Tips For Typesetting Self Published Book

By: Shawn Nag  |  Posted In: Tips & Tricks  |  June 28, 2011

First time self publishers consider the design elements with care for their front cover only. They fail to realize the inner pages should be formated with as much precision to provide a joyful reading experience. Though the cover of the book may attract one and all, but readers will spend most time reading through the pages, so the formatting and typesetting of the pages is very important for any self publishing author. There are many reputed printers in the market who will do the formatting and typesetting for the pages if they are paid something extra. This is an easy way out for the self publishers, but if your printing service provider is not experienced enough in printing various types of promotional products as well as self published books, then you might have to spend sleepless nights wondering how your book will turn out to be! This is the reason many self publishers are looking to learn the skills of typesetting and formatting and design the books themselves. This not only saves some hard earned money but also allows the author to decide the exact output for the book. Thus below given are some of the tips that will help you as a self publisher to typeset and format your books:

 

  • Consistency: It is important to maintain a consistency in your book’s layout, this is the way the final print of the book will appear. To make the book look professional you should maintain consistency right from the front cover to the designing and layout of the pages. Always double check whether the headings and text of all the pages is same. Good designing and consistency will make the book easy for the eyes of the readers.
  • Layout: Some consideration should go into the insertion of margins and the page size in your book. These attributes have to be changed depending the layout you want for your book. When you are sending these files to the printing agency make sure they conform to the specifications of the printers, this is especially important if your book contains a lot of images. All the files have to be converted to PDF format before sending to the printer. Word documents and similar types of files can be converted to PDF using Acrobat.com, Open Office or various other paid or free PDF creating software.
  • Text: Most important attribute of the text and font size is clarity and comfort to the eyes. There are various decorative fonts that look attractive but they may pose problems when read for long hours. This is the reason traditional sans-serif fonts are popular among the publishers as they are easy to read in print or on screen for many hours. In this respect the choice of fonts for the book should be made to conform with the rest of the design elements in the book.

Make sure you have checked for these essential features before visiting the doors of the printing service provider. Taking up the services of renowned printing agency such as PrintPapa will help you immensely in getting the best output for the self published book. They not only specialize in book printing but also offer various other printing services such as printing of brochures, posters, banners, calendars, business cards, etc.