Digital Sub-editing And Design (focal Journalism)

E-Book Overview

This excellent book covers editing in the digital age, demonstrating the tools needed for effective text editing. Learn how to write powerful headlines and captions, and how to edit body text quickly and cleanly. It also concentrates on design in the digital environment, introducing typography and the related issues of readability and legibility. The skills of picture editing are explored, including image selection, cropping, manipulation and the ethics involved. These core skills and methods are then applied to the World Wide Web. Recent research into how people navigate Web pages is considered, and recommends ways to write more effectively for the online medium. The first section concentrates on editing in the digital age, demonstrating the tools needed for effective text editing. Dr Quinn shows how to write powerful headlines and captions, and how to edit body text quickly and cleanly. The middle section concentrates on design in the digital environment. Chapter five introduces typography and the related issues of readability and legibility. Chapter six covers the principles of design and how they can be applied to print and electronic publications. Chapter seven looks at the skills of picture editing, including image selection, cropping, manipulation and the ethics involved. Chapter eight investigates other forms of visual presentation such as diagrams, logos, maps and cartoons. In the final section, these core skills and methods are applied to the World Wide Web. Chapter nine considers recent research into how people navigate Web pages, and recommends ways to write more effectively for the online medium. Chapter ten examines how the principles of print design can (and cannot) be applied to Web pages. Learn the skills of subbing from a renowned expertCovers everything you need to know to get professional resultsAn indispensable mentor full of practical tips and guidance

E-Book Content

Digital Sub-editing and Design Dedication For my wife Deirdre, with love and admiration. Journalism Subject Adviser to Focal Press: Professor John Herbert Digital Sub-editing and Design Stephen Quinn Focal Press OXFORD AUCKLAND BOSTON JOHANNESBURG MELBOURNE NEW DELHI Focal Press An imprint of Butterworth-Heinemann Linacre House, Jordan Hill, Oxford OX2 8DP 225 Wildwood Avenue, Woburn, MA 01801-2041 A division of Reed Educational and Professional Publishing Ltd First published 2001 © Stephen Quinn 2001 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any material form (including photocopying or storing in any medium by electronic means and whether or not transiently or incidentally to some other use of this publication) without the written permission of the copyright holder except in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 or under the terms of a licence issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency Ltd, 90 Tottenham Court Road, London, England W1P 0LP. Applications for the copyright holder’s written permission to reproduce any part of this publication should be addressed to the publishers British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the Library of Congress ISBN 0 240 51639 7 Designer: Stephen Quinn Printed and bound in Great Britain Contents Acknowledgements Introduction vii 1 SECTION A: ELECTRONIC EDITING Chapter 1: The editor’s changing yet consistent role 9 How the digital environment is changing the job. New roles in an information-clogged world. Chapter 2: Words, glorious words: editing body text 24 The sub-editors’ tools. Tips on how to produce clear and