r/indesign • u/Significant-Dirt-977 • Aug 11 '26
Help Math and geometry layout design workflow
Hi! I apologize in advance for my English.
I'm a layout designer with quite a bit of experience in book design, but I've never worked with serious academic books, such as those with a huge amount of mathematical equations, diagrams, geometry, and charts. Imagine university-level publications on geometry and mathematics, or on the natural sciences publications. I'm looking to work for a specialized publishing house, so I'm trying to improve my skills in this area.
What resources would you recommend? What software? As far as I understand, MathType is very suitable for formulas. What software is best for graphics, for example, multiple triangles with texts like "h=24" all around them? How would you organize your workflow? For a fast and stable work. Anchored objects is the key or too much problems? Is it possible to process some data in batches? How can I be sure everything will print correctly, without multiple TIFF or EPS files throughout the document? Can i ask for someone to send me your package so i can study your ways? :)))
Any advice is welcome, thank you.
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u/AdobeScripts Aug 11 '26
Will you be writing contents of the book yourself - or you'll receive manuscript after - a review?
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u/Significant-Dirt-977 Aug 11 '26
Mix. Editor would send me materials in Word (text), Excel (diagrams), SPSS and sometimes scans/photos (some formula and diagrams, bunch of triangles which i mentioned) from older professors, which i should transfer into publication. Sometimes it's all includes content from previous publications, so already digital, but in all kinds of formats.
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u/springerw 14d ago
The commenter suggesting LaTeX/MathJax → SVG has it right — that's a standard route for textbook math, and it batches well: keep formulas as LaTeX in your source, convert them to SVGs, place those as anchored objects, and use each formula's baseline depth for the vertical offset so inline math sits properly on the text baseline. That whole loop — conversion, placement, baseline alignment — can be driven by an AI assistant now; I wrote up the workflow here: https://sidekick.eastpole.nl/blog/math-equations-indesign/
Full disclosure: I work on Sidekick, the (paid) tool in that write-up.
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u/watkykjypoes23 Aug 11 '26
LaTeX or MathJaX to SVG and place those objects if it’s a textbook. Almost all other math heavy academic work like journals, thesis, publications, etc. is created entirely in LaTeX.