[scribus] Newbie Questions About Spreads

[Gregory Pittman]

wingsgroup wrote:
> I am new to DTP and Scribus and needing to get a project done in the next 2.5
> weeks. (I'm probably crazy!) Anyway, I have searched, but not really found
> any good answers to my questions. My project is actually a homeschool group
> yearbook and I am wanting to use two-page spreads for the section dividers.
> It will be a picture across the pages with text running across. How do I go
> about this without losing the text and making the picture look funny? I used
> single pages for the setup and just put the picture and text right across as
> I was designing it visually. I didn't do a lot yet because I realized that I
> needed answers to these questions first. I read somewhere about bleeds and
> so I did make my pages slightly bigger (the printer suggested .25 inches).
> Someone suggested using margins for the gutter, but I am afraid that I might
> get some white space showing. I would appreciate any help you can give!
>   
This is a big task for your first effort of this type. Scribus can do 
this, and perhaps others will chime in with their advice based on 
experience.

You will want to choose the Double-Sided layout when you make your 
document, and perhaps eliminate the gap of the display between adjacent 
pages. You will likely also want to use Master Pages so that you can 
have guides and margins set for left or right pages.

http://wiki.scribus.net/index.php/Working_with_Master_Pages

You don't say which Scribus version you are using. If you are using 
1.3.3.x, there is a script called BleedandPrintMarks which will create 
bleed areas if you need this - you create a document the size that you 
want the end result to be, then when you run the script, all pages are 
enlarged to add the bleed area.. In 1.3.5svn, the bleed is built in to 
the PDF export dialog. In the end, you need to work with whatever your 
printer can manage or suggest. It would also be a good idea to submit a 
few pages to the printer to make sure they're Ok, and find out if you 
need to adjust anything.

I don't know that using an old book as an example is especially useful 
-- this is the end result and doesn't necessarily tell you how to do it 
in Scribus.

Greg