CreativePro Forum

Return to Member Forum

• Author
  Posts
• • October 16, 2016 at 10:54 pm #89041
    Mary Baker

    Member

    Hello everyone!

    I’ve been all over the internet and this looks like the only place left that may be able to help me. I do hope someone can get me headed in the right direction. I am helping my father update an old manuscript of his that was originally put together in PageMaker. Creating the for-print version in InDesign was nice and easy. My father wants to self-publish through Lulu.com and was very excited at the idea of having both a print version and an ebook version available. So, since I knew that InDesign has the ability to create ePubs, I said, “Okay, I’m sure I can figure out how to do that.” I’ve always wanted to explore this feature anyway, as it’s the one thing I’ve never played with before. This is a 200 page book with about 120 photos and captions, so it’s very image-heavy. The images also need to be in specific places within the text to match up with the story.

    When it turned out to not be as simple as exporting the .indb file and getting a reflowable ePub with all the pictures and captions in the right places, I started digging for information. Tips, advice, anything. I found a lot of things that are for InDesign CC, or CS5, but CS6 seems to be lacking in ePub how-tos. I would love to look at an eBook template, or see some step-by-step instructions for eBook newbies. XD I downloaded the reflow able eBook template that’s available to premium members here, but once I have my text and images in it, it crashes when I try to export to ePub.

    Don’t get me wrong, I’m having a grand time messing around and experimenting with all this new stuff, (I love learning new things) but I’m on a deadline and running out of time. I’ve got about a week to get this eBook cleaned up and working/looking good and I just can’t tell what I’m doing wrong. I know InDesign can do this when someone who knows how is setting the book up.

    So here’s what I have: My text, titles, captions, images, and footnotes are all being controlled with paragraph styles.

    They’re pretty basic:
    H1 (chapter number)
    H2 (chapter title),
    1st Paragraph (the first paragraph has a drop cap on the first letter),
    Body (main text)
    Img (not sure paragraph styles is the best way to control image placement, but I read that the image is best placed with the text so everything flows together. Is that correct?)
    Caption
    Footnote

    My main source of confusion is the images. There’s lots of them and they’re not playing fair with me. *pouts* But I’m not quite sure what I’m doing wrong. I’m placing them directly into the text and using the paragraph style setting to control spacing below, above, and to either side of the images. ‘Below’ seems to be the only setting that makes it into the ePub, though, and the image ends up being pushed right up against the text above it no matter how many pixels of space I tell it to leave up there. Then there are the captions, which are having more or less the same problem.
    I’ve read that keeping images and captions together is a problem no matter what, so I’m guessing that I’ll need to edit the… CSS? (This is where I’m charging into unfamiliar territory!) But yes, I am finding it difficult to get the captions to match up with the pictures, aside from just keeping them together. The main problem is that I want the caption to begin and end at the edges of the image, so they’re the same distance across and the caption stays directly below the image. My captions keep being wider than the image no matter what I do with the paragraph styles settings, which confuses me.

    Ideally, I’d like the images to resize themselves depending on the screen size/resolution they’re being viewed at as well. Is there an ideal image size for this and what settings should I be using to control image placement on a page? Any advice would be hugely helpful!

  • October 17, 2016 at 1:02 pm #89062
    Paul Marriner

    Member

    You have asked questions which pose problems for all eBook producers. My best advice considering the time available is to take out a month’s subscription to Linda.com and watch Anne-Marie Conception’s videos on making a reflowable ePub in CS6. This is how I learned. This will still only get you 90% of the way and you’ll need to learn some code to get the rest of the way. I don’t know how you plan to market the book (or even if you do) but to massage a book with drop caps, footnotes, and numerous image/caption combinations to work in Kindle for example isn’t a week’s project.

    Paul

  • October 17, 2016 at 8:52 pm #89083
    Janis Friesler

    Member

    Since you have a lot of images, think about fixed layout ePub. Ann Marie has a course about this on Linda.com that is very good. I think fixed-layout with a lot is a lot easier to create than reflowable formatting.

  • October 18, 2016 at 2:55 am #89085
    Kai Rübsamen

    Member

    Hi all,

    there are several problems here!

    1. CS6 is only conditionally suitable for export to EPUB. Many features like putting divs around images to honor specialties for iBooks and ADE are only included in CC and above. So if someone wants to have good results with CS6, he/she must dive in the code and work e.g. with GREP in BBedit to complete missing things.

    2. Anne Maries training give a good starting point. It cannot deal with all exceptions. Otherwise this training must be 20 hours or longer. A lot of exeptions are discussed in Liz Castros Blog. So, to view and understand AMs training and to read every post in Liz blog, would take probably more time, than is available.

    3. CS6 doesn’t support Fixed Layout!

    So, first there is a need for an example. Then a decision, if the publication is suitable for one of those two formats (fixed or reflowable) or maybe not! This depends on the orientation of the images.

    Then Mary needs to find out, if she wants to learn all those stuff or take money in her hand and let the work do by a professional.

    Kai

  • October 18, 2016 at 12:45 pm #89121
    Paul Marriner

    Member

    While it’s true that CS6 doesn’t support fixed layout, if your goal is to sell as a Kindle on Amazon you can convert a pdf directly via Amazon’s textbook creator. It’s basically a proprietary pdf format. I have one up and it’s listed as a “print replica.” It was prepared in CS6 as an interactive pdf and then converted using the Kindle fixed-layout converter.

    Paul

  • November 7, 2016 at 8:18 pm #89618
    Mary Baker

    Member

    Thank you everyone, for the timely and informative replies. It’s all been very helpful, and I’m sorry for not responding more quickly. I’ve been watching the videos on Lynda.com (they’re excellent) and looking at Liz Castros blog. I was able to get a working, almost-acceptable, reflowable epub made, but due to time constraints, ended up having a professional finish the work for me. XD He’s done a great job tidying up my amateurish attempt and given me some good advice as well.
    I may practice creating a fixed layout epub (which would be exported as a PDF, if I understand correctly) with a very image-heavy family book that I have set up in InDesign, just so I can see how that works. I’m pretty sure that one would not be suitable for anything but fixed layout, as the placement of images is extremely specific and rather complex.

    I am learning a lot of new things thanks to you all pointing me in the right directions, and will continue to learn as I go.
    (Code is not as scary as I thought it would be. It was actually kinda fun once it stopped looking like an alien language. Still confusing, but fun.)

    Thank you again for all the help!

• Author
  Posts