Comments on: Adding Space Between Paragraphs, Not Lines

By: Rhiannon Miller

Rhiannon Miller — Tue, 06 Mar 2007 11:09:08 +0000

Rather than spend time putting lots of soft returns in manually, I prefer to find a likely-looking word or phrase and take it over or back using ‘No Break’. Sometimes I need a couple of goes before I find one that pans out nicely with the automatic wrap, but it seems to work well. This is, however, a last resort; I normally prefer to run a spread short or long, or, if there are illustrations in the text, increase the spacing above or beneath them.

By: Alexandre Giesbrecht

Alexandre Giesbrecht — Mon, 26 Feb 2007 16:01:05 +0000

I usually try to edit a paragraph (or get it edited) with just one or two words in its last line. If for some reason the author or I can’t rewrite them, I try adjusting tracking (not lower than -10) or horizontal scale (not lower than 98%). If it doesn’t work either, then I must arrange better the objects on the page. Maybe a text wrap a few milimeters to the right/left will do it.

By: Lee Patterson

Lee Patterson — Mon, 26 Feb 2007 15:06:08 +0000

Hi, I read things here and often find useful tips. Here’s a first for me, a suggestion!:) I will usualy go back a page or so and scan for lines that can handle a soft return on last word/words and allow them to build into a cascade of new line ends until I have what I need. It doesn’t take long and is normally a good ‘reader-focused’ solution. Soft returns are my favourite keystrokes in DTP. For what it’s worth:)

By: Lee Patterson

Lee Patterson — Mon, 26 Feb 2007 15:04:55 +0000

Hi, I read things here and often find useful tips. Here’s a first for me, a suggestion!:) I will usualy go back a pge or so and scan for lines that can hadle a soft return on last word/words and allow them to build into a cascade of new line ends until I have what I need. It does’nt take long and is normally a good reader focused solution. Soft returns are my favourite keystrokes in DTP. For what it’s worth:)

By: Cari Jansen

Cari Jansen — Sat, 24 Feb 2007 03:11:56 +0000

The text wrap / justification issue doesn’t occur in all object interact with text frame scenarios…

Try this:
Create a text frame with 3 columns, fill with placeholder text and set vertical justification to “justified”.

Next add object with textwrap, but… set the text wrap option to “Jump Object”. As long as the object interacts with the top or bottom edge of the frame and doesn’t sit somewhere in the middle, your text columns are nicely justified

By: Guido Benigni (Rome, Italy)

Guido Benigni (Rome, Italy) — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 21:03:15 +0000

Absolutely right, Caleb! That’s the most annoying thing about it. If any object with a text wrap applied just “touches” the text box, the justified text goes to hell.
I keep hoping in CS3, though…

By: Hayley

Hayley — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 20:45:24 +0000

I must say, having created many many books in InDesign, and having worked on hundreds at my old job, aligning the spreads manually shouldn’t take more than an hour of my time in the worst case scenario. Only occasionally will I need to change a sentence, and that is usually to avoid an orphan. I am also guilty of occasionally kerning a paragraph 5/1000s of an em, which was taboo at my old job. Unless there is a lot of short dialogue I really find that it isn’t too much of a pain.

By: Caleb Clauset

Caleb Clauset — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 20:41:05 +0000

Different publishers have different standards for balancing pages, but it can substantial time commitment.

While paginating the book make only take 30 minutes, balancing the spreads could take hours… Teacup Software’s TypeFitter was developed to help reduce the pain of this very manual task, but even with TypeFitter it is still very much a manual process (albeit faster).

That being said (I have to be careful here, NDA’s and all), I have worked on an automated column balancing solution (full disclosure: I work for Typefi Systems as a solutions consultant) that is an add-on to the Typefi Publish automated publishing platform (built on InDesign/InDesign Server). There are still some edge cases where an editor needs to make changes to the text to get the spreads to fully balance, but it largely eliminates the manual process of balancing pages and, coupled with our automated layout, dramatically reduces production time for complex titles (from weeks to a matter of hours).

By: Caleb Clauset

Caleb Clauset — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 20:24:58 +0000

One major issue with vertical justification is that it’s not available if any object with text wrap applied intersects with the text frame that you’d like to vertically justify.

By: Hayley

Hayley — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 20:23:07 +0000

Hey all,

Here’s the thing: yes, all spreads have to align at the bottom. But, they do not all have to align at the same point. All publishers that I worked with at a certain typesetting company allowed for a spread to run one line short or long. For mass market titles they were usually allowed to run short. You can’t have more than 3 short spreads in a row, and you can’t have short and long in the same book. If the spread is uneven, kick a line onto the next page by manually manipulating the text box. Also, you can generally card (add extra space) above headers. You can consider manually feathering pages with a slight bit more lead. Editing your sentence should be a last resort. Also, aligning spreads should be the last thing you do before print. Hope this helps!