This Week in InDesign Articles, Number 8
Safari is about to burst under the weight of all these articles I’ve kept open for you. (Yes, I know there are better ways to bookmarks articles, but I’d never remember to look for them again. I need stuff right in front of my face reminding me, or else it never gets done.)
- Ever wondered why InDesign has a Pencil tool? You must watch this video of Gareth Hinds roughing out a page of his graphic novel in InDesign! (In a later video, he exports to jpg, prints, and then uses a “real” analog pencil).
- Keith Gilbert reminded us that you can change the order of the Glyphs panel, which may help you find characters faster.
- Need a set of predefined layers when you create documents? Here’s a script that adds layers automatically! Even cooler, you can set up “sets” of layers and then choose which set you want when a new document opens.
- Thomas Silkjær has made a bit of gold again with this free script for making custom frames behind blocks of text. This is quite amazing, actually. For example, if you want a light blue frame behind a paragraph, and the paragraph breaks across two columns… this script can still do it for you! If you use it for a real job, please click the Donate button on his site.
- Thanks to CreativePro.com for pointing out this awesome hour-long, free webinar recording that Michael Murphy did on the topic of making Acrobat Forms with Adobe InDesign. If you do forms, you need to watch this.
- I really enjoyed seeing this reminder of how designers specced type in the “bad ol’ days.” It drove me to go buy a used copy of How to Spec Type by Alex White. (WorldCat.org can tell you where you can find that book in a nearby library.)
- Anne-Marie pointed out this page at Adobe.com that shows the PDF Compatibility Levels. Very handy!
- Are you planning on upgrading to Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard)? If so, check out my friend Jeff Carlson’s book on the subject.
Well, that’s enough for today. I still have some other new goodies here that I need to read (thanks to Mike Rankin’s Publicious blog). In the meantime, I hope you enjoy these!
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Thanks for the tips. I was particularly interested in Thomas Silkjaer’s custom frames script, so I downloaded it and tried it. It works great except for one major limitation (major at least for me): the frame it creates is column width rather than slightly larger than text width.
For me, where this fails is when I need to have the frame behind text that is indented left and right from the column margin. For example, if a standard paragraph runs the full column width, say 144 points, but the text I need framed runs only 72 points wide and is indented 36 points on both left and right, the script creates a frame that is 144 points wide, not 72 points + x points on either side. Perhaps there is a way around this, but I couldn’t find one with the script.
Elsewise, the script works great.
Rich: I’m glad the script can be of use! What you request is a quite easy fix, and I will make sure to release an update ASAP.
Actually it was a bigger task for me to make sure it fit the column and not the text width. If your text is indented 36pt in both left and right, and you run ragged right text, would you want the box to be added from column +/- the 36pt or would you like it to be added from the longest line of the text? Alternatively I could add support for a “negative padding”? What would be easiest to control for you?
Thomas, thanks for the response here. (I left a similar comment at your website, not realizing you would see it here. I apologize for the duplication.)
Generally, I use left justification as I am typesetting books. On occasion I do use ragged right for certain types of text in the books. And, although I used equal L/R indents in my example, depending on the element, the left might be indented 36 points and the right 24 points, or some other combination.
So, I’m not really sure how to answer your question. If it were the ideal situation, I would like to be able to set the left and right parameters based on the parameters of the paragraph style adding 3 points to each side. That is, if the L/R settings for the text were 36/24, the frame would be 33/21, that is, using the +/- system.
One of the nice things about your script was that if I selected several adjoining paragraphs and applied the text style to them, the frame continuously covered all of the paragraphs. With that in mind, how would it work if the standard was the longest line of text and I chose 5 bulleted items whose lengths were unequal?
The script is updated to support “negative padding” :)
David,
Your lists are great with useful, interesting and fun “stuff”. I do, however, have one huge complaint. You have to stop recommending books. Some people are addicted to drugs or alcohol…I’m addicted to books! Because I am of the type-specing, galley, rubber cement, 8 typeface, EditWriter 7500, ain’t never heard of WYSIWYG cause they haven’t invented it yet, era…I had to order the type specing book. It will be here tomorrow.
I grouse but please keep writing, and recommending…I’ll keep buying and reading!
The “How to Spec Type” book just came in. It is great! In many ways, I think that it should be part of any graphic artists training. There is a lot to be said for knowing how and why something became what it is…a good example being upper and lower case type!
How many of us still have “e-gauges” next to our keyboards? I have a great 12 inch one from Agfa Compugraphics that has points, pica, inches, line weights, line spacing and type sizes…all on clear plastic…and I use it all the time.
Again, thanks for the list!!!
I’m trying to find Thomas’ script and cant find it. His website must be down. I tried googling for creating-automatic-text-boxes, but no luck. I was sure I saved this one but after a long time not using it now I cant find it…