Question about blank page?

[smokewolf]

Alright guys, I am about finished with my latest editted copy of The Swing.

My formatting starts every chapter on the left hand page and that page is a chapter marker and contains no text (other than the chapter # and a poem).

However, one chapter (the second to last one) is only two pages long. With the normal chapter header page this would have the next chapter start on the right hand side. For now I put in a blank page (with 'this page left blank intentionally' on it).

This file is to be both my pdf and print file. Is this ok, or does anyone have anything better.

BTW, this is a chapter on experience and is already maxed out as for as text and art (2 pieces on 2 consecutive pages already).

[Jack Aidley]

I'd say stick with your convention - even with such a short chapter I think it would look wierd otherwise.

The other option as I see it is to re-edit so that the two page chapter is a sub-heading in a different chapter if that's possible for your game?

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

I suggest that "this page intentionally left blank" is unnecessary. Over the last few years, I've discovered that readers have no problem with blank pages, especially when it's clear that they serve as a set-up for a specific sort of formatting (e.g. chapters beginning on the same side). The same goes for half-page and three-quarter page blank spaces.

I'm currently on a mission to eliminate the "fear of white space" that seems to dominate most RPG formatting.

Best,
Ron

[Matt Wilson]

What Ron said.

I can pick up any of the many "how to" books off my shelf, most of which cost $20 or more, and they all have at least a half page of blank space before the start of a new chapter. Some books have a minimum of one entire blank page, plus whatever white space is left on the previous page.

I don't think that hurts their sales.

[Matt Snyder]

Yes. And I hate, hate, hate "this page intentionally left blank." It insults the reader's intelligence. As in "We know that by default, you assume we'll screw up. So, we didn't ok? Please keep reading and buying our stuff. ... Please?" Bleah. Half of design is confidence. Just do it, and just know why you did it.

[daMoose_Neo]

It'd only be an issue to myself if I'm reading it, get to the end and go "And what else?", in which case I'd think you screwed up.
As long as the material is covered as much as it needs to be, theres no reason you couldn't have 2 pages of white space for your formatting, I'd still get all the information I needed.

And white space is good ^_^ Good on eyes, good on mind ^_^

[jdagna]

I don't have a problem with white space either... however, I don't like totally blank pages.

What I would do (if possible) is increase the tracking on the text in the short chapter just enough to force it onto a third page.  In my experience, you can increase the length by about 10-20% without anyone noticing the change in tracking (especially if it affects a whole chapter).  Thus, if you're dealing with two full pages right now, you should have enough to fill up a third page a quarter to a half of the way.

You can also eke out an extra 2-4 lines by giving some extra white space around the top and bottom of the artwork

[Shreyas Sampat]

Justin, that idea completely baffles me. Could you elaborate on why you prefer that approach.

[Chris Passeno]

Traditionally, the chapter starts are on the right.  Our eye's are trained to look there.

Maybe I'm too picky, but if I see a blank page on the right in the middle of the book, I'd think that it was a mistake.  If it was on the left, I'd think nothing of it, so long as it's at the end of a chapter.

As for a completely blank page, why?  It costs the same if you put something on it or not, so why not put some art or graphic on it?

[madelf]

I second Justin's recommendation.

It's an excellent compromise, and would eliminate the puzzlement (even if not irritation) that some people will have when they get to a blank page.

[Luke]

Hi Keith,
chris is dead on.

You want all your chapters to start on the right-facing page, even if that means having a blank page on the facing left page.

What I do in BW is just put a ghosted graphic on the blank left hand pages, it opens up the layout and offers a nice rest for the reader as they move through.

I'm a big fan of white space as well. Check out the NPA for an example of an open, clean yet very useable layout. Also note that not all the games start on the right facing page! Why did I break my design sense? 'Cause I didn't have enough graphics to ornament those pages. (I would have needed 8. I had 0.)

good luck,
-L

EDIT:

What I would do (if possible) is increase the tracking on the text in the short chapter just enough to force it onto a third page. In my experience, you can increase the length by about 10-20% without anyone noticing the change in tracking (especially if it affects a whole chapter). Thus, if you're dealing with two full pages right now, you should have enough to fill up a third page a quarter to a half of the way.

A more typographically correct and far better looking option than playing with the tracking, is to place with the character and word spaces. These options can be found in H&Js in Quark and Justification in InDesign. Using the Justification option proportionally scales the spaces between words and letters as needed from paragraph to paragraph. Letting out the word space by a point or two can open up a line or paragraph and is almost imperceptible.

One of these days I've got to do a guide to good typography for RPGs...

Keith, since you're laying out your game and you have oodles of extra space, what's your type size and leading (line space)? What font are you using? The best guideline for body copy for our purposes is to use leading 3 pts bigger than your type size. For example, Burning Wheel uses Bauer Bodoni 9 pt over 12 pt. A deep leading greatly enhances readability.

Another guideline, if you're going to futz with your type (which I recommend) do it uniformly and consistently across the whole document.

[smokewolf]

1) Too late on the left vs. right layout. I am not a great layout person and it took too long to get everything right as it is now. Besides I did it on the right for the last print version and do not see much difference.

2) The text is actually about 1 and 1/4 th of a page. I had to put two images there just to get it to 2 pages (and there is still a small amount of white space at the bottom at the last page of text).

3) As for font and such. Garamond 10pt. I am using Word and spacing is set to normal, and kerning is not checked.

I know this is not the greatest to work with but it is what I got.

I feel ok about leaving a blank page there with everyone's opinion here. It toward the back of the book, between the last two chapters. I am so nervous about this (I have done 4 different edits for print so far) and hopefully this is the last one until Version 2.

[Chris Passeno]

If the majority of your chapter starts are on the left, I'd be easy to fix.  Just add one "extra" page toward the beginning.  The most often overlooked way of doing this is to put an extra page right behind the cover.  This is usually the space provided for the inside front cover.

If you add that extra page, it would kick all the rest of the pages over one, so your left chapter starts would become a right chapter start.

[smokewolf]

I have a whole section in the middle of the book that is formatted special for which page its on. For pages on the left the tables are offset so that most of them are to the left and viseversa for the right.

There are three tables on each of these pages and they are offset from each other. So the left page has a table left justified, then right then left again.


There are also other examples of this to but these are the most predominate (about 20 pages worth).

[jdagna]

Keith, the reason I made my recommendation is that it's a simple (and usually invisible) way to make the amount of text you have fit onto more pages, thus avoiding a blank page altogether.

It's something I learned to do back when I was working with newspapers, where you don't want any white space whatsoever, but you don't always have time to add more copy.

Personally, I have to wonder why just over a page of text justifies a whole chapter to itself, but at this stage, I don't think you'll be hurting yourself with a blank page if you need it.  I'm in the middle of finishing layout on my latest project and I know there are some changes that I wouldn't even consider because of the amount of work required at this stage.

A more typographically correct and far better looking option than playing with the tracking, is to place with the character and word spaces. These options can be found in H&Js in Quark and Justification in InDesign. Using the Justification option proportionally scales the spaces between words and letters as needed from paragraph to paragraph. Letting out the word space by a point or two can open up a line or paragraph and is almost imperceptible.

That actually is a better solution.  I got used to doing the tracking adjustment back when it was my only solution (12 years ago or so in Pagemaker), so I tend to default to that by habit.  However, it's still the only solution in many programs that aren't as advanced as Quark and InDesign.  I'm not sure what Keith was using, so I figured a tracking adjustment would be more universally available.