Do paragraph styles go in documents or templates?

[Guest]

If paragraph styles don't belong in templates, what kinds of things do belong in templates so you're set up for success when you create a new document? 

Thanks! 

[Barb Binder · Accepted solution]

A template should include assets that you can build on to complete your project. This includes but is not limited to:

• defining the paper size, margins, bleed and trim
• defining styles (paragraphs character, object, table and cell )
• defining master pages/parent pages
• adding placeholder frames, if using
• adding variable definitions, if using
• adding condition tags, if using

Basically everything you need to create the document so that you can just drop in and style the content.

~Barb

[Guest]

Thank you!

[Dave Creamer of IDEAS]

Just out of curiosity, who told you that paragraph styles do not belong in templates?

[Guest]

I guess I'm not sure where and when to add paragraph styles in the design process. I'm still learning about paragraph styles, and they really confuse me. I've been through a few InDesign documents where the paragraph styles have been set up, and I don't understand them. For example, some headers throughout the document that are the exact same use different styles, and it doesn't make sense to me. To me it seems you need to click every paragraph in the document individually and assign it a style, and that just doesn't seem efficient...

Still learning! 

[Bevi Chagnon - PubCom.com]

To me it seems you need to click every paragraph in the document individually and assign it a style, and that just doesn't seem efficient...

By @Deleted User

That is exactly what designers should do!

And that makes the workflow incredibly efficient, not inefficient.

Have you taken classes from a good instructor, someone knowledgeable about design and the publishing workflow?

[Guest]

I guess that makes sense. I just see it as a very time-consuming process. Definitely have some learning to do! 

[Scott Falkner]

Formating all of the text in a long document can be a time consuming process. All of the text needs to be formatted. With paragraph styles the text can be formatted with a click. Global changes to all text with that style can be done with a few clicks and you can be confident the changes will affect all text that has the style applied. WIthout paragraph styles formatting text will be a long, repetitive, frustrating process with many opportunities for error. (Did you remember to change the leading for all the body copy paragraphs but not the subheads? Are you sure? Are you sure you’re sure?). When you apply a paragraph style all the formatting is applied in one click.

One thing to look out for is some documents may have been handled by many people, dozens or more. Not all of them are equally competent or disciplined. Many may have never met the person who meticulously set up the original template the document is based on. This can add layers or formatting, duplication of styles, or inconsistencies.

Consider a monthly newsletter. Person A might have taken a long time to create a perfect template. They then used the template to make the January 2014 issue. They used the template to make the February 2014 issue. For one reason or another Person B decided to use the February 2014 issue to make the March 2014 issue (this is far more common that starting from a template). But the copy was longer than expected so they changed the leading of the body copy. Person B is not as experienced as person A, or Person B was rushed, so they made the change locally instead of editing the paragraph style. Person C used the modified March 2014 issue to make the April 2014 issue. Lather, rinse, reapeat and it is seven years later and the December 2021 issue looks dramatically different from the template Person A worked long and hard to get right. Person A hasn’t worked here in years and only one person remembers them. Person W is now responsible for the newsletter and they have the benefit of a weekend night course to get up to speed in InDesign.

That scenario is painfully familiar to dozens of people in this forum. This is why you sometimes see documents with either no styles applied or dozens of nearly identical styles.

[Guest]

Awesome, thank you!

[Dave Creamer of IDEAS]

Styles of (practically) any kind give two benefits:

• Consistency of formatting, and
• Global updates.

The importance of these two benefits cannot be overstated.

Often multiple styles have the same appearance. The usual reason is in case changes are made to once style but not the other. If you only used one style, you would have to go through and manually edit the change one at a time. Of course, it is always possible that a document that has been through many hands has unnecessary duplicate styles due to ignorance (lack of knowledge). 

A good template should use a logical naming system for the styles. If the style naming is not thought out and is haphazard, it can create lots of confusion for the next person. 

When starting to flow your text, start off by selecting all and applying your main body style, then go through and apply your other styles, such as headings and bullet lists. The initial formatting has to be done paragraph by paragraph regardless whether your use styles or not--the payoff comes from not missing any settings (consistancy) and when you need to make changes (global updates).

Another thing that is very important is to make use of based-on styles. If all your body-related styles (bullet lists, numbered lists, etc.) are based on your main body style; and your heading styles are based on of the next leve up, that is Heading 2 is based off of Heading 1, Heading 3 is based off of Heading 2, etc. That way, you only have to make major edits to the parent style and the edits will ripple down to the based-on children. 

Edit: It took me a while to type this so I did not see Barb Binder's excellent (as always) post that basically states the same info.

[Guest]

Cool. Thanks so much for this! 

[Guest]

I have a follow-up question: When is it a good idea to override paragraph styles? (when it's the same font but different size, for example?) Also, is overriding paragraph styles a good idea so you don't have too many styles? Or is it better to avoid overriding paragraph styles altogether? 

Thanks!

[Scott Falkner]

Almost never.

For example, consider the newsletter example I gave earlier. That document might have styles for:

• Headlines
• Subheads
• Intro paragraphs
• Bylines
• Body copy
• Bullets
• Numbered lists
• First body copy paragraph (perhaps with no indent or a drop cap)
• Pull quotes
• Headers
• Footers
• Captions
• Sidebar heads
• Sidebar copy

If a particular issue has an article that is too long to fit using Body copy I would add a style for Body Copy (tight) or Body copy (-Pb) to indicate the change made. If this happens enough I will probably add it to the template. I might instead make a global change to the body copy style. What I won't do is apply local formatting (i.e. override the paragraph style). I would rather have lots of styles than wonder where I have local formatting applied.

I said, “Almost Never,” because in this example there is one place I would probably apply local formatting: headlines. The headline style would be a quick way to apply the basic font, weight, colour, tracking, size, and spacing I want each headline. But I usaully want the headlines to be rectangular, so I will often bump the size up or down to get the size I want. In this case I am aiming for a cinsistnet colour to the headline, not a consistent point size.

Other places where I would apply formatting outside a paragaph style are character level formatting, like italics, bold, or formatting hyperlinks differently. This is where I apply a Character Style rather than formatting using the Character panel. This is for consistency, and to make global changes easier.

It is not uncommong for me to have dozens of styles in a long document. An annual report I am working on has for different body copy styles, not counting variations (like last paragraph, first paragraph, or bulets). That's just to account for different H&J options.

[Dave Creamer of IDEAS]

I agree with Scott, for pretty much the same reason. Generally, I would say no overrides, but it depends on the type of document.

For well-structured documents, I avoid overrides--usually by making additional based-on styles. However, let's say you have a newsletter that changes the size of the article headings to fit the space available. It wouldn't make sense to make dozens of different heading styles, each varying by a few points of size. In that situation, I would make one main heading style and use overrides for the other sizes. 

[Danielle McLelland]

Consider the reason for the override: is it a change in one instance, in one document out of many, or momentary like when you're highlighting or flagging something for FPO? 

In one instance of a long document, you may decide to adjust the overall letter spacing of a heading, possibly knock the type size down a point. Maybe you can't reword it and it must fit a certain space. That's a great case for a local override. But maybe you notice that happens on a few pages, and you'd like to have a fallback in other cases. That's when it's great to create a character style. PS: this ONLY works if your paragraph style has leading set to auto (number remains in parentheses) and you use line spacing to set the line height.

Now, maybe you're already using a character style for a local color on that spread. Since you can have one paragraph and character style applied, you'll have to choose: decide which appearance is more likely to cause problems as you continue your design, and do your best to use styles to control that, and using local formatting for the rest. Or you could create YET ANOTHER style...

If your file has a decent likelihood of being repurposed, just be organized, consistent, and conscientious with whatever approach you take. Sometimes I'll make a character or paragraph style to apply formatting, but then I'll delete the styles before archiving the file. You can choose "Apply local formatting" when you delete the style, and the appearance stays, but you don't bloat the next file or end up with legacy styles that trickle into other documents when stuff is copied and pasted or imported. 

I've been enjoying your questions and the responses! I'll add this: You know your operating environment and the lifecycle of this project better than us. There's no right or wrong way go about formatting; there's just tedium + error or efficiency + consistency. Your quest to understand this stuff makes you a valuable designer already!

[James Gifford—NitroPress]

Is there ANY difference between a document and a template, except that the latter is saved under a different extension and forces a copy when opened? Some apps draw greater distinctions, but AFAIK, you could have a full dictionary as an ID template and open it to create a document with one word changed.

[Dave Creamer of IDEAS]

You are correct--most applications that use templates just have a different file extension causing them to open as an untitled document. Usually, you can simply change the extension at the desktop.

[Barb Binder]

Hi Rachel:

I start adding paragraph styles as soon as I add text to an InDesign document. When introducing paragraph styles to my students, I tell them that they are a collection of formatting attributes that are saved under a short, clear name. For example, my Title style might set my titles to Myriad Pro Bold, 30/32, Align center, Space after 15 pts. 

Paragraph styles offer three distinct benefits:

1.) One click application of multiple attributes to a single paragraph (like my Title example above),

2.) Uniformity (all my Titles use the exact same definition so they will look exactly the same), and most importantly

3.) You can edit the style definition and it will be InDesign's job (and not ours) to locate and update all occurences of that style. 

I do understand this statement: "To me it seems you need to click every paragraph in the document individually and assign it a style, and that just doesn't seem efficient...", and yes you will need to assign styles to each paragraph. But it is much easier to click once to assign a style with multiple attributes to a paragraph than to assign multiple individual attributes to the same paragraph manually.

Good luck with your learning, and come back when you have more questions for us.

~Barb

[Guest]

Hi Barb,

Thank you for breaking this down; I appreciate it! 

[James Gifford—NitroPress]

I can't add a lot to the excellent responses so far, except to say what I say to a lot of students and clients who come from things like Word, where styles are a nice but often ignored feature.

Styles in a professional tool like InDesign aren't a gloss or an add-on; it's not like building a house and then painting it. Mastery of styles and learning to use them consistently is more like choosing the exactly right pieces to build something; when you're done, it's both built AND painted all in one operation. More formally, styles are not a purely visual touch, but a whole system of document construction, management and formatting. You will find it VERY worthwhile to take some online courses and the like to learn and master them.

[Barb Binder]

What kind of document are you working on Rachel? As per my list of the benefits of using styles, number 2 is uniformity across the document. A subhead on page 2 will be formatted the same way as the subhead on page 222, without you having to remember the settings. You will lose that if you override the styles. In some documents—books, annual reports and catalogs that uniformity is standard. In shorter files like newsletters, mixing it up and fitting content to the page is more the norm.

~Barb

[Guest]

Ok, that makes sense. Thanks! Essentially I'm trying to make a template for a document that already exists. My hope is that it's easier for the next person who deals with it. It's a pretty long document. 

[Dave Creamer of IDEAS]

I've attached a PowerPoint that I did to cover the features you might run into with long documents.

[Guest]

This is awesome, thanks for this! I think I haven't been seeing the logic of how to set paragraph styles up, but this helped. I've created a few styles in my document, and I think it might be too many so far - I'm wondering if you can base a style on a parent if its the same font, but italiczed or bolded.  

[Dave Creamer of IDEAS]

>> I'm wondering if you can base a style on a parent if its the same font, but italicized or bolded.  

Yes, indeed--as long as the entire paragraph is being italicized or bolded. If you only want certain letters or words affected, use a Character style.

• If the entire paragraph is affected, use a Paragraph style.
• If only part of the paragraph is affected, use a Character style. 

When you turn on the style's preview option, there is really no major advantage to formatting the text manually. In fact, with paragraph styles, a big advantage is not have to have the text selected (just have your cursor in the paragraph).