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Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum?

I tend to think that the classic "Lorem ipsum" text needs explaining to clients who haven't seen it before. But text along the lines of the following seem inelegant:

Copy goes here. Copy goes here. Copy goes here.
Xxxxxx xx x xxx. Xxxxxxxx xx xxx x xx

Are there any alternatives I should consider?

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5 Answers 5

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Ideally, nothing. Instead, use the actual content. Content is integral to a successful design, but, alas, even today, it's still treated like an afterthought all-to-often.

Otherwise, Lorem ipsum is pretty much the habit.

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  • Do you mean use examples of actual content? There are many applications in which you have to design for content that doesn't exist yet, for example a newspaper/website.
    – e100
    Commented Feb 18, 2011 at 15:47
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    That's my point. Content is often an afterthought. Ideally, the content would be getting created prior to or during the visual design phase. Granted, we rarely work in ideal workflows.
    – DA01
    Commented Feb 18, 2011 at 17:08
  • Actually it is a fairly popular opinion that readable content distracts from the design layout, So it really depends on what you are trying to get feedback on. Grey blocks in place of photos can serve a similar purpose
    – Hemi
    Commented Feb 18, 2011 at 20:06
  • Don't forget that "readable placeholder content" can be indistinguishable from the real thing. Lorem is real obvious real fast.
    – horatio
    Commented Feb 18, 2011 at 20:23
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    Depends on the client. Some get so caught up in the content (change this headline! I don't like this photo! We don't do charts that way!) that they can't see the design they're supposed to be giving feedback about. Others want real examples so they can judge the layout more accurately. In addition to Lorem Ipsum, I often put placeholder content in magenta, because nobody colors anything magenta, and it's very easy to say to the client "anything in pink is dummy copy." Then you can use real copy, but they'll ignore it as they should.
    – Lauren-Clear-Monica-Ipsum
    Commented Mar 2, 2011 at 18:40
9

Yeah - that'll work.

http://www.lipsum.com/ is what I usually use.

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I use Fillerati, which gives you text from public domain books to place in your documents.

If you've got any sort of content already from the client, you can use that too.

I once used a computer science text book (only thing I ever used that book for) as dummy text...

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There are many possibilities:

  • Using InDesign, you can change the loremipsum text visibility by changing the Preferences → Display Performance → Greek Type Below → Put a higher number than the text size:

enter image description here

  • Flip the text vertically enter image description here

  • In Illustrator use filters over the text, in this example: Roughen and Feather

enter image description here

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  • The first example appears to be censored text. The "weight" of the bars in a layout seem heavy (dark) to me. My audience would certainly 'question' flipping the text in the second example. Feathering the text is tough on me : ) Have you ever used any of these ideas in a layout with success?
    – Stan
    Commented Apr 23, 2019 at 1:05
  • Actually not, I was never in this situation. The InDesign example looks to coarse for the zoom, it's a 10 pt text, in a page looks like a lines pattern. Ok, the three examples are zoomed. Those are just some ideas.
    – user120647
    Commented Apr 23, 2019 at 1:09
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Your discomfort in using classic placeholder "Graphics Greek" text comes from not knowing enough about it. It is an amalgam of Latin that imitates the patterns of ENglish so closely in terms of frequency of various lengths of words so closely, that you can lay it in position, copy it to Word, use the word count tool, and know what amount of real text is need to fit the layout. Get over your discomfort and they will get over yours and you'll come across as a professional.

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  • As I said, the issue is that it needs explaining to clients.
    – e100
    Commented Jan 22, 2014 at 16:00

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