SOS Botany - inDesign

Intro to InDesign

InDesign is used to combine text and images in preparation for print.

File Management

1. Create a new folder on your desktop. Name it yourlastname-project.
2. Copy all images your are going to use in your project into a subfolder in this project folder
3. Make sure to save your project file into this folder

Setting up your document

1. Launch InDesign and choose Create new Document
2. From the New Document window choose the following:
   • # of page = X
   • Orientation = X
   • # of Columns = X
   • Margins = X inches
   • Gutter - X inches
3. Click OK

Margins and Guides

1. Note the margins of your document. Make sure to keep your text and artwork within this boundary
2. Add a Guide to help you place and align objects on your document
   • With the black arrow select tool, click and drag from the ruler area into your document

Adding Text

1. Select the Text tool and drag diagonally to create a frame on your document, start typing.
   • You can also Copy and Paste text from other applications
2. Using the black arrow tool select a corner of the bounding box to rezize

Text Flow

You can flow text between multiple text boxes

1. Text boxes that are too small to contain all of the text will have a red + box in the lower right corner
2. Click this box and the cursor changes to the "Text Loaded" cursor
3. Click anywhere on your document and a new text box will be created flowing text from the previous text box
4. Use Guides and your Margins to snap text boxes into alignment

Formatting Text

1. Select the text you want to format (Command A to Select All is a useful shortcut here)
2. Change your type using the character and paragraph options in the top property bar

Add an image

By default, images placed into InDesign are only linked. It is important to have a good file management strategy to keep your images properly linked to your InDesign document.

1. Create a Frame as a placeholder for your image. Make sure it is selected
2. Go File > Place
3. Locate the image on your local hard drive that you want to place and click Open
4. The image will fill the frame but if it's too big portions may be cropped.
5. To fit the image to the frame, right click on the fram and choose Fitting and choose the appropriate way to fir your content

If you did not use a frame for your image...

1. Your cursor changes to the "Image Loaded" cursor. Click your cursor where you'd like the image placed.
2. To resize your image hold down the Command AND Shift key then grab a corner of the bounding box and drag to resize.
   • Note what happens if you forget to hold down these keys...

Text wrap around an image

1. Select the image and from the top properties bar choose the text wrap option you'd like
2. Move a text box near/over and image to see the text wrap around the object

Wrapping it up

Placed images in InDesign are by default only linked to the original image file. There are advantages to this but it can create problems when moving files around. You must move your graphics and images together.

If you need to gather up all of your images into one location your final step in saving your work is to "package" your InDesign document and linked images. If you have been working with a project folder that contains your InDesign document and image files this final step is unnecessary.

1. Save your work File > Save
2. Package your document to create a folder of your InDesign doc with all linked images. Go File > Package
3. Click Package
4. Add any special instructions and click Continue
5. Create the package folder.
   • Note the package options. You can accept the default of packaging the top three options from the list.
   • Note the folder name and location. Save locally first, you will eventually copy this over to Orca/programs. Click Package.
6. Click OK at the copyright warning
7. InDesign will now create a new folder that contains a copy of your project as well as all linked images in a Links folder.
8. Copy the entire folder back to Orca/Programs.

After the workshop...

When you want to continue working on your InDesign project

1. Copy the entire project folder down to your local harddrive
2. ALERT: Make sure to put all images into the Links folder within your InDesign project folder folder BEFORE placing additional images into your InDesign document. This will ensure that you will never have broken links to your images.