Thursday 10 January 2013

InDesign Workshop 1

The workshop - part 1;
InDesign is an industry standard piece of layout software, very useful piece of software to use for printing, as it ha very advanced print features, more advanced than Illustrator or Photoshop. InDesign should be your programe of choice when using multiple pages. Many similarities between InDesign, Photoshop and Illustrator, lots of the same tools, that work in the same way.

Selecting 'New' then 'Document' usually always choose this, as the others are too advanced.

Page size;
Comes up with a box like this. Use InDesign for print most of the time therefore leave the 'Intent' as print. First change the 'Page Size' to what we want it to be. Not appropriate to use American sizes, but we also have the option to just type in whatever size we want to page to be.
Facing pages;
We can specify the number of pages that we would like to use. Next to this there is a box that has been checked as 'Facing Pages' this depends whether the format is going to a book like format, the facing pages are the pages which face each other.
Column;
If I need to set column I can do this, this will help me to arrange the page and will be able to see guides, they are there to use and be helpful, but it won't effect the print itself.
The gutter;
The gutter is the space between the columns.
Margins;
You can also set margins on the page, the margins will put guides on the page so that you can position your content in the correct place on the page. There is a button on the right that says 'More Options' which comes up with this box;

Bleed;
This extended box is very useful. The bleed is to do with cropping and trimming. Produce a bleed so that there is no white edge, then set trim marks so that you know where you should be cutting it. This gives us the opportunity to put a bleed on the outside of the page, always add a 3mm bleed, just in case.
Slug;
Slug will appear in the area that contains the printers marks, trim marks, registration marks, folding marks, things that are printed but are lost when the page is trimmed down. It is used to set the area outside the page, within which things will print, so it doesn't just stop at the bleed.

Changing document;
To change this information about the page go to 'File' then 'Document Setup'. To change the Margins and Colums you can go to 'Layout'.

Allows you to see a thumbnail of the entire document, when you click on these pallets. If you click on the arrow down with three lines, you will find options to change the document or change the number of pages.


This will give you these options where you can change the amount of pages. This gives you an easy way of navigating through the documents rather than scrolling through and looking for your correct document. Adding pages to the document shows you this;


Then to remove the documents you can justdragging the pages down to the little rubbish can.

Facing pages;
When selecting a new document and selecting 'Facing Pages' this is the difference between the two, as when they have 4 pages the look very different, as they have a different layout.

Creating guides;
You can add guides onto a page by just dragging the ruler and positioning it where you want it, this will give you a guide line.



Go to 'Layout' then 'Create Guides' this will give you this box, and will allow more accurate guides, and position them exactly where you want them to be.


By selecting 'Rows' 6 and 'Columns' 4 it gave me this.

To type text, you have to go to the type button then drag the text frame, so that you can see the box that you will be writing in.
Filling text box;
Going to 'Type' then "fill with Placeholder Text' allows you to so a large body copy text, which doesn't make sense but it does allow you to the text even if you don't have content to go in it. It looks like this;

This is the text box that has been filled.



There are different places where you can go to get your text formating options.


Text Box;
You can move the text box and the size and shape of the frame of the text box. The text will change according to you changing the size and shape. You can have as many text frames as you would like on a page. You don't have to contain all of the text that you want to use in the frame, use as many as necessary.
Lining text box;
When moving the frames around you may see a pink guide appear, this means that this frame is now centered within in the frame. There will also be a green guide that will appear when you find that you are in lined with another text box.

Importing Text;
You can import text from a different programe such as 'Word' or 'Illustrator' rather than typing it back in again, you can import text from a different file. By going to 'File' then 'Place' you are able to drop text from another document into you current document.

Considering placing images;
Bringing them from different programes there are different things that you need to consider, these are the things you need to consider.

To place the image you go to 'File' then 'Place' then choose the image from your files, it will them come onto the page and be stuck t your mouse, therefore click once to drop it onto the page, you can move afterwards using the selection tool.

Cropping the image;
If you are wanting to crop the image, you just use the selection tool, and by holding the it down, you can see what is being cropped out, whereas if you just drag it will purely remove.
Enlarging pictures and making them smaller;
By enlarging the image in InDeign it is lowering the resolution of the picture, you can do it but you shouldn't do it with Photoshop images. Making the image smaller will not lose quality it will although cause problems during printing. Although when they are an illustrator file, they are able to be enlarged or made smaller.


Other ways to import images;
Go to the 'Rectangular Frame tool, and create a box, then go to 'File' then 'Place' and select my image, this will then go into my frame, as it is selected.

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