[scribus] Using Scribus for novels and short stories

Sat Jan 15 16:38:07 CET 2011

On Thursday 13 January 2011 23:28:24 S B wrote:
> Sorry for the delay, Lorn.
> I don't know how Word XP handles that task (it's a version I don't
> have--I have word 2007); I THINK open office will kern those files.
> In any event, the latest version of OO is later than Word.
> Sorry I don't have all the information you need.
> Steve.
>
> On Sun, Jan 9, 2011 at 2:19 PM, LORN MACINTYRE <
>
> lorn.macintyre at btinternet.com> wrote:
> > Dear Steve,
> >
> > Again, thank you for your help. Will I be able to perform design
> > functions such
> > as kerning to  print quality in Word XP before transferring the
> > files into PDF
> > format? Or should I bring the files into OpenOffice and edit them
> > there?
> >
> > Regards,
> > Lorn
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > ________________________________
> > From: S B <sbinsandiego at gmail.com>
> > To: Scribus User Mailing List <scribus at lists.scribus.net>
> > Sent: Sunday, 9 January, 2011 21:04:18
> > Subject: Re: [scribus] Using Scribus for novels and short stories
> >
> > Lorn, I've not tried this with Word, but quite a bit depends on
> > what pdf creator you are using.  Are you using adobe acrobat?  If
> > so, that provides great control.  If not, it should be fairly
> > simple using one of the "cheap,"
> > or "Free" products.  Open Office will also convert to PDF in its
> > latest iteration, and Word '07 (and doubtless later) also saves
> > to PDF.  If you can, I'd leave it in Word, and convert from
> > there. If your novel doesn't include illustrations, it will
> > probably be easier to do. I think that if you
> > want to do this for free, you'll be happiest bringing it into
> > Open Office and then converting from there.  You may wish to
> > contact your printer and make sure that there are no differences
> > he can't handle.  As far as the crop
> > marks and embedded fonts, normally you can choose to embed the
> > fonts when you save or convert (whichever), and the crop
> > marks--I'm not sure; normally if I save and tell the program to
> > retain crop marks, I can then see them on the page, in gray. 
> > CMYK? "K" is black. Do you have anything BUT black?  If you have
> > illustrations, you have a choice between CMYK and RGB, normally.
> > You may want to search Microsoft's knowledge base, and your help
> > files, to be certain you're doing this correctly. I'm happy to
> > help in any other way I
> > can, but I'm not certain I know enough to provide accurate
> > information. Good luck.
> > Steve B.
> >
> > On Sun, Jan 9, 2011 at 3:16 AM, LORN MACINTYRE <
> >
> > lorn.macintyre at btinternet.com> wrote:
> > > Dear Steve,
> > >
> > > Thank you for this valuable advice. I have 20 chapters (240
> > > pages) of text formatted with running headline and page number
> > > footers, written in Word
> > > XP. So how may I turn these into PDF files which can be
> > > commercially printed,
> > > with the printer's instructions thus: "one single file set up
> > > in page
> >
> > order
> >
> > > (excluding the cover or jacket, saved as single page to view
> > > and not as double
> > > page spreads., with fonts embedded, with crop marks selected so
> > > we know where to
> > > trim your text once it is printed. Minimu 10mm clear white
> > > space on all sides.
> > > Ensure that you are using CMYK workflow."
> > >
> > > Regards,
> > > Lorn
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > ________________________________
> > > From: S B <sbinsandiego at gmail.com>
> > > To: Scribus User Mailing List <scribus at lists.scribus.net>
> > > Sent: Saturday, 8 January, 2011 23:11:04
> > > Subject: Re: [scribus] Using Scribus for novels and short
> > > stories
> > >
> > > Lorn, I have not used Scribus for this purpose, but I used it
> > > for
> >
> > preparing
> >
> > > lessons for a class in church some time ago. It works very very
> > > well for that.  This is a similar applications, because the
> > > lessons I taught were each fairly short, but the aggregate was
> > > fairly long.  I didn't use any sophisticated formatting, but I
> > > did use lots of illustrations and
> >
> > drawings.
> >
> > > It works well for that. I can't give you guidance as to the
> > > processes, because I actually WROTE the documents in Scribus
> > > rather than in a word-processor.  I guess I wonder why you
> > > would use Scribus as the formatter
> > > and not just use the word processing program.  I know that many
> > > novels
> >
> > have
> >
> > > been created in Word or Open Office (and other word
> > > processors), so it
> >
> > does
> >
> > > interest me. I have a couple nonfiction books I've been working
> > > on that I did in Word, and that worked out quite well, and it
> > > was easy to do. Steve Bradley
> > >
> > > On Wed, Jan 5, 2011 at 8:33 AM, LORN MACINTYRE <
> > >
> > > lorn.macintyre at btinternet.com> wrote:
> > > > I am endeavouring to use Scribus in order to edit a novel of
> > > > 20
> >
> > chapters,
> >
> > > > importing the files from Microsoft Word via OpenOffice in
> > > > order to
> > >
> > > preserve
> > >
> > > > the
> > > > formatting. There seems to be little information on the web
> > > > about this
> > >
> > > type
> > >
> > > > of
> > > > project, so it would be good to hear from subscribers who
> > > > have already
> > >
> > > done
> > >
> > > > this
> > > > for a novel or short story collection, so that I can profit
> > > > from their experience and perhaps eventually put together a
> > > > step-by-step process
> > >
> > > which
> > >
> > > > will
> > > > help other writers and save time and frustration with regard
> > > > to font choices,
> > > > kerning, etc.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > Thanks in anticipation,
> > > > Scottie
> > > > -------------- next part --------------
> > > > An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
> > > > URL: <

Manual kerning is something I never do with a novel text block. A good 
typeface will already have ligatures.  And the spacing of 
words/letters is best done automatically. When imported into a Scribus 
text frame Scribus will reset the text according to what you set up in 
Scribus.

The one exception is running headers, which I sometimes set in small 
caps with extra spacing between letters (not necessarily a full 
typewriter space.) In TeX I have special tools for that. It would not 
be hard to do in Scribus. But it would have to be set up in Scribus 
itself to do it properly.  My general rule is, do as little layout as 
possible in the word processor. The final typesetting engine, TeX, 
Scribus or InDesign, will do it better. 

Scribus does not have a handy facility for trim marks. TeX does. In my 
decade or more of typesetting novels and other books professionally 
(i.e. I charge money) I have only encountered two publishers that 
wanted camera ready hard copy. In one case years ago the publisher 
didn't know that their printer would rather work from a proper size 
pdf instead of camera ready copy.  I enlightened them.

In the other, they were so sure that their way was the only good way 
that I didn't argue with them. So I gave them camera ready copy on 
sheets of paper with no trim marks, showing 6 x 9 pages centered on 
8.5 x 11 sheets of paper, set in Times Roman, with the roman numerals 
in the frontmatter starting at number i five pages into the file (after 
the TOC etc.) and so on. I priced the job accordingly. I won't be 
doing business with them again. I don't have to work with ignoramuses. 

I would check to see if the publisher or printer you are using will 
accept just a proper size pdf. LSI will, Createspace will, Booklocker 
will and so on. 

For an example of text for a novel set by OO Writer, TeX and Scribus 
please download this paper:
http://wexfordpress.com/tex/compare.pdf

Word processors are used by many authors for typesetting books. But 
those of us who do it for a living use either InDesign or TeX. Such 
niceties as optical alignment and microtypography are not available in 
word processors. Scribus now has those, but many other features such 
as tables, footnotes, indexes etc. are either missing or difficult to 
achieve in Scribus. So it is still a work in progress. But it is great 
for book covers, newsletters, flyers and the like. I could do a novel 
in Scribus today. But TeX is faster for me. 

-- 
John Culleton
Create Book Covers with Scribus:
http://www.booklocker.com/p/books/4055.html
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