This Week in InDesign Articles, Number 83

I’m at Macworld/iWorld Expo in San Francisco this week, exploring what’s new in the world of Mac OS and iOS, and trying (hard) to avoid the many booths that focus almost entirely on iphone and ipad cases. I’m still trying to get rid of the beautifully decorated, white leather iphone 4 case that says “hell” on it that someone gave me last year! (I keep hoping that it really says “hello,” but no…)

Anyway, in the meantime, I’d better send out this list of cool blog posts, articles, videos, and more that I think every InDesign user should know about:

I wrote an article for InDesign Magazine on Tracking Down Obscure Glyphs in InDesign, which is now available to everyone at creativepro.
Our newest lynda.com InDesign Secrets videocast is up! Two movies come out every other week, and the free one is Anne-Marie talking about how to make your own motion path for the Animations panel. (If you have a subscription, you can also watch my video on moving vectors back and forth between InDesign and Illustrator.)
Note: If you’re not a lynda.com subscriber already, use this URL to find our videos and use this link to get a free one-week trial: lynda.com/trial/indesignsecrets
For anyone making maps, here are a bunch of free “passenger/pedestrian” symbol signs you need on hand!
Laying out a book cover for a book that will be printed “on demand”? Read this article about design considerations you need to think about.
I never worked at a newspaper, but I still love reading them… on paper! But this is a fun 15-minute video that describes how newspapers were created in the good ol’ days. Worth watching, just for the paper tape (with binary code) to hot metal typesetting, if not for the mind-boggling method of getting a halftone. It’s amazing anything ever got printed!
Making a restaurant menu? You should watch Nigel French’s short video title on the subject at lynda.com!
It’s a brand new world… one where new versions of software pop up all the time, instead of once every 12 or 18 months. Here’s the release notes on the newest version of the Adobe Digital Publishing Suite (DPS).
Hey, unless you’re living under a rock, you know that Apple announced (and shipped) iBooks Author and iBooks 2 last week. If you’re curious, here’s a good (and technical) write-up on the format that iBA exports. And another one. And number three. Jeez, they just keep coming! And here’s a chart that shows how iBooks Author stacks up against InDesign.
Are you in Finland, Sweden, or Denmark? Go see Rufus and Terry next month! (My son wants to go to Denmark, solely for the Lego. Well, someday.)
Twixl Publishing has a great system for building iPads app from InDesign. Check this video out to see how easy it is. Or read through this easy step by step to see how it’s done.
You know you like chrome effects! It’s cooler than flat color. Check out how Mike does it in this video.
Even though this is about TeX rather than InDesign, I have to admit, I love the title of this question: How do I make my document look like it was written by an Cthulhu worshipping madman?
And, if you really want your head twisted around, read this explanation of why an ebook with ebooks is slightly heavier than an empty one. (I love this kind of science… you’ll see more evidence of this when my new book comes out this autumn.)