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Writing and Publishing, Part 28:
Becoming your own publisher:
Design and Manufacturing Techniques Continued:
Points on PageMaker:
Last time, I gave the layout for the front of our book. I made
the point that it is not really part of the body of work, but
is still necessary and/or useful. To separate it from the body
of work, I lay it out and page number it separate from the book.
For page numbering, in this first part, I use lower case Roman
numerals. For reference, here is the page order of the elements
I used in my last book.
Page i Title page.
Page ii Copyright page.
Page iii Acknowledgments.
Page iv Disclaimer.
Page v - viii Table of contents.
Page ix Selected quotes.
Page x Blank.
Notice that except for the title and copyright pages, the order of these elements is somewhat arbitrary. This is the order I have evolved to. It seems somewhat natural.
I have indicated previously that there is more than one page layout program which can produce suitable files for our book manufacturer. The one I use is Adobe's PageMaker. It is the one I chose when I knew nothing about anything in publishing and I have stayed with it. I cannot claim to know how it works, but I can make it do what I need to do. For every function which I use in PageMaker, I am sure the competing programs have a similar function.
PageMaker will allow me to create the entire book as a single document, if I choose to do so. In practice, I do not choose to. That would make one incredibly cumbersome file. In practice, I lay the book out in sections, chapters or parts. A typical book will have 12 or more files. The first part I lay out will be the front section of the book. In my example, this is just the ten pages above.
If I do not already have one, the first thing I will create is what is called a template file. This is the starting file I will use throughout the book with slight modification for the front section. For the front section, I will create a separate template file based on the main template file. The differences will be minor, having to do with running headers and page numbers. For the main body of work, I like to have running page headers and Arabic numeral page numbering. For the front, running headers would be silly.
Some of the template file definition will be done in what PageMaker calls master pages. These are one, or more, special pages which can be selectively applied throughout the document. They are not actual pages, but forms which can be applied to the real pages. In these master pages, we can set the page number style and position for the whole document. We can also create guides which help us to place the various elements of our document. Guides are simply layout lines within our document which do not print. We can also define any running headers and or footers in these master pages.
In the template file, I will define the page size of the book, the margins, the page orientation (landscape or portrait), and the page numbering I want to use. I will also specify a target printer and the output resolution of that printer. For this, I get the requirement from my selected book manufacturer. They will tell me what device to target and the required resolution in dots per inch. All of these parameters I define now are for the text part of the book. I will get to the cover later. That is a separate issue.
In addition to page information, I will want to define a number of text styles. A style is a complete set of specifications for a body of text and can be applied to a block of text after it is imported into the document. We can specify the font, the font size and style, the font color, and the characteristics of the paragraph. One style which I usually define, I name Story. As the name implies, this is the style I will apply to most of the text in my book. Here is the specification for the style, Story.
Font, Bookman, normal, 11 point, auto leading, black.
Leading has to do with the space between lines. It is pronounced
like the metal. We can suppose it harkens back to the bad old
days when type was made of a lead based metal. There are other
parameters like baseline and tracking. which can be set to get
unusual effects. In most case, I leave these alone. In paragraph
control we can set indenting, character spacing, and kerning.
In my Story style, I indent the first line of each paragraph.
All of these parameters affect the form and shape of the text.
Sometimes, I experiment with them for my cover design. In the
body of the work, I leave most things at the normal settings.
It is also possible to set rules for hyphenation and tabs.
Other styles I will create are filler, headline, title, subtitle, poem, and center. The names describe the function of each style. The strength in using styles is that a style can be applied to a whole block of text at one time. Also we can be assured of consistency throughout the book. We won't have to remember the details once they are set. We simply apply the style.
We can also define colors, other than black, to apply to text within our book. I do this in my catalog, which I create in house. In my books, I stick to black text and greyscale graphics. Greyscale means black and white. I have yet to make what is called a coffee table book.
Once a template file is created, we can save it and use it as often as needs be. When we want to create a new document, we can open the template file, import our source information, apply styles, and save the result as an application file. Our template file remains unchanged.
In the case of my example above, I will use the PageMaker place command to import the WordPerfect source files and place them where I want them in the document. I can then apply various styles to the text to get the effects I desire. Once I am satisfied, I can print the file. Then my spouse can have the pleasure of telling me what I did wrong. For her, that's the best part.
For this first part, there will be no graphic files to import. For those cases where I have graphics, I will still use the place command to import them. Then I can use the text wrap command, if I wish, to control how text flows around the graphic. This is very handy when the text and graphic must be closely linked.
Next time I will begin by discussing the center of the book.
As I said this is really the book proper.
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