I prefer using left justified / ragged right type for body text (especially in newspaper articles). Justified type looks nice from a distance, but can really throw off the tracking of your type when you look at it up close.

When working with InDesign and laying out publications, getting ragged-right text to flow in a visually pleasing manner can be a pain in the neck. Due to the various length of words in the English language, I sometimes find myself having to insert soft-returns to flow text to the next line so that you are left with neatly organized, easy-to-read columns of type.

That is where this tip comes in handy!

Balanced Ragged Lines to the Rescue

This tip was provided to me by my friend Craig Fultz. We are both designers and sharing tips between each other does wonders for increasing productivity.

Using the Adobe InDesign feature “balanced ragged lines” automatically cleans up the “rag” of your type and auto-flows the paragraph. The best part is it does this without messing up the tracking of the type.

1. Highlight the paragraph whose rag you would like to clean up.

2. Go to the paragraph pallet. Fom the extra pull-down menu at the top right choose “balance ragged lines”.

3. Wallah! The rag of your type is cleaned up automatically!