InDesign Character Styles: General
Mercedes
Created on May 15, 2024
Character Styles panel serves as a hub for managing and applying character-level formatting across your document. The "General" tab within the Character Styles panel provides essential options for defining and organizing character styles efficiently.
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Transcript
Name your Character Style here. This name helps you identify and apply the style to text throughout your document. Click to learn more.
When creating a new character style, you can choose an existing style as its base. Any changes made to the base style will affect the new character style. Click to learn more.
Here, assign a keyboard shortcut to a character style. You can then use this shortcut to apply the style quickly and efficiently while working on your document.
Click to revert a character style back to its original settings or to the settings of the style it's based on.
When creating a new character style, toggle this box ON to apply the new style to your selected text. This avoids overrides on your selected text.
All settings selected for your character style appear here.
Character Style names should be descriptive AND intuitive, reflecting the purpose or characteristics of the style. When we use clear and consistent naming conventions, we:
Quick Tip: Style Name
- Streamline our workflow. It’s easier to manage and update styles as needed when you have a good understanding of what will be affected.
- Make collaboration with the team easier. It’s common to have another person jump in you document. Descriptive names allow everyone to understand the function and usage of each style in the document.
Shortcut: Explained
When you assign a shortcut to a character style, you can simply select the text you want to format and then use the designated keyboard shortcut to apply the style instantly, without the need to navigate through menus or panels. This can help speed up your workflow, especially when you frequently use specific styles throughout your document.
Example: If Garver - Red Bold is set to Ctrl+Alt+R, you can select text > Ctrl+Alt+R and the Garver - Red Bold style will be applied without having to open/use the Character Styles window.
Paragraph Style vs. Character Style
How do I know which one to use?
Paragraph Styles: A paragraph style should be used for "big picture" formatting. It manages the entire paragraph from start to finish.
Character Styles: A character style should be used for small pieces of the bigger puzzle. The attributes of a character style can be applied to words or individual characters. (i.e. Bold, Italic, Red, CAPS, Highlight)
Character styles are important! They set you up for success when it comes to nested styles.
Based On: Explained
Using the "Based On" option lets you build on existing styles without starting from scratch. This means the new style inherits all the attributes (such as font style, tracking, character color, etc.) of the base style. For example, if you have a Blue style and need to create a variation with slightly different attributes (i.e. Blue Bold Italic), you can base the new style on the existing one (Blue) and only modify the few elements that need updating (font style).This feature is just like "Based On" for paragraph styles.