Formatting question

[Rose]

I'm trying to set up text for a book in Word, to be dumped later into
PageMaker. Because there's little text on each page, I'd like to liven
things up by using an interesting typeface initial capital letter on
each bit of text. However, when I've played around with this, the
initial capital is too far away from the next letter in the text, which
affects readability. Is there some way to get the second and subsequent
letters closer to the intial capital and to ensure that the second and
subsequent lines aren't oddly spaced?

I hope this is the right newsgroup for such a question and, if not,
someone will kindly point me to the correct one. Thanks in advance!

 

[anon k]

I'm trying to set up text for a book in Word, to be dumped later into
PageMaker. Because there's little text on each page, I'd like to liven
things up by using an interesting typeface initial capital letter on
each bit of text. However, when I've played around with this, the
initial capital is too far away from the next letter in the text, which
affects readability. Is there some way to get the second and subsequent
letters closer to the intial capital and to ensure that the second and
subsequent lines aren't oddly spaced?

I hope this is the right newsgroup for such a question and, if not,
someone will kindly point me to the correct one. Thanks in advance!

If you're dumping it into PageMaker later, why not save the layout until
then? All of the text will be re-flowed, re-spaced, re-aligned and so
on anyway, so your hard work in Word may be largely lost.

PageMaker will allow you to adjust the line positioning to fit letters
like L and A which become very detached in Word.

Another way to smooth over the gap, and this follows centuries of
typographic precedent, is to surround the dropped initial with a border,
or use a typeface that's been designed specifically for use as dropped
initials. They're often called 'ornamented initials' but there are many
that are not very ornamented at all.

 

[Rose]

If you're dumping it into PageMaker later, why not save the layout until
then? All of the text will be re-flowed, re-spaced, re-aligned and so
on anyway, so your hard work in Word may be largely lost.

PageMaker will allow you to adjust the line positioning to fit letters
like L and A which become very detached in Word.

Another way to smooth over the gap, and this follows centuries of
typographic precedent, is to surround the dropped initial with a border,
or use a typeface that's been designed specifically for use as dropped
initials. They're often called 'ornamented initials' but there are many
that are not very ornamented at all.

Thank you, Anon! I wasn't sure of the capabilities of PageMaker, never
having actually used it...

 

[anon k]

Thank you, Anon! I wasn't sure of the capabilities of PageMaker, never
having actually used it...

In that case, it might be worth saying that the key to a happy PageMaker
life is to do only your wordprocessing in a wordprocessor, only your
graphics in the graphics programs, and only your layout in the DTP
program. Mixing and matching is a sure way to get the programs to mess
up the document. Many of us learn this the hard way