Every day we read various texts - articles in newspapers and magazines, small notes, textbooks, manuals, books, documents. All this after writing is not immediately published or goes to print. Creation, editing - the stages of the appearance of the finished text. What is meant by the last term? What types of editing exist and what is their essence?
Concept of editing
“Editing” came from the Latin language. There is a word like redactus in it. Its meaning is “tidied up”. In Russian, “editing” refers to multidimensional concepts. It has several values:
- First of all, editing is called correction of the written text, elimination of spelling, punctuation, stylistic errors. Also, this word means changing the design of the document (changing the font, indents and other technical parameters of the text, dividing into columns).
- There is another definition. Editing is a type of professional activity. Editors are working in the media who are preparing for the publication of print media.
Types of editing and their definitions
Editing can be divided into 2 types. This is general, also called universal, and special. The first type of editing is understood as an integral system of the editor’s work on the text. During the correction, the written is improved, spelling and punctuation errors, repetitions of the words are eliminated.
Special editing refers to the work on the text from any special side, for the assessment and analysis of which general knowledge is not enough. This work can be done by editors who are in-depth specialists in a certain field of knowledge, to which the corrected text or document belongs. Special editing has a classification. It is divided into:
- literary;
- scientific;
- artistic and technical.
Literary Editing
Literary editing is the process by which the literary form of the text or work being checked is analyzed, evaluated and improved. The editor carries out the following work:
- corrects lexical errors;
- brings text style to perfection;
- eliminates logical errors, improves the form of the text (breaks into paragraphs, chapters or combines fragments);
- shortens text while retaining semantic content;
- checks the actual material (dates, names, quotes, statistical values).
Scientific Editing
A huge number of books, articles are written on certain scientific topics (for example, medical). Often the authors are not specialists. Reputable publishers use the services of scientific editors. These people check the text from the scientific side, eliminate any inaccuracies, delete irrelevant and false information.
It is worth noting that the names of scientific editors in books and magazines are indicated on the title page in accordance with the requirements of publishing standards. A note that a scientific editor was involved in the project serves as a guarantee of the high quality of the text and the veracity of the information presented.
Art and technical editing
Art editing in reputable publishers is performed by art editors. They are engaged in the design of the cover and the entire magazine, newspaper or book, the selection of images and color schemes. Thus, art editing is a process in which the design of a publication is developed, sketches, layouts, illustrations from an artistic and printing point of view are created, analyzed and evaluated.
There is also such a thing as technical editing. During it, the technical parameters of typing and its layout are adjusted, fonts, their sizes, indents, line spacing are changed, if necessary, numbered and bulleted lists are added for ease of perception of information.
Modern editing features
Almost all modern people can no longer imagine their life without computers. This technique is in housing, and in educational institutions, and in various organizations and companies. Using computers, a variety of texts are created: articles, abstracts, theses and scientific papers, documents. A huge number of programs have been developed that opened up great editing opportunities.
One of the famous computer programs is Microsoft Word. Using it, you can not only type text, but also edit files, arrange them properly:
- remove spelling and grammatical errors (in the text they are underlined by red and green wavy lines by default);
- Resize margins, select appropriate page parameters (sheet format, portrait or landscape orientation);
- add various underlines, highlight text in the right places in different colors, quickly insert markers and numbering;
- divide the text into columns, insert tables, charts, graphs, images, add footnotes, hyperlinks.
Quite often, in the process, users are faced with the need to edit PDF files ("pdf"). This format is common, popular. Special programs have been created for editing such files. They allow users to delete unnecessary pages, highlight important points in bright colors, move text and graphic blocks. Editing "pdf" using programs is very easy, because their interface is intuitive. All necessary tools are displayed in programs in panels.
In conclusion, it is worth noting that editing is an important process of preparing texts. It can be carried out using various computer programs. They provide users with great features. With the help of them, plain text without formatting can be turned into a business report, properly designed, or into bright advertising that attracts a resume.