Today, I was formatting an e-book for a client and trying not to tear my hair out over her sweet-natured ignorance of Word’s style features that sent the whole project into an e-meltdown. (This is a whole other subject for another thread: Authors Who Abuse Microsoft Word; conversely, there could be an even more interesting thread about how MS Word abuses authors!)
So, when this e-project came to a grinding halt (I have a phone date scheduled with client to discuss solutions for formatting issues), I switched gears and began doing page layout for my latest print book. And I was reminded, yet again, what a time-consuming, futzy process it is, and how confusing it must be for newcomers.
I’ve been doing print-book layout professionally for 30+ years, for Big-6 pubs and a few smaller ones, as well as my own, both fiction and trade non-fiction. I’d like to say I can do it with my eyes closed, but that would be stretching credulity … just a bit.
Print book production is not ‘push-button’ technology. Never mind what the tub-thumpers tell you, it is a craft and it takes time to learn, much like plumbing, dressage (I’m a horsewoman), and being a journeyman electrician. I would not want to trust my home’s electrical system to a noob who’d ginned up for a couple of weeks via a Dummies’ book and a LEGO circuitry board. And, OK, to forestall those who’ll jump in and say having a wonky print book is not in the same league as having faulty wiring, I will agree. I’m just making an analogy here about professionals who learn their craft and charge others accordingly for their expertise.
So then I got to thinking about authors who use templates from CreateSpace (or try to make their own) and how bewildering the whole process must appear. I see endless questions in forums from confused authors who’re trying to cope with industry buzz words such as font and leading, recto and verso, headers and page numbers, gutters, margins, and bleed, along with the mysteries of pages that (in some CS layouts) appear to flip from left to right without warning. The list goes on, but I’ll stop here.
This is not the language of normal people. For most of us, it’s like trying to learn brain surgery by watching SCRUBS. If I were in these authors’ shoes, I’d be racing for help … to the nearest book designer/typesetter.
This stuff is complicated, never mind the blogs and websites that tell you can be a typesetter in just a few hours and that recommend you buy InDesign or Quark (which are heavy-duty software programs for page layout purposes), or another piece of software (often of dubious quality) that’s not quite up to the task.
Typesetting is a craft that’s learned slowly and carefully over many years, preferably from a mentor who knows how to do it. Mine was an old-time hot-lead typesetter who schooled me in the relatively (back then) new technology of ‘cold type’ that I learned thoroughly and then transferred (in the mid-1980s) to the brand-spanking new Mac/laser printer/PageMaker technology that what was then called Desktop Publishing, never mind it was (to us ‘old time’ typesetters) a bit of a misnomer, given we were typesetters, not publishers.
Sorry folks, but it takes years of hard work to get it right. A typesetter’s experienced eye is trained to spot all sorts of things most people don’t … loose lines, ladders, too tight/too loose kerning and/or letterspacing, widows and orphans, inappropriate font/leading, unbalanced spreads, too short/too long a line length, too tight/too loose leading, and a whole other list of typographical sins that will affect a reader’s experience.
So, when this e-project came to a grinding halt (I have a phone date scheduled with client to discuss solutions for formatting issues), I switched gears and began doing page layout for my latest print book. And I was reminded, yet again, what a time-consuming, futzy process it is, and how confusing it must be for newcomers.
I’ve been doing print-book layout professionally for 30+ years, for Big-6 pubs and a few smaller ones, as well as my own, both fiction and trade non-fiction. I’d like to say I can do it with my eyes closed, but that would be stretching credulity … just a bit.
Print book production is not ‘push-button’ technology. Never mind what the tub-thumpers tell you, it is a craft and it takes time to learn, much like plumbing, dressage (I’m a horsewoman), and being a journeyman electrician. I would not want to trust my home’s electrical system to a noob who’d ginned up for a couple of weeks via a Dummies’ book and a LEGO circuitry board. And, OK, to forestall those who’ll jump in and say having a wonky print book is not in the same league as having faulty wiring, I will agree. I’m just making an analogy here about professionals who learn their craft and charge others accordingly for their expertise.
So then I got to thinking about authors who use templates from CreateSpace (or try to make their own) and how bewildering the whole process must appear. I see endless questions in forums from confused authors who’re trying to cope with industry buzz words such as font and leading, recto and verso, headers and page numbers, gutters, margins, and bleed, along with the mysteries of pages that (in some CS layouts) appear to flip from left to right without warning. The list goes on, but I’ll stop here.
This is not the language of normal people. For most of us, it’s like trying to learn brain surgery by watching SCRUBS. If I were in these authors’ shoes, I’d be racing for help … to the nearest book designer/typesetter.
This stuff is complicated, never mind the blogs and websites that tell you can be a typesetter in just a few hours and that recommend you buy InDesign or Quark (which are heavy-duty software programs for page layout purposes), or another piece of software (often of dubious quality) that’s not quite up to the task.
Typesetting is a craft that’s learned slowly and carefully over many years, preferably from a mentor who knows how to do it. Mine was an old-time hot-lead typesetter who schooled me in the relatively (back then) new technology of ‘cold type’ that I learned thoroughly and then transferred (in the mid-1980s) to the brand-spanking new Mac/laser printer/PageMaker technology that what was then called Desktop Publishing, never mind it was (to us ‘old time’ typesetters) a bit of a misnomer, given we were typesetters, not publishers.
Sorry folks, but it takes years of hard work to get it right. A typesetter’s experienced eye is trained to spot all sorts of things most people don’t … loose lines, ladders, too tight/too loose kerning and/or letterspacing, widows and orphans, inappropriate font/leading, unbalanced spreads, too short/too long a line length, too tight/too loose leading, and a whole other list of typographical sins that will affect a reader’s experience.
