I find it hard to believe nobody has any information at all they can share... Something, a nibble perhaps.

:-) It’s not that tough, Andrew, but it’s an editing question, not a typographic one, so you won’t find much of an answer in EoTS.... Find a copy of the United States Government Printing Office Style Manual instead.

1. Is there a standardized rule of thumb when it comes to indents?

Depending on the face and the size of the page I’m using, I like two or three ems — depends how far down you have to go.

2. When setting up outlined lists, what’s the standard flow? Is it I.A.1.a. or something different? I remember creating outlines in 7th grade English class, but I don’t remember what the format was anymore.

Given the topic, I’d follow GPO style as closely as possible, so you’d have 1, 1.1, 1.1 a, 1.1 a (i). That being said, I did work at Treasury that went I.A.1.a.(i) — just pick one and stick to it.

3. Finally, when doing bulleted lists and when those lists are indented, should I continue to use the same bullets for the indentures? Or should I change bullet styles (color, character, size)?

I don’t mind how you’ve used the coloured carrot in the sample at all, particularly how tight this is set. It really could use for some extra space (or a 1-em indent) between paragraphs where there’s really not a lot of indication where one starts and the next begins.

A couple of other things — line up your tables with the left column flush left and anything with numbers either on a decimal tab or flush right. Centering makes them a witch to read. ;-)

And is there any chance of giving the text a loosening-up? Man, you’ve really got it squished on the page!

I think the colored carrot is just confusing. It signals ’bulleted list,’ but then every paragraph is flagged, so it isn’t a list under a common topic heading, which is what bulleted lists should be. An indent or space between paragraphs would work better, I think.

Great Linda, that’s information I can USE! I don’t have any style guides and I approach all of these designs in the dark (I’m the only guy here.) So, having a starting point will be very helpful, and that style guide will help answer some other questions for me too.

And is there any chance of giving the text a loosening-up? Man, you’ve really got it squished on the page!

What would you recommend? I’m aligning to the baseline grid with .1535 inch spacing (which works out to 11.05pt leading.) My body copy is 9pt Karmina Regular.

I’ll attach and updated PDF.

I think the colored carrot is just confusing. It signals ’bulleted list,’ but then every paragraph is flagged, so it isn’t a list under a common topic heading, which is what bulleted lists should be. An indent or space between paragraphs would work better, I think.

William, it’s set up that way because of the source material. I don’t write the reports, I just try to beautify them. The content is collected from paraphrasing a much larger and in-depth report. It’s like a summary of the deployment focusing on specific areas hence the orange header bars. However, I do agree, I think the bullets are abit much sometime, especially when there are multiple levels.

Everything is tight to get it into as small a document as possible. This document is actually the longest I’ve ever created for one of these PDRs, and it’s because of the information on page 5, I’ve never had to include a table like that before. Most of the time I can create a nice 2 sided tabloid.

I’m aligning to the baseline grid with .1535 inch spacing (which works out to 11.05pt leading.) My body copy is 9pt Karmina Regular.

Try dropping the body copy to 8.5 pt with leaving the leading at 11: the difference in print size won’t be that noticeable, but with the extra .5 pt of space, it’ll make it a little less dense.

Or....

This document is actually the longest I’ve ever created for one of these PDRs, and it’s because of the information on page 5, I’ve never had to include a table like that before. Most of the time I can create a nice 2 sided tabloid.

Since you’re designing this for print (vs. electronic) distribution, having a page 5 means you’re going to need an extra sheet anyway (either a tabloid folded cover with sheet inside, or three d/s sheets) with a blank side. If there’s any chance you could use it, do so, since the paper cost will be the same and the look much nicer. Bump the text to 10pt and the leading to 12 (or more, if you can), and add some extra space before major headings.

(Looking at this reminds me of a couple of subcontracts I did in DC for Beltway Bandits: ah, those were the days....) :-P

I’ll try those suggestions Linda. This is an internal document so there isn’t to many budget constraints on printing (only a few top level clients see it). So, most of the time I print in house as long as it’s 8.5x11 and thing larger I go to the local print house.

By the way, your reminiscing gives me hope that I won’t be doing in-house government contract design work forever... a scary thought.

Well, back to the salt mines...

I’ve attached a NEW document (PDR USS Bonhomme Richard LHD6r.pdf)for another deployment. I’ve opened up the spacing, refined the subheadings and I’m very proud of how things turned out.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this look/design. It’s a double sided sheet design. The content was minimal and the images weren’t especially great. I don’t expect to many of these PDRs to be like this, but for the amount of information I think it works well.