Skip to main content
hellopaul4
hellopaul4
Inspiring
March 13, 2018
Question

How to link a heading in one column with body text in another

  • March 13, 2018
  • 2 replies
  • 1358 views

Hello,

I have some headings and paragraphs that I'd like to keep together, like this:

I've tried using drop caps, indenting the text and "unindenting" the first line with the header on it, plus a few other unsuccessful workarounds. So I'm hoping someone might have the answer - as you can hopefully guess from the screengrab above, I'd like to have the headers right-aligned, to the left of each paragraph, but lined up properly with the first line. I know I could fudge it manually with a lot of leading/space before/after adjustments, but obviously that would all be useless if the body text was then edited. Is there a simpler way?

Thanks in advance for any suggestions!

~ Paul

UPDATE: I might have found a solution, here: Split Text frame in 2. Header on the Left, Paragraph on Right. (image inc)

...unless InDesign has introduced a better way to do it since last year?

This topic has been closed for replies.

2 replies

winterm
winterm
Legend
March 13, 2018

Assuming your body text is Left aligned, Myriad 10/12.

For body text: assign big enough Left Indent (let’s start with 30 mm).

For heading: assign Baseline Shift -12 mm.

Space between chapters can be adjusted by making Heading leading bigger / smaller. Say, setting it to 0 effectively eliminates any additional space.

hellopaul4
hellopaul4Author
Inspiring
March 13, 2018

I played with indenting the body text, un-indenting the header and moving it down with a baseline shift, but it would all go a bit wrong if the header went to two lines, so I'm sticking with the pasted/anchor method for now.

But thanks, everyone, for your quick and detailed replies!

Doug A Roberts
Community Expert
Doug A RobertsCommunity Expert
Community Expert
March 13, 2018

in Laubender's link, you can see the solution to that in one of Obi-Wan's later posts: create several character styles, each with an increasing baseline shift (i.e. style 1 has a shift of -18, style 2 -36, style 3 -54, depending on the leading you want to use). then use them sequentially as nested line styles in the heading para style.

L
Community Expert
LaubenderCommunity Expert
Community Expert
March 13, 2018

Hi Paul,

did you try anchored text frames for the headings?
Anchored to the first insertion point of the paragraph.

The header's background could be a paragraph shading of the paragraphs in the main text.

Regards,
Uwe

    hellopaul4
    hellopaul4Author
    Inspiring
    March 13, 2018

    Thanks Laubender​. I'd just found that method too; I tried to update my original question with the anchor explanation, but the forum won't let me. So here's what I did:

    That video was fairly useless, just showing someone applying a style and a load of magic happening, with no guidance on how to do the magic. So instead I discovered anchored objects: Cut the text box containing the header, paste it at the start of the paragraph, right-click this newly-pasted text box, choose Anchored Object > Options... and play around with those lovely settings. Job done.

    Terms & ConditionsAccessibility statement
    Using the community Terms of use Privacy Cookie preferences Do not sell or share my personal information ad choicesAdChoices