Using Watermark feature for designing letterhead

[oregondesigner]

My intention is to create a letterhead <.dot> that looks like printed
letterhead. I read through the instructions for the watermark but there
is a missing component here in my MS Word 2004 application. When I
bring up the Background menu there is no "Washout" section to click or
unclick. Anyone have a better idea to create the letterhead? Thanks.

 

[Daiya Mitchell]

You don't use the Background menu. Did you try to use Format | Background?
Totally irrelevant here. You want Insert | Watermark, and the dialog should
be relatively self-explanatory from there, or experimentation won't hurt
anything.

(If you can't find Insert | Watermark, look under View and if 5.1 Menus is
checked, uncheck it)

If that doesn't work, please clarify-- exactly what instructions did you
read, exactly what did you do, what did you expect to happen, and what
happened instead?

 

[mmmmark]

Of course the graphic could also just be inserted into the header/footer
which accomplishes the same thing. In fact, that is the only way to do it
in the Windows version of Word.

-Mark

 

[Daiya Mitchell]

I was going to say that, but since that's what the Watermark feature does
behind the scenes, and he/she already read those instructions, I decided not
to.

Although--if you create a first page header after putting something in the
header, what happens? I have this vague idea that using the Watermark
feature might actually make Word take care of replicating it (because people
complain about not being able to delete it).

Surely WinWord has the Watermark feature? What do you mean by that? I
didn't think MacWord got it until after WinWord.

Daiya

 

[mmmmark]

<snip>
Surely WinWord has the Watermark feature? What do you mean by that? I
didn't think MacWord got it until after WinWord.

Daiya

<snip>

<removing egg from face>

You're absolutely right, Daiya. They slipped that in version 2003 of
winword, and they only recently upgraded us to that here at work. In fact,
in version 2000/2002(XP) they don't even have a Insert\Background menu.

It's a give and take. Sometimes features happen first in the Mac version
and other times in the Windows version.

-Mark

 

[CyberTaz]

Hello Daiya -

If you use Insert>Watermark the image will be centered automatically, but it
is also included on every new page generated, regardless of natural, manual,
or next page section break causes. This is also appears to be true for *any*
type of section break.

However, it is actually a copy of the watermark in each section header, so
any can be deleted at will without affecting those in other types of
sections (delete from Odd without deleting from Even). The deletion after
the first page in a new doc doesn't seem to be a problem as long as the user
sets the Different First Page option. I think *that* is where most people
have the problem.

Regards |:>)

 

[Daiya Mitchell]

Thanks, CyberTaz.

So it sounds like that makes an advantage to using the Watermark feature
over manually putting a letterhead graphic in the header, especially for the
couple of people who have posted who are designing templates for others, and
don't know what the section break situation will be?

E.g., they design a letterhead, but then the user wants First Page Header
for some reason, and I think that would leave the first page sans graphic
and the user helpless, no? Using Watermark to place the graphic would fix
that situation (I had a solution, but it wasn't very efficient).

Daiya

 

[oregondesigner]

Thank you, Daiya, and everyone else who responded to my question. I am
still not quite satisfied with the way to set up my clients' Word
templates for their letterhead 1st page (and possibly 2nd page which
doesn't include the address info.) To give you more information, here
is what I am trying to accomplish:

I have designed letterhead and a 2nd sheet for print. The client
oftentimes needs to create something in Word and send electronically,
create a PDF and send to their prospects. So I design the Word template
for them to do so. Note that the 2nd sheet includes the logo and tag
line, with no contact info. To accomplish this in Word, I embed a TIFF
image on the entire left side of page 1. The client can add as many
subsequent pages as necessary for their document.

I am not certain about the best method to accomplish this. Yesterday I
was experimenting with locking down the embedded TIFF (anchor) by
Insert | Picture on the page. I then Insert | Text Box on the right
two-thirds of the page and anchored that down too. The client will type
only in that text box.

BUT--I really like the idea of the watermark because it appears so much
cleaner--only it is washed out--even when I unchecked the box. ??? It
prints fine, but my clients will not want to see a washed out template.
They will want to see it at 100%. Is there a remedy for that? Also, can
you have two watermarks in one document? CyberTaz pointed out something
about the using the Different First Page option. But when I tried that
(after Insert | Watermark) it still appears on every page after that.

Regards,
-cc