Preparing a Manuscript with Tables, Graphs, and Art for Editing

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If you’ve ever worked with an editor before, you’ve probably noticed an annoying tendency. We don’t care about your fancy formatting or the polish and look you worked so hard on achieving with your manuscript. In fact, the prettier and fancier your document, the more we seem to be annoyed by it.

The reason is that all of the layout and design work should be done after the words are edited and ready for print. You don’t varnish a table before you finish putting it together and sanding out the imperfections.

That means don’t bother with pasting all of your extra material, like tables, graphs, charts, photos, and drawings, into the document, because the actual text could change dramatically in the course of editing.

Also, it just plain gets in the way. And one of the first things your editor will do when you send them your beautifully arranged manuscript is to pull out all of that visual material.

​It creates visual clutter and makes the file size large and unwieldy. Many word processors and computers balk at opening large files and can get glitchy and unpredictable when you try to work with files that are too big.
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If Not There, Then Where?

If I can’t put it in the manuscript, what do I do with it?

​Excellent question!

After all, your editor will need access to all of the material, either for editing the tables and graphs or for making sure each image fits with the surrounding text and supports the points being made.

Each image should have its own, separate, clearly marked file. And by clearly marked, I mean that anyone working on the manuscript should be able to match the file with the callout in the text by just looking at the file name.

​Then, all of those files are grouped with the manuscript itself when you send it off for editing.
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How Do You Know Where It Goes?

While the images shouldn’t be embedded in the manuscript itself, you will need indicators for when the time comes for the designer to put it all together.

That indicator is called a text callout. The callout needs to be easily located, and the best way to do this is to accompany it with a character that isn’t used anywhere else in the document. That allows the editor or designer to find them all with a simple search tool and prevents any callouts from eluding those responsible for removing them before your document goes to print.

For example, you might use brackets [ ] or angle brackets < > or any other character that doesn’t appear in any other context.

​<graph 3 here>
{figure 1 about here}

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​Clarity and ease of use are the key factors here, but individual editors might have their own preferred methods for how they want a manuscript prepared. So, you really can’t go wrong with going straight to the source and asking your editor what they want you to do.

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​Rebecca Miller is a professional copyeditor and general fan of all things having to do with the written word and the English language.
You can check out her website at Oakdale Editing or connect through Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, or Email.