How to Insert an Initial Cap at the Beginning of a Paragraph in InDesign

Insert initial drop caps to add interest to a text-heavy page.

One of the quickest ways to increase design appeal to a text-heavy document is to insert an initial cap at the beginning of one or more of your paragraphs. An initial cap increases the size of the first letter to a specified number of lines. While initial caps can be created from the paragraph panel, creating a paragraph style that includes an initial cap will allows you to quickly insert it into multiple paragraphs.

Instructions

1. Select the “Type” tool. Click on the paragraph to position the cursor inside it.

2. Click on the “Window” menu, hover over “Styles” and select “Paragraph Style.”

3. Hold down the “Alt” key and click on the “New Paragraph” icon at the bottom of the Paragraph Style panel to create a new style based on the current paragraph style.

4. Enter a name similar to “Initial Cap” in the “Style Name” box.

5. Click on “Drop Caps and Nested Styles” in the menu at the left.

6. Type the number of lines that you want the initial cap to occupy in the “Lines” box.

7. Enter “1” in the “Characters” box to indicate that you only want one character to change.

8. Click on the “Character Style” drop-down menu and select “New Character Style.”

9. Design the initial cap as desired. Click “OK” in both style dialog boxes to create the character and paragraph style.

10. Position the cursor in the paragraph where you want to insert the initial cap or select multiple paragraphs.

11. Click on the paragraph style that you just created to insert an initial cap in all of the selected paragraphs.

References

• Adobe InDesign CS5 & CS5.5: Use Drop Caps
• Layers Magazine: Getting the Drop on Initial Caps