Facing pages & spreads

Facing pages turn a stack of loose canvases into a real booklet: pages pair up at a spine, the cover stands alone, and page templates know which side of the spread they are on. This page covers turning the mode on, working in the spread-aware Pages panel, and choosing between spread and single-page export.

Turn on facing pages#

You can enable facing pages when you create the document, or at any point afterwards.

For a new document:

1. Open the new-document dialog (see New document & presets).
2. Tick the Facing pages checkbox before you create the document.

For an existing document:

1. Go to File ▸ Document setup….
2. Tick Facing pages.

The moment the setting is on, your pages pair into left/right spreads glued at the spine. Page 1 always stands alone as a right-hand page (the cover), page 2 and 3 form the first full spread, and so on.

Note: turning Facing pages off simply unpairs the pages. Nothing moves and nothing is deleted, so you can toggle it safely.

The spread-aware Pages panel#

The Pages panel is the slim filmstrip docked at the right edge of the editor. In a facing-pages document it shows one row per spread, with the two pages of each pair butted together at the spine. The lone cover sits offset to the right of center, exactly where it lives in the finished booklet.

From the panel you can:

• Navigate: click a thumbnail to select that page and jump the view to its spread.
• Multi-select: Shift-click for a range, Cmd/Ctrl-click to add or remove single pages.
• Reorder: drag a thumbnail (or a multi-selection) to a new position. A blue bar shows where the pages will land.
• Rename: double-click the page number caption under a thumbnail and type a new name.
• Open the page menu: right-click a thumbnail for page actions, including template commands.
• Collapse: click the panel header (Collapse pages panel) to shrink it to a narrow rail; click the rail to expand it again.

Hover a thumbnail to see the page name and its dimensions.

Tip: reordering can flip a page from the left side of the spine to the right (or back). Popcorn Editor handles this for you: pages that use a spread template automatically swap to the matching left or right variant after the move.

Page-order view#

The canvas workspace normally lets you arrange canvases freely. When you want to see the document the way a reader will, switch to page-order view.

1. Open the View menu.
2. Toggle Page-order view.

The editor remembers where each page sat, then stacks all pages vertically in reading order, with facing pairs glued side by side. Toggle it off and every page returns to its previous free position.

Note: the stacking physically moves the canvases in the document. In a live collaboration session, teammates will see the pages move too.

Spread templates: left and right page templates#

Booklets usually need mirrored layouts: page numbers on the outer edge, wider inner margins at the spine. Spread templates give you a linked left and right variant of one page template.

Create a spread template:

1. Design one page of the spread the way you want it.
2. Right-click the page (in the Pages panel or on the canvas) and choose Save as spread template. This command appears only in facing-pages documents; Save as page template is always available for a single-sided template.

The result is one template with left and right variants, marked with a spread · L+R badge wherever templates are listed.

Apply it to pages:

1. Right-click a page and choose Apply page template… (or Apply to pages… to target a range such as 1-4, 7, 9-12).
2. Pick the spread template.
3. Under Spread placement, choose how the variants land:

With Auto (per side), the pairing stays correct even as you add, delete, or reorder pages: whenever a page changes sides, its template variant swaps automatically.

Export: reader's spreads vs. single pages#

A facing-pages document can export two ways, and the right choice depends on who receives the file.

1. Open the export dialog via File ▸ Download.
2. Choose PDF and set Color space to Print (CMYK).
3. Tick Reader's spreads (side-by-side pages) if you want each facing pair rendered as one wide page.

As the in-dialog hint puts it: "Each facing pair exports as one wide page. Turn off for print-shop single pages."

Use reader's spreads for proofs, client review, and on-screen reading, where seeing the spread as one image matters. Leave it off when sending files to a printer: print shops impose booklets themselves and expect individual pages. The cover still exports as a single page either way, since it has no partner.

Note: reader's spreads and step-and-repeat imposition are mutually exclusive. While reader's spreads is on, the imposition options are hidden.

For everything else in the dialog, see The export dialog and Print-ready PDF.

Next steps#

• Facing pages build on the general multi-page workflow; read Working with multiple canvases for adding, duplicating, and resizing canvases.
• Set up shared margins, numbering, and repeating layout in Page templates before you pour in content.