Here’s Why We Avoid Four-Color Body Type

Thank you, The Wall Street Journal. You did me and a whole lot of other production managers a huge favor today with your printing foul-up. Every couple of years, it seems, I have to talk an editor out of going along with a designer’s proposal to jazz up a publication by getting rid of boring old black body type in articles. “Ooh, purple would look nice.”

The Journal printed a graphic showing Pinterest postings intended to inspire innovation among General Electric employees. The Pinterest captions use colored body type, which is fine for the web but looked like mud when printed