Re: Experiences with smaller staff sizes?

[Urs Liska]

Am 03.12.2013 00:22, schrieb Keith OHara:
> Urs Liska <ul <at> openlilylib.org> writes:
>
> > When I started using LilyPond I was impressed by the default look and
> > feel of the scores. Rather often I felt the need to fit more music on
> > the page, and for a beginner the most natural (and probably only) way to
> > achieve this is to globally reduce the staff size. But when reduced
> > staff size to about 17 or even less for some kinds of scores I found the
> > overall impression much less impressive than before. While still being
> > beautifully balanced and laid out it became somewhat anemic.
> I know that you know that LilyPond does not simply scale down the lines
> and fonts, but uses relatively heavier weights at the smaller staff-sizes.
> It sounds like you feel the effect should be stronger.

Basically yes.

And I'm noticing that I can't adjust everything to the same amount.
Say I make everything heavier, either because the "opticals" effect 
should be stronger or because I just _want_ that score to be heavy. Then 
some items, particularly articulations and a few other things like the 
mentioned arpeggio bracket will be out of balance because I can't simply 
override their #'line-thickness. I think we managed to catch the more 
visible things through Janek's patches, but there still are grobs that 
aren't perfectly consistent with the global look and feel of the score.

> I use 15 to 22-point staff-heights, and find the results easily readable.

I didn't mean to say readability is affected. It's just that these 
scores lack that "wow" effect ;-)

Best
Urs

> Miniature scores, with about a 12-point staff, from LilyPond are not as
> heavy as traditionally-engraved miniature scores.  Personally, the word
> 'clean' comes to mind before 'anemic'  when I compare LilyPond scores
> at small sizes to the lock of older "pocket scores", but I see what you
> mean.
>
>
>
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