A book can be produced in several ways. Online platforms such as those offered by Amazon allow prospective authors to submit Word files and the XML software than is hidden behind the website, runs the files into PDF files ready for print. It's also possible to use Word for a limited amount of design.

The design of our book is being completed in Indesign. It's part of Adobe Creative Cloud which has numerous different type of software for print, animation, web and design. It includes Acrobat to read PDF files, Typekit for legal font use, Photoshop and Lightroom for photographic work and Illustrator for illustrations and diagrams. All of these programmes are being used for our book just as it would be for any professional publishing house.

The authors wrote their files in Pages or Word and did a little basic styling. These files are then placed in Indesign. In this software paragraph styles, character styles and page templates are created placing very close attention to the format of the page, how it's printed and the type of printing (digital or litho). Our text design is carefully planned so that the pages look neat but allow space for our photographs. Indesign is also able to check that all our images meet a high criteria of production. Finally all the pages are created into PDFX files (the X means print quality) and are sent to the printers.

It means that we have close control over the quality of our publication and can be assured it's produced to a high standard. We thought you would like to have a look some of our pages as they appear in Indesign. It looks very complicated doesn't it?!

Pages from Balsham, a village story, 1617 - 2017 in Indesign