Beginner’s Desktop Publishing Volume 3, June 2013
Navigating InDesign
Adobe Moves to the Cloud
Effective June 17, 2013, Adobe is retiring its Creative Suite (CS) in favor for its new, online Creative Cloud (CC).
With this redesign, CC users will gain access to additional features not offered in prior CS bundles.
Among these features will be access to online design communities such as Behance and Prosites, video training modules, Muse Mobile and Edge Animate software, and cloud storage – 20GB for individuals, 100GB for businesses. Users can also download the programs for both Windows and Mac platforms, rather than purchasing each separately. Other bonuses features include access to Business Catalyst web hosting, automatic updates as soon as they are released and the Creative Community – which functions as a social networking community for design professionals.
Along with the bundle changes, comes a change in pricing. Adobe is replacing its one-time upfront purchase fee with a monthly subscription plan. At $69.99 for businesses, $49.99 for individuals and $29.99 for students, the new CC will cost slightly more Than CS Standard, but contains the features previously available only in CS Premium. (see Table 1) This new pricing plan may also help to make the software more accessible students and individuals who cannot afford the large upfront fee. The reviews from existing customers are mixed.
Many CS customers are not pleased about paying for a monthly subscription rather than owning it outright.
At the end of the day, Adobe believes that the additional features will be the main selling point. With just under 500,000 new subscribers, they just may be onto something.
In This Issue Adobe Moves to the Cloud 1 How to Read the Document Window 2 Exporting to PDF 2 Making the Most of Your Toolbox 3 Which PDF Preset is Best? 3 Book Covers 4 Layers 4
Table 1
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How to Read the Document Window
Many of the pages that you see every day have a grid. You may not see it but it is there, holding up the design, establishing structure, guiding the page elements. A grid is an invisible structure used to guide the placement of elements on your page. Grids don’t appear on the printed piece but their presence helps create a sense of unity when designing a document. They are a series of guidelines that determine the margins of the piece, space between page elements (headlines, body text, photographs, etc.), and let you know where to put things on the blank page. Just like a house’s blueprints, InDesign grids help you build your document from the bottom up.
C – The Magenta Line The magenta box within your black page or spread lines represents your margins – or the blank border on the side of your page. Margins that lie too close to the end of the page may be cut off during the printing process. This is your document’s frame. D – The Purple Line The purple lines represent the number of columns that you have chosen for your document. InDesign lays these columns out for you proportionately in order to ensure an even distribution and unity. Columns are your document’s interior walls. E – The Red Line The red box outside of your document is your bleed. With a bleed you can print elements to the end of the page. Like a porch, the bleed lines help you to extend your document’s workable space outside the margins for a clean, polished finish. F – The Blue Line The blue InDesign guide represents your slug line. The slug is a place to store printing, custom color bar and other information. Like a shed, the slug contains important items that you may not necessarily want to store inside your document’s “house”.
Exporting to PDF A & B – The Black Lines These lines represent your final page and spread size. A page is a single document, such as the cover of a magazine. A spread contains two or more pages that face each other, like page 2 and 3 of this newsletter. This is your document’s foundation.
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T he simplest and fastest way to ensure that all
viewers, including those without InDesign, can view your piece just as your created it is by exporting the document to PDF. Exporting to PDF also limits editing capabilities, ensuring that your document will not be changed. To export to PDF, click File>Export> Adobe PDF>Save
Making the Most of Your Toolbox
Like most Adobe products, InDesign is equipped with an entire toolbox designed to increase your productivity. The toolbar can be found at the right of your InDesign window. Each component group can be dragged within the toolbar so that you can place your tools in the order that is most relevant to you. Additionally, some of the tools have multiple options. For example the rectangle tool icon can be expanded to also choose an ellipse or a polygon. The expandable groups all have a small, black triangle in the bottom right-hand corner. Let’s explore some of the most commonly used tools: Selection Tool: This is the white arrow at the top lefthand corner of your toolbox. You can use the Selection Tool to select entire objects or groups of objects by dragging the tool over the items to be selected. Direct Selection Tool: Located directly to the right or below the Selection Tool is the Direct Selection Tool. This tool allows you to select just one point on an object’s path and can be used to warp a shape. Type Tool: The Type tool has two options from which to choose. You can use the standard type which allows you to create text within a text box or you can select Type On A Path to create shaped text on a line or shape that you have already created. Frame Tool: This tool can be used to create text or image frames. You can use this tool to create shaped
Which PDF Preset is Best?
When exporting an InDsign file to PDF, you will have three presets to choose from: ◊ The first preset is smallest file size. This is used when designing a document to be viewed online. This is also useful when the document is intended to be posted in a cloud-based document management system like Sharepoint and DropBox as it reduces the amount of space used. ◊ The second preset is high quality print. This is the best preset for documents intended to be printed on home printers. This saves your document at a 300 dpi so as to not lose image quality. ◊ The final preset is press quality. This setting should always be used for any doocuments that will be professionally printed. This option preserves all your colors and transparencies.
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text boxes or images. By placing the frame and then inserting an image, you can change the image without losing its spot on the page. This is also useful for creating rounded images from rectangular graphics. Eyedropper: If you are familiar with Photoshop, then you will recognize the eyedropper tool. This can be used to select colors from a document. It can also be used to copy character attributes and line fills. Gradient Tool: This tool can be used to apply gradients to a single image. It can also be used to apply a gradient to multiple images simultaneously. Free Transform Tool: This tool can be used to freely alter the shape of an image or shape. It’s worth noting that the Free Transform Tool may alter the image’s proportions. Scale Tool: Unlike the Free Transform Tool, the Scale Tool is useful for quickly resizing graphics or shapes. The scale tool will maintain the original proportions.
Book Covers
your spine width.
To begin your cover, you will need to know the trim size and the spine width measurements for your book. It ’s sometimes best to wait until you have a final version of your interior file, which will provide the final page count and determine
You may wish to include images in your cover. These should be cropped to the exact size you wish for them to appear, flattened, color-adjusted, and ready to place on your cover file.
Layers
One of InDesign’s most crucial features is the Layers Panel. With the realease of CS5, Adobe completely revamped this panel in order to allow increased functionality. Here are some highlights of this feature: ◊ Individually name layers ◊ Layer visibility can be turned on and off ◊ Individual objects can be selected by opt/alt
Any text that you wish to include in your cover should be saved in a word-processing file, edited and spellchecked. This could include back cover text, author biography, title, subtitle, etc. You may want to include additional guides to assist in creating your cover file. Creating a horizontal line that marks the center of your cover, and creating two vertical lines on the front and back covers to mark the center is a good idea.
Any graphics or colors that are intended to bleed should be extended out to the bleed lines. Any text should be placed at least 1/8” inside the trim lines.
Using the Type Tool, draw a square and then either type or copy and paste your book’s title into the square. Next, using the Black Arrow Tool, position the text box on the front cover where you would like it to appear. Follow the same steps for all other cover text, such as subtitle, author, back cover text, etc. Keep in mind that if your page count is under 100 pages, you should not create spine text. When you have completed your cover file and are ready to make a PDF, save the InDesign copy of your file first. Then select File > Export. Name your file and select the location of where you would like to save it. Click Save. A settings box should open. Follow these guidelines for creating the PDF settings:
Under Adobe PDF Preset drop-down menu, select the default setting of High Quality Print.
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