On Oct 11, 2004, at 1:13 PM, Aaron Sherber wrote:
At 12:39 PM 10/11/2004, Christopher Smith wrote: >I should mention that I immediately went in and edited some things to >make it more to my taste (like changing the text to 2nd, 3rd, 4th, >etc., as counting by spaces is less intuitive for me; and turning >"Avoid Staff Lines" off in the placement, as the top horizontal bar >kept being masked by a staff line;
This is all somewhat a matter of taste. I agree that counting by spaces is less intuitive, but I think it makes more sense in this case, for exactly some of the reasons you mention. For example, if you had a double stop E4 and G4 on the treble clef, the correct bracket to use is actually the 2 space bracket, which you probably have labeled as a 5th. This will let the bracket extend from just below the E to just above the G. The "avoid staff lines" checkbox makes sure that the bottom of the expression doesn't collide with a staff line, and picking the right height makes sure that the top doesn't.
Note that this changes somewhat depending on what the notes are. If your third is C4 and E4, you should use the 1.5 space bracket, which will go from directly next to the C to just above the E. And if your third is F4 and A4, you actually do want the 1 space bracket (which you've probably got as a 3rd).
To me it makes more sense to think of these in terms of spaces (distances) rather than intervals -- I wouldn't think to apply a bracket of a 4th or 5th to an interval of a 3rd -- but as I say, whatever works for you. Glad you find this useful as a starting point.
Aaron.
Thanks for the explanation. I went back and tried it with "Avoid staff Lines" back on, and sure enough, all worked out exactly as you described it. I WAS using too-short brackets in certain situations, and your method works out perfectly. As is often the case, I learn more about engraving and improve my eye from this list!
I STILL can think more easily in terms of intervals, though, so I left the text identifiers as I had edited them. I did find out, though, why you had so carefully kept the text to the RIGHT of the left-most limit of the bracket; it's because hidden text is taken into account for spacing purposes! I discovered this the hard way.
Change of subject:
On another topic, for those here who use the JazzFont, I discovered a better way to notate a jazz turn (like a classical turn, but in manuscript shape) than the glyph that is included. I tried hand-crafting one in the Shape Designer, and it looked terrible. Then I found a nice one in the Apple Chancery font - the tilde character (~), at 28 points and bold, matches the JazzFont nicely. Some tildes in other fonts are too flat; this one is nice and curvy without the exaggerated curve in the classical turn. While I was at it, I reduced the point sizes for some of the diagonal lines in the articulation library of the JazzFont, which made them shorter AND not quite so clunky. I am really enjoying the enhancements to the default file included with recent versions of Finale; it is MUCH more usable than before.
Christopher
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