript, authors would underline to tell the printer where to italicize the text. We are no longer bound by the limitations of typewriters, so why continue the bad habit?

Where Small Caps Are Correct, Don't Substitute Capitals

Between uppercase and lowercase are Small Caps. These are letters with the shape of capitals, but the height, roughly, of the lowercase "x," "n," and "o." Most word processors fake small caps by using the uppercase at a reduced font size, typically around 70% of normal.

The Chicago Manual of Style gives two ways to indicate time of day: lower case with periods ("The flight leaves at 2:00 a.m.") and small caps without periods ("The flight leaves at 2:00 AM"). These are what good writers and professional typesetters use, and you should decide on one or the other as a company style, then use it consistently in your business communications. No matter what, do not use full size caps ("The flight leaves at 2:00 AM"). Looks ugly, doesn't it?

Small caps are also preferable to full size uppercase when typing acronyms or abbreviations, such as NASA, FBI or UNICEF. If you are in the kind of industry where text is often peppered with acronyms, you'll find your documents look immediately more professional when you use small caps.

Small caps are a useful way to differentiate trademarked names from surrounding text, for which full caps would simply look hideous, when your letter refers to product names or proprietary terms you want to protect.

Bonus Tip

In Microsoft Word, the keyboard shortcut Ctrl-Shift-K (Windows) or Cmd-Shift-K (Mac) converts selected text to small caps. Ctrl/Cmd-I toggles Italics on and off; Ctrl/Cmd-B does the same for Bold.

Happy typesetting,

Alan Gilbertson
Creative Director
G&G Creative

The Creative Tips newsletter is published by G&G Creative, Tujunga, CA. More at www.gngcreative.com or on the blog.

G&G Creative specializes in graphic design, photography and copy writing for print and the web.

Copyright © 2009 Alan Gilbertson. All Rights Reserved.