Desiging in Word

A

Aaron

Hi

I've been given the daunting task of designing in Word.
Being a graphic designer, I'm not used to this!

I have two questions:
1) What is the best way to go about designing in Word?
Tables? No tables? (I'm using both text and images).

and

2) These "designs" will be saved as templates. How do I go
about locking images/graphics down so that people can add
text as necessary, but the images won't reposition?

Appreciate the assistance.
 
S

Suzanne S. Barnhill

It depends a lot on what you're designing--whether these are forms, which
can be protected, or letter templates that people will need to use with all
features enabled, and so on. The main consideration is that by and large
users don't *intend* to mess up your design, so you don't really need to
protect templates from intentional tampering, just from inadvertent messes.
The easiest way to do this is to anchor static graphic elements to the
header or footer and set up the headers and footers in such a way that users
won't need to access them very often.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
Word MVP FAQ site: http://www.mvps.org/word
Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
all may benefit.
 
J

Jezebel

Aaron said:
Hi

I've been given the daunting task of designing in Word.
Being a graphic designer, I'm not used to this!

I have two questions:
1) What is the best way to go about designing in Word?
Tables? No tables? (I'm using both text and images).
Click to expand...

Experiment with tables, textboxes, and frames: these are the three basic
methods for position in Word. They each have their uses and drawbacks.

Create some graphics (textboxes, inserted pictures, and anything from the
Draw toolbar). Right-click, select properties, and make sure you understand
all the options on the Layout and Advanced Layout tabs. Read help on the
'Anchor' concept: this is the key to object positioning, and controlling
whether or not the object moves as text is added.

Work with all the non-printing information displayed.

Prepare your pictures before importing them into Word: set the size,
resolution, etc using a graphics program like Photoshop or Corel), and save
in an appropriate format. Always keep separate copies of component graphic
files.
and

2) These "designs" will be saved as templates. How do I go
about locking images/graphics down so that people can add
text as necessary, but the images won't reposition?
Click to expand...

These are properties of the object, see above, especially in relation to
anchors. You can only discourage your users from screwing up the document.
You can't prevent them.
 
A

Aaron

Hi Suzanne,

Thanks for the reply. This is a newsletter template
that I am designing. I will lay out text and images,
but parts need to be customizable, where the company
can insert some of their own text.

Thanks.
 
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