Wrapping it up

01.18.18: Wrapping it up

IF YOUR TEXT is set justified, you’re bound to have a problem with poor wordspacing in text wraps. It’s just unavoidable, which is why I often recommend to clients that they go to flush left text.

Some newspapers choose to stay with justified text and that’s OK. But then that weird wordspacing (left, above) comes into play. Some who do layout won’t even notice or try to fix the problem. Aarrggghhhh! Some will select the paragraph next to the inset item and reset just that one paragraph in flush left (center). Well, that may fix the space between words, but it looks odd and it’s distracting.

My solution? Select the type (sometimes you have to do it line by line) and adjust the spacing between letters and words so the type remains justified but the spacing is more even. Even that can look a bit strange (see the second line, “aggressive persons;” in the example at right), but it works much better than a flush left paragraph in a justified story.