Hello all!
I am just starting with Dorico. I have been a Finale power user since 1991, (you know, when it came on three floppy disks ~1.44MB X 3~), and a Sibelius power user since 2012, due it its popularity among the percussion writers that I work with. As an arranger, I have been waiting for software that bridges the miles-wide gap between notation and DAW and have hoped that Dorico will meet that need. (So much time to create the perfect score and individual parts and not being happy with demo recordings without taking as long to sequence as it did to engrave.) I recently decided that it was time to explore Dorico and was immediately impressed with this new paradigm. I’ve decided to transition to the new software with my next project…which is a method book for school band. The frame approach of Dorico seems to be a brilliant way to integrate music, text copy, images, and web links into a publisher friendly format, and hopefully it will translate well to an electronic version as well as feed into an app format. This brings me to my topic…
How should I lay out my project to have the most efficient workflow for the creation and publishing of a method book?
There will be a teacher’s manual as well as an individual volume for each wind instrument. My initial thought is to add all players to make a full score, obviously, but from here I was thinking that I’d make each PAGE of the book an additional FLOW. Then I was thinking that i would use a CUSTOM SCORE LAYOUT to be each specific instrument BOOK. If my logic is correct, I can then select a different player for each custom score/book, add all of the layouts to it and have a complete book. My only wonder is how I can have the same instructive copy/text and images on each flow/page without having to realign every page in every custom score/book. Is this making any sense?
Each page will contain a short exercise, ranging anywhere from 2 - 8 measures along with instructive copy, illustrations, video links, tips, and other info. I foresee it being a rare instance where there will be more than one exercise on a page, and there may be occasion to have one exercise take up two pages.
This is just my first pass at how to make the most efficient workflow, and I’m eager to hear any other ideas based on anyone’s experience.
Thank you so much for your consideration!
Ed