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Question

Keep font style formating (bold, italics) while setting paragraph style options

Forum|Forum|1 year ago
September 21, 2024
3 replies
1463 views

Hi!

So what I'm trying to do is import text from Word (which has regular, bolded, and italic font styles) into InDesign without removing its formatting.

I can do that first step just fine, the problem is, there are other elements of the all the text I would like to edit (size, indents, leading, tracking) which would be easiest to do by just having a preset paragraph style, however, you cannot set a paragraph style without also setting a font style which overrides the original formatting from word (converts all text to light, medium, bold, etc).

Has anyone ran into a similar problem?

I really don't want to manually set all the paragraph formatting everytime when there's just one thing I don't want to edit.

How to

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Robert at ID-Tasker

Legend

@Vibrant_being0298

If you've access to WORD you can use those macros to convert local formatting to CharStyles:

https://id-tasker.com/uploads/WordStyle.zip

[...] you cannot set a paragraph style without also setting a font style which overrides the original formatting from word (converts all text to light, medium, bold, etc).

By @Vibrant_being0298

There is kind of a workaround - you need to create SET of styles and base them on a "master" style - then duplicate whole set as a Group / Folder - and change font in the "master" style of the set. Because it's a new group - all styles based on this "master" will automatically get new font.

James Gifford—NitroPress

Legend

Don't use Word's spot formatting feature. It's for reports and memos.

Define actual character styles for each, and apply Bold instead of hitting Ctrl-B, etc. Those styles will import to InDesign, can be mapped to existing styles if you have them, and can be adjusted globally (if, for example, a font's semibold makes a better "bold" than its bold).

But as RT already pointed out: Word not only allows a lot of very sloppy kwik-format options, but tends to emphasize them over using styles properly. InDesign is 100% style-based and style-driven, and you can't get away with spot formatting for anything except, well, reports and memos. 🙂

V

Vibrant_being0298Author

Participant

Thank you, but the issue is that I don't want to edit each piece of differently formatted text individually, whether that's in indesign of word. I'd simply like to import paragraphs of text from word to indesign, and then have all the text conform to a paragraph style with the exception of the font style.

James Gifford—NitroPress

Legend

Well, that's a nice goal, but it may not be realistic. For one thing, import of a whole Word doc is one process, with some advanced features, while cut and paste of paragraphs from a Word doc to an ID doc is... less manageable.

If the Word formatting is impeccably done, you might be able to use simple style-to-style mapping—

Create an InDesign style with the EXACT same name as the Word style.
In the ID document, make sure you have an empty paragraph with the (ID) style applied.
Copy the paragraph from Word.
Paste the paragraph into the waiting empty para in ID.

Now, in theory, the style mapping will magically convert the paragraph's format to whatever you've defined in InDesign. That part is fairly easy if you are selecting clean, cleanly-formatted text; experiment with simple stuff to see. (Text without any applied overrides like bold or italic, etc.)

Whether or not the paste properly respects Word bolding, italics etc. is a bit more hit-or miss; if it does, the formatting will be unmanaged, spot-applied formatting as it is in Word. You will have no control over it except to select it and reformat it in some manner. More likely, though, ID will import the text and retain any Word characteristics as spot, override formatting — your ID style is under there, but under a spot override to retain the font, size, etc. That will then have to be cleared manually.

There simply is no easy, magic-wand, automatic way to ensure Word formatting pastes into ID without taking the more involved route above of "regularizing" the Word formatting at one end or another. You might as well expect to toss a completed jigsaw puzzle to someone and have it arrive in fully assembled form.

The problem is not as much Word as the very loose, sloppy practices Word promotes for Word users. Those bite when you need to move them into a more rigidly organized tool such as ID.

Robert at ID-Tasker

Legend

Paragraph Styles require everything to be set in the style's definition - that's why you can / should use Character Style to "override" some parts of formatting - instead of a local override.

You are not limited in the number of both Styles.

When importing text from Word - you have two options:

1) define styles in advance - use the same names of the Styles as they are in Word document - create a template - so when you import Word document - InDesign's formatting will be used - instead of formatting defined in Word,

2) edit Styles in InDesign after importing text from Word.

Overall - InDesign isn't Word - InDesign won't interfere with formatting and won't "automatically" create 10s/100s of new Styles.

In InDesign - you have to define everything yourself.

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