Frame breaks

Dorico Pro Help

Product
Dorico Pro
Version
5.1
Language
English
Document type
Webhelp
ft:openMode
fluidtopics

Frame breaks occur when musical material reaches the right page margin at the bottom of a frame and must continue on a new system in the next frame in the music frame chain, which is usually on the next page. Dorico Pro automatically arranges music in frames so that systems are correctly spaced and legible, but you can also control frame breaks manually; for example, to insert page turns at specific positions in part layouts.

Frame breaks that you have inserted manually are indicated by signposts, which you can hide/show at any time. They are also layout-specific, meaning each layout can have frame breaks at different rhythmic positions.

Frame break signpost, selected
Note
  • By default, system/frame breaks snap to the barline before the earliest selected item. You can change whether breaks are allowed at rhythmic positions within bars.

  • Frame breaks at the start of frames that were created using Make into Frame have Wait for next frame break activated in the Format group of the Properties panel by default. When this property is activated, Dorico Pro creates a frame containing all material between that frame break and the next frame break.

    If you later delete subsequent frame breaks, this creates very full frames with tightly spaced, or overlapping, systems. For example, if you delete all subsequent frame breaks, all music until the end of the flow is forced into a single frame.

  • You can also control the content of music frames by fixing the number of systems per music frame in each layout.

Video tutorial about system/frame breaks (English)