I wanted to make a few revisions to an orchestral score I finished in 2004. It was in an early version of Sibelius, and I hoped it would be easy to update. However, when I opened the score in Sibelius 6, it didn’t look good and I feared it would be a lot of work to make it ready to revise. I was wrong — the Magnetic Layout feature made it quick and easy.
So here’s the procedure I used:
- Select all.
- Set Magnetic Layout to Default (Edit menu). That should have happened with the selections I made when I opened the score, but I wasn’t sure all the symbols were behaving.
- Reset Space Above and Space Below Staves to Default (Layout menu).
- Reset Position and Design (Layout menu).
- Optimize Staff Spacing (also on the Layout menu).
That’s it. The score was basically ready for revisions.
In the past, I did a lot of little mouse movements to put symbols where I wanted them. Magnetic Layout is a great boon for carpal tunnel sufferers and obsessive editing. Along with Optimize Staff Spacing, it’s pretty quick now to get page layout looking good.