Best Way to Make Chapter Start at Right Place

[Dungarven]

Hi, I would be grateful for help with finding the most efficient way to format an opening page for a memoir. I have created paragraph styles for the CHAPTER Headings, adding space before and after to place them where I want them. I have made them start on the next page, and created another style based on that for the ones that need to start on the next odd page. So far so good.

Then I created another style for the Quotation that follows in italics a certain distance below the Chapter heading. I am treating the Author's name as a Character style below that again. Maybe there is a better way to do that.

Anyway, then comes the challenge because some of the quotations are one line long, some are two, and some are three lines long. I will need to vary the space below the author's name so that my initial paragraph starts consistently in the right place on the page below it. I may need one empty line for a long quotation, or three empty lines below if the quotation is short. I have experimented with space before and after and wondered if I will need to adjust spacing locally in each instance. Then I remembered this vast wealth of experience and knowledge waiting to be tapped in the Forum! 

I would be grateful if anyone can be so kind as to steer me in the right direction. What would be the most elegant way to tackle this, please? What would be the easiest way?

Here is how I want it to look:

Forum Kobo test.afpub

[walt.farrell]

I would probably create multiple Text Styles for the Quotation + Author block, for example:

• Quote1 for a 1-line quotation plus an author line
• Quote2 for a 2-line quotation plus an author line
• Quote3 for a 3-line quotation plus an author line

Then the "Space After" for each could be adjusted so the following paragraph lines up where you want it.

For the situation where the Author name needs different formatting, this might also mean creating 3 Author text styles. So,

• Quote1 could have a "next style" of Author1
• Quote2 could have a "next style" of Author2
• Quote3 could have a "next style" of Author3

Then the "Space After" would be applied differently to each Author style.

Note, though, that "next style" only applies to text you type, as far as I know. So if you're Placing or Pasting the text in, then you probably have to set the text styles manually.

[Old Bruce]

1 minute ago, walt.farrell said:

Note, though, that "next style" only applies to text you type, as far as I know. So if you're Placing or Pasting the text in, then you probably have to set the text styles manually.

If you select the "first" paragraph and some subsequent Paragraphs you can choose Style Then Next Styles if you right click on the "first" style.

[thomaso]

On 9/27/2022 at 9:17 AM, Dungarven said:

some of the quotations are one line long, some are two, and some are three lines long.

If you replace for all the quotations (e.g. with F&R for their style) all (single*) paragraph breaks with line breaks then you can use the "Next Style" feature for all 4 paragraph types and styles: chapter > quotation > author > story. 

*in case you have in an extra quotation document all quotations separated by 2 paragraph breaks (¶¶) you could first replace all those ¶¶ by any not-used glyph, then replace all single ¶ with line breaks (¬), and then replace again all these not-used glyph with ¶¶ again.

On 9/27/2022 at 9:17 AM, Dungarven said:

I will need to vary the space below the author's name so that my initial paragraph starts consistently in the right place on the page below it. I may need one empty line for a long quotation, or three empty lines below if the quotation is short. I have experimented with space before and after and wondered if I will need to adjust spacing locally in each instance.

Yes, you might need to manually adjust every chapter start page, while their are various ways. Aside Space Before / After for instance to use of the option to exclude both a Style and/or a Text Frame from the Baseline grid, or use the Text Frame Align options. Therefore you could create two text frames on this pages, one for chapter + quotation + author and the second below for the story.

Now you can adjust Text Frame Align options for the upper frame, e.g. "Justify" + increase its "Maximum Paragraph Space". If you use 2 styles for the story you can assign one to its first paragraph only (then Next Style: story 2 ff) which has the flow option "Start: in Next Frame" assigned. This latter setting ensures that the story always starts at the same vertical position (= its frame's position).

 

Disadvantage: this workflow enables you to have a large "Space After" the chapter title but, by "Justify", also a slightly varying leading in the quotation (when its number of lines vary) + a varying distance between quotation & author. There maybe smarter ways to handle this, at least currently I don't know one. I haven't tried yet if a baseline grid for the upper text frame would be useful.

[Petar Petrenko]

Long time ago I asked for the same feature and suggested Affinity to add in paragraph styles option -- something like "space before" -- which will start a paragraph at a specific distance from top margin (not from a last line of a previous paragraph). I find this very useful, but others users suggest to me to do a workarround with tables -- which is not very elegant.

[Old Bruce]

12 hours ago, thomaso said:

I haven't tried yet if a baseline grid for the upper text frame would be useful.

There is a problem with the baseline grid offset in the Text Frame Panel not giving me what I want. The Baseline grid can be set to start at 100 points from the top of the frame and it does. But... the text starts up near the top with the second line being on the baseline grid.

28 minutes ago, NNN said:

... suggested Affinity to add in paragraph styles option -- something like "space before" -- which will start a paragraph at a specific distance from top margin (not from a last line of a previous paragraph). I find this very useful, ...

I doubt that it is only you and I who would find this useful. Perhaps a good place for it would be in the Flow section.

[thomaso]

26 minutes ago, NNN said:

will start a paragraph at a specific distance from top margin (not from a last line of a previous paragraph)

There is a similar option, moving text downwards from the frame's top edge – but it gets overridden as soon a paragraph is placed in between.
I wonder how this might work independently, guess it would require a different concept of leading where paragraphs do not depend on / refer to others but the frame only?

[Petar Petrenko]

5 minutes ago, thomaso said:

I wonder how this might work independently, guess it would require a different concept of leading where paragraphs do not depend on / refer to others but the frame only?

Let say, something like this:
Heading -- space from top margin = 0 mm
Subheading -- space from top margin = 15 mm
QuoteSubheading -- space from top margin = 40 mm
Body Text - no indent -- space from top margin = 70 mm
Body Text -- space from top margin = 0 mm (means it starts immediately after the previous paragraph which is in this case Body text - no indent)

and after that everything works as it works now.

[Old Bruce]

3 minutes ago, NNN said:

Let say, something like this:
Heading -- space from top margin = 0 mm
Subheading -- space from top margin = 15 mm
QuoteSubheading -- space from top margin = 40 mm
Body Text - no indent -- space from top margin = 70 mm
Body Text -- space from top margin = 0 mm (means it starts immediately after the previous paragraph which is in this case Body text - no indent)

and after that everything works as it works now.

I would not do that. I do like having one paragraph style set to use a "space from top margin", or text frame instead of margin. But having others use "space from top margin" too will likely lead to problems. A simple space before and or after will take care of things like the Subheading being three lines long instead of the usual one line, in this scenario you would most likely have the QuoteSubheading starting within/overtop of the Subheading. 

[thomaso]

47 minutes ago, NNN said:

Let say, something like this:
Heading -- space from top margin = 0 mm
Subheading -- space from top margin = 15 mm

No doubts a layout can be described with words this way.

I rather meant how would it get coded & the influence of possibly conflicting settings get handled. Compare this situation below:

Here chapter has 'space before' = 0 and this 0 from frame top edge.
–> But now quotation, the next paragraph/style, pulls chapter down by its baseline grid if chapter is set to respect baseline (where actually none should exist in the frame according this grid start setting) …:

… whereas if chapter is set to ignore the grid then its 'space after' prevents quotation from respecting the grid:

This is why I assumed it might require "a second leading concept", as kind of an additional layer, aside the existing leading & leading by grid. As more options we get as more dependencies we need to decide or set. This can easily run into chaos unless we are well aware about the hierarchy in the different systems of vertical text arrangement. And even if we have the hierarchy in mind during style definition … then the 'break even point' where it gets inefficient to setup such automatism may come earlier than expected.

[Petar Petrenko]

1 hour ago, Old Bruce said:

I would not do that.

At least, we agree that something like this is need it and how you will use it is up to your liking.

 

1 hour ago, thomaso said:

Here chapter has 'space before' = 0 and this 0 from frame top edge.
–> But now quotation, the next paragraph/style, pulls chapter down by its baseline grid if chapter is set to respect baseline (where actually none should exist in the frame according this grid start setting) …:

Well, you'll have to do some math and adjustments, as well.

[thomaso]

41 minutes ago, NNN said:

Well, you'll have to do some math and adjustments, as well.

Does it work then? Have you tried and can show a result?

Also note, what @Old Bruce mentioned before about Text Frame Baseline Grid:

2 hours ago, Old Bruce said:

There is a problem with the baseline grid offset in the Text Frame Panel not giving me what I want. The Baseline grid can be set to start at 100 points from the top of the frame and it does. But... the text starts up near the top with the second line being on the baseline grid.

[Petar Petrenko]

5 minutes ago, thomaso said:

Does it work then? Have you tried and can show a result?

I know how I would use it if there is such an option.

[Dungarven]

Thank you all for your advice and good work around ideas.

I was hoping that Affinity Pub would have a way of using space before as measured from the top margin. It was disappointing to learn that NNN had asked for this some time ago, and it is still not being offered. That would have been the perfect solution. As it is I will try Walt's idea of three different stylings for three different lengths of quote. That one is the easiest for me as a beginner.

With much appreciation!

[Petar Petrenko]

41 minutes ago, Dungarven said:

As it is I will try Walt's idea of three different stylings for three different lengths of quote.

Why don't you try using a table to see if it is a right way to you?