Consistent space after/below headings?

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    • #75710
      Ruben Solér
      Participant

      Hi all

      I’m having a problem with the headings in a book I’m doing:

      When the heading is anywhere on the page but the first line, I get the desired amount of space before (6,767mm) and after (1,128mm) that I specified in the paragraph style. The heading is not aligned/bound to grid.

      However, when the heading is the first line on the page, the space after increases, with the body text paragraph beneath being pushed down to the third line in the grid. This is because the body text *is* aligned to grid, and there’s simply no room for it on the second grid line from the top down, lest it lie closer to the heading than the allotted 1,128mm.

      I’ve tried changing the placement of the grid to adjust for this, but I still can’t seem to get the space quite consistent, although I managed to decrease the difference in space after the heading to just over 1 mm.

      Is there any way to get consistent space after headings without having to align it with the grid? Should I just do my headings in a completely different way?

      If this is all very unclear and poorly formulated, I’ll upload some screenshots. Thanks for any help!

    • #75712
      David Blatner
      Keymaster

      You might need to set the First Baseline Offset (in Text Frame Options) to Leading instead of Ascender.

      • #75718
        Ruben Solér
        Participant

        Hi David

        Thank you, that worked nicely! Instead of Leading though, I chose x-height with Min: 2,3mm. If I’m confusing terms here, it’s because I don’t have the English language version of ID. Either way, those settings made for a good compromise when I didn’t want the header to be offset too much, but also don’t care if there’s a bit less space between said header and the body text.

        I found an old blog post of yours (now that I knew which terms to search for) which I think might hold some solutions also:
        https://creativepro.com/push-down-the-first-line-of-text.php

        Thanks again!

    • #75719

      Here’s what you can do. Go to the first instance of the head that falls at the top of the page. For the text under it, temporarily tell it not to align to baseline grid. Now to manually apply a one point rule of “none” above the head. Be sure that “keep in frame” is checked. Adjust your offset of the rule above until the head sinks and the text aligns properly. You will want to have “preview” checked so you can see your progress.

      Once it aligns properly, redefine your style sheet so all those heads will have that rule and offset. And go ahead and tell that paragraph to align to baseline grid again.

      I work in picas and points so I’m not sure what mm is in relation to points. But be sure that when the head is in the middle of text that the rule above doesn’t cut off the descenders of the text above (it probably won’t).

      Another thing I’ve seen designers do (which I never do) is to create a separate master page for heads that fall at the bottom of the page. They base it on the main text master page, but adjust the top margin so the head sinks lower.

    • #75722
      Ruben Solér
      Participant

      David: Thanks a lot, that worked really well! For First Baseline Offset I chose x-height, with Min.: 2,3 mm. The ascenders are pushed a fraction outside of the text box, but the offset isn’t too visible. Also, this method (with my settings) made the space between the header and the body text a bit less than the 1,128mm, but it looks much better. Thanks! Can’t wait for the next podcast btw :)

      Dwayne: That’s a really cool solution as well, but unfortunately it doesn’t work for my situation, as the misalignment between the header and the first line on the opposing page becomes to visible when I’m nearing the header/body text distance that I’m after. Still, that’s a really cool way of doing it, and I’m gonna keep it in my notebook for a project where it could be applicable!

      • #75723

        I’m glad you got it working. I always sink heads for even lines. Many times I’ll have a head with a line and a half space above and a half line below. So I have to sink it a half line. The head won’t align with the first text line on the opposite page, but the text afterwards will.

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