On Saturday 25 July 2009 03:24:03 pm jwminer at accessvt.com wrote: > Greg wrote: > > I think that such information is useful for conceptual and > > instructional > > purposes, but for many uses not so practical except for > > purists. It's > > easy to see that hardly any if any modern books use the > > Gutenberg proportions. What we see is that there are different > > plans depending on > > the content and purpose of the book. > > > > This isn't to say that there are not abundant examples of poor > > design > > and layout all around us. My advice would be to continue your > > quest for > > the opinions of others recognized as having something useful to > > say, but > > in the end pay attention to the layout of various publications > > you see, > > and when you find something displeasing, unattractive, or which > > contradicts its apparent intended purpose, try to understand > > why, so you > > can avoid making similar mistakes. > > The "content and purpose of the book" exist within constraints, > particularly financial. Ideal proportions of white space mean > more pages, and more pages mean more costs all down the line: > paper, printing, binding, shipping, stocking. So modern books > typically skimp on the white space and if it looks fine to us, > we've become inured to it. But do we want to pay even more for > books in order to have a beautifully designed page? There's no > free lunch. > > There are a few principles I keep in mind when setting up a book > page. The inner margins should be smaller than the outer margins. > When we hold an open book, it presents itself as a unit and a > double-wide inner margin looks odd. The bottom margin should be > larger than the top margin. A bottom margin that's smaller than > the top margin makes the text block look like it's going to slide > off the bottom of the page. Make the bottom margin large enough > so readers' thumbs don't cover the text when they are holding the > open book. Outer margins large enough to hold some reader's > annotations are desirable. > > The right type size for the length of the lines is important. One > and one-half alphabets per line (39 to 45 characters) is a common > suggestion, though you can't always adhere to it.
Bringhurst would accept as little as 45 characters for double column newsprint but would prefer 65 for normal book work. -- John Culleton Create Book Covers with Scribus/e-book $5.95 http://www.booklocker.com/books/4055.html
