Arpege
Music

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Printing a score in a different format than A4

It is sometimes useful to create a score with a different size than A4. If you desire a smaller format, here is how to proceed. Let us take the example of a score used as a CD jacket (+/- 115 mm x 115 mm).

With the creation assistant (Professional version), create your score with the number of measures and staves you want. Let us take for example 36 soloist measures. Validate without computing the page layout.

Enable the reference marks tool (keyboard shortcut ":"). You will see 2 frames around the score (red and green). The red frame corresponds to the printer margin outside which nothing will be printed (physical limits of the printer). The green frame shows the space wherein Pizzicato will layout the measures and staves. We will modify the printer margins.

In the file menu, select the "Page layout" item. In the upper part, you will find the printer margins and the additional margins. These margins are placed graphically to show the left, right, upper and lower margins. Here are for example the possible values for these margins at this stage (warning, they are not the same for all printers, so adapt the operations) :

printer margins : left=3 - right=6 - upper=3 - lower=5

additional margins: left=7 - right=4 - supper=7 - lower=5

the page size is shown above : height = 296 - width= 209

Here is how to compute the new printer margins to obtain a 115 x 115 mm score:

printer right margin= paper width (209) - printer left margin (3) - desired width (115) = 91

lower printer margin= paper height (296) - upper printer margin (3) - desired height (115) = 178

then, select the internal margins. If you want for example a 5 mm border on each side of the paper, enter "5" in the 4 additional margin text boxes. It will force Pizzicato to place the measures at 5 mm from all borders.

Finally, select a value for the enlargement/reduction ratio. In our example, a 50 % value will give a correct result. To complete the example, select 6 measures per staff, no space for the title and check the "Distribute the systems on the page" box. Click OK (and recompute) and your page layout appears.

You can then work on the score and lay out the measures and staves, then print the pages. Now you only need to cut the paper to the desired size.