Depending on your monitor's display resolution, and your QuarkXPress layout view percentage, you may or may not be able to read the words on your QuarkXPress pages.
If the text on your layouts looks like gray bars instead of character shapes, there isn't anything wrong with your vision. The makers of QuarkXPress assume that at a reduced page view, you are not interested in reading the text in your QuarkXPress project. Instead, the general thinking is that you are more interested in the page layout than the editorial content. This assumption is called text greeking.
Correct assumption or not, it is not recommended that you attempt to read and/or edit text at reduced views such as Fit in Window. As far as I'm concerned, there are two types of print publishers in the world, those who have glasses–and those who will. Working with text while in a reduced view will hasten your journey into the "have glasses" club.
If you are not a fan of text greeking, or if you'd like to enable the feature, follow these steps:
- Windows users, choose Edit > Preferences;
Mac users, choose QuarkXPress > PreferencesThe Preferences dialog box appears. There are many categories.
- Select the Print Layout, General category
- From the Display area in the upper right of the dialog box, select Greek Text Below (put a check in the box)
- Click OK
- To view the "greeked" text, choose View > 50%
At this reduced view, you should notice that the letter shapes disappear and instead you see gray bars-greeking. If you can still see letter shapes instead of gray bars, try zooming out a bit more by changing your View Percentage to something like 30%.
Want to learn more about QuarkXPress? Attend our QuarkXPress 8 Basics class. Click here for more information.