Book Design vs Typesetting

by Walt Shiel

Some people seem to lump the terms book design and typesetting into one task. Although that is frequently the way a printer-ready book is produced, with one person taking the finished manuscript through the entire process, the book design should really be a precursor to the actual typesetting.

I think most people who handle the entire process actually split the process into the two parts, even if they don’t think about it that when they’re doing it.

Book design requires an analysis of the manuscript, its tone, and its intended audience. And a review of many other factors, such as:

• Are there graphics and/or photos that must be placed within the text?

• Are there tables, bulleted or numbered lists?

• How long are the chapter titles (and how much variation is there among them)?

• How many levels of headings and subheadings are required (and how long are those headings and subheadings)?

• Are there footnotes, endnotes, or other embedded references?

• Should each chapter begin on a recto (right hand) page?

• Is the text dense (as in long paragraphs with little to break it up or provide sort of built-in white space)?

That’s far from an exhaustive list, but gives you an idea of the things that need to be considered before placing the text into the layout software.

The answers to the above allow a designer to decide on some appropriate options for the fonts that would work well, the sizes of the fonts, the leading (space between lines in a paragraph), the margins, how best to place the graphics and/or photos, the use of decorative doodads (such as on chapter opening pages or to mark section or scene breaks).

Also, this is the time to determine the optimum trim size for the book. The designer also has to decide standards for things like hyphenation settings and limits and the limits within which the software will be allowed to adjust word and character spacing.

Once those decisions are made, the designer can then define the styles to be used throughout the book — page, paragraph, character, table, and graphic styles, as required. There also will be specific styles defined for various types of paragraphs — e.g., a drop cap and a non-indented paragraph to start a new chapter. Those styles, combined with the overall document settings (margins, trim size, bleed, etc.) form the basis for the book’s template.

Once a template has been defined and set up in the layout software, the text can be flowed into the template. At this point, actual typesetting begins. The designer (or typesetter, if the tasks are separated) then applies the appropriate styles to the pages, paragraphs, characters, tables, etc.

But that’s not the end of the job.

The designer/typesetter must then go through the book to fine tune it, making sure that it looks good. Do the pages look balanced? Are there orphan or widow lines that need adjustment (software can do this but often results in changes to surrounding lines that are less then optimum)? Are there too-short last lines of paragraphs that can be adjusted? Are there any “rivers of white” in the text (good layout software rarely produces this)?

Some self-publishers cringe at the prices quoted for book design and typesetting. That’s usually because they don’t understand the amount of knowledge and craftsmanship that makes the difference between an acceptable book and a beautifully designed and typeset book.

Buying expensive layout software will give you the tools to do a great job but won’t give you the knowledge and skill to get the most out of that software.

Good book designers spend time studying — reading the books written by the acknowledged experts and sometimes reverse engineering (even if only mentally) outstanding examples of the craft.

Good book design is much art as it is technology and tools, perhaps much more