The flexibility of cascading styles
Use all the power of VideoPsalm’s cascading styles to quickly create clear and attractive presentations.
Examples of what you can do with cascading styles
- Change the font for all texts at once or just for one verse.
- Assign a background image to all verses in a chapter or to all Bibles.
- Left-align the text of all verses of a song, or only of a particular verse.
- Adjust the information displayed in the footer (author, copyright, etc.) for a particular songbook.
Tip
It is important to keep an eye on the currently selected style level.
The current style level is indicated in the toolbar, at the top left.
In the screenshot below, the style level is set to “Verse”:
Subsequently, for as long as the style level remains on “Verse”, all style changes that you do will be assigned to the selected verse (and only to that verse).
Which style level to use?
Then, make sure that the style level is set to “Song”.
The new background will be applied to the song (to all its verses).
Style levels for songbooks
| Icon | Style level | Validity range | Priority |
|---|---|---|---|
 | Song verse | Selected song verse | Highest priority |
 | Song | Selected song | |
 | Songbook | Selected songbook | |
 | Songbooks | All songbooks (i.e. not for Bibles) | |
 | Base | All slides (songs and Bibles) | Lowest priority |
Style levels for Bibles
| Icon | Style level | Validity range | Priority |
|---|---|---|---|
 | Bible verse | Selected Bible verse | Highest priority |
 | Bible chapter | Selected Bible chapter | |
 | Bible book | Selected Bible book | |
 | Testament | Selected Testament | |
 | Bible | Selected Bible | |
 | Bibles | All Bibles (i.e. not for songbooks) | |
| Base | All slides (songs and Bibles) | Lowest priority |
Let’s see some uses for the style levels:
The “Base” style
Use the “Base” style to define the global defaults.
The “Base” style allows you to define the default attributes for all slides, for song verses, Bible verses, etc.
Set a default font, font size, color, text margins, and transitions at this level.
Important
The background of the “Base” style must be chosen carefully.
This background is displayed when the screen is “off”.
The screen is usually turned off between two songs or Bible verses, or when you manually “turn off” the screen:
Normally, you will want to assign a solid black background to the “Base” style.
To display your church logo whenever the screen is switched off
- Assign the church logo to the “Base” style level background.
- Assign a different background to the “Songbooks” style level. This way, each song verse will get displayed with the songbooks style background (and not with the “Base” style background).
- Similarly to the songbooks, assign a different background to the “Bibles” style level.
Additional read
The “Songbooks” style
It is useful to assign a generic background image to all songs.
That way, all song verses will get displayed with this default background, as far as it is not replaced at a higher style level (“Songbook”, “Song”, “Verse”).
You may also want to adjust the margins of the body, header and footer.
Additional read
The “Songbook” style
Normally you won’t have to adjust style attributes here, unless it is a “Bible verse” songbook or an “Announcement” songbook.
Additional read
The “Song” style
Sometimes you will want to assign a specific background to a song.
All the verses of the song will get displayed with this background, except those that have a specific background.
Remember that the “Verse” style level has the highest priority.
The “Verse” style
This style has the highest priority. Its settings override the lowest style level attributes.
Sometimes you will want to assign a specific background to a song verse, or change the alignment of its text, etc.