Great for magazine and poster design, this effect works best when you have dense text on a page. If you need to, brush up on the basics of creating a text wrap in InDesign here.

What You’ll Need to Create Your Text Wrap Effect

You’ll need access to a trio of Adobe programs—Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator and, of course, Adobe InDesign.

You’ll also need a photo or vector graphic with a strong silhouette and preferably no background or a white background, so it can be easily removed. 

Here, I’ve already created a layout for a magazine, complete with columns of text. You can easily apply this effect to any similar layout you have created.

1. How to Prepare Your Image

You can use either a photo or vector image to create your text wrap effect, but if you’re using a photo you will need to follow a few extra steps using Photoshop and Illustrator. To allow text to wrap around a silhouette, you will need to create a vector shape. 

If you have a ready-to-use vector shape, skip ahead to Step 4.

Step 1

You might have a part of the image you’d like to maintain in the final effect, such as the umbrella handle. In this case, you will need to isolate the handle in Photoshop. To begin, open the original photo in Photoshop. 

To remove a white or plain colour background, go to Select > Color Range. Click once on the background to pick up the colour, before adjusting the Edge Detection slider in the Properties panel that opens. 

When you’re happy with the tightness of the selection around the edge of the shape, click OK. Then hit Delete on your keyboard to remove the background. 

Step 2

Use the Lasso Tool (L) to loop off any part of the image that is not the handle (the part you’d like to keep as a photographic image in the final result). 

Then hit Delete to remove the selection. 

File > Save As the image as a Photoshop file, which will preserve the transparent background. 

Step 3

Open Illustrator and File > Place, choosing the original photo, as before, and opening it. 

Go to Window > Image Trace. 

In the Image Trace window, set the Mode to Black and White. Check the Ignore White box at the bottom of the window.

Check the Preview button, and then experiment with the Threshold, Paths and Corners sliders, until you’re happy with the traced result. 

When you’re done click Trace to exit the window. 

Go to Object > Image Trace > Expand. 

Select the Eraser Tool (Shift+E) and use this to separate any parts of the image that you won’t want to use in the text wrap effect. In this case, this is the handle of the umbrella, which will be substituted with a photo version. Delete any parts of the graphic you won’t use. 

Step 4

Your vector shape is ready to use—you can either save this as a vector file (e.g. Illustrator, EPS), or Edit > Copy the vector directly in Illustrator, ready to Paste into your InDesign document. 

2. Create the Text Wrap Effect in InDesign

Step 1

In InDesign, expand the Layers panel, and lock the layer which contains all the text in your document. 

Go to New Layer from the panel’s main menu, and create a new layer for the text wrap image to sit on. 

Step 2

If you have a photo element to your image, use the Rectangle Frame Tool (F) to create an image frame on the layout. 

File > Place the edited image you created earlier [in 1.1, above]. 

Step 3

File > Place or Edit > Paste (if you’ve copied the vector in Illustrator) the vector shape, and position it on the page. Use Shift and your mouse to scale it proportionally.

Expand the Swatches panel (Window > Color > Swatches), and set the Fill Color of the vector shape to [None].

Step 4

Go to Window > Text Wrap to open the Text Wrap panel.

Select the shape and choose the third option along, Wrap around object shape, from the set of icons at the top of the panel. You can experiment with the Offset value to make the text wrap tighter or looser. 

For these ‘invisible’ wrap effects, it’s usually better to have a tighter text wrap, and therefore a low offset value, such as 0 mm. 

Pro Tip

You may also want to create a subtle text wrap around some photographic elements on your layout. 

To do this, you can create a quick vector shape directly in InDesign using the Pen Tool (P). Trace your way around the element you want to wrap text around, lopping it round to create a complete shape. 

Then apply the Wrap around object shape option in the Text Wrap panel, and ensure the Fill Color of the shape is set to [None]. 

Great Job!

Your ‘invisible’ text wrap effect is finished. 

Why not try using this technique for a variety of different shapes to create interesting and stylish concepts in your magazine and poster designs?

Ready to get creative? Discover more great InDesign tutorials here, or brush up on your type skills with these typography tutorials.

The post How to Create Invisible Text Wraps in InDesign appeared first on InDesignSkills.

Here, we’ll look at what widows and orphans are, and share some quick and easy tips for banishing them from your typesetting.

What is a widow?

A widow is a lone word or short group of words that appears at the bottom of a paragraph, column or page.

They tend to make long sections of text look unbalanced and messy, as well as leaving too much excess white space at the end of a page.

What is an orphan?

An orphan is a similar unwanted straggler, but this describes words that appear at the top of a page.

Orphans really belong on the previous page, as not only do they look untidy on the page they appear, but they also break the flow of reading across two pages.

OK, got it. Now how do I get rid of them?

There are three quick and easy solutions to banishing both widows and orphans, leaving your typography beautiful and neat.

The directions below are descibed for InDesign users, but you can observe the same general processes whichever design software you’re using.

Solution #1: Slightly extend the edge of your text frame

It’s amazing how even extending the side of your text frame just a millimeter or two can tidy up those widows and orphans, and it’s barely noticeable that the frame is larger than others around it.

In InDesign, take the Selection Tool (V, Escape) and pull the right or left edge of your text frame slightly, extending it until the orphan or widow is pulled into the main body of the paragraph.

Solution #2: Apply optical margin alignment to your text

Optical margin alignment is a method of shifting small text elements like commas, apostrophes and serifs to sit outside the edge of the text frame. As well as being a great way of making your paragraphs look generally more symmetrical and attractive, it’s also a nifty way of helping to get widows and orphans in line.

In InDesign, go to Window > Type & Tables > Story.

With the text frame selected or your Type Tool (T) cursor set in the paragraph, check the Optical Margin Alignment box. You’ll notice a subtle shift across some of the text. If your widow or orphan is a short word this can be enough to make them toe the line.

Solution #3: Apply tracking or kerning to the text

Some designers would argue that reducing tracking (letter-spacing across a group of words or a paragraph) is the lazy solution to banishing widows and orphans, but in some situations it’s simply necessary.

If you’re dealing with only a tiny word that is stubbornly resistant, reducing kerning (letter-spacing between individual letters) slightly between either some of the letters of the word, the preceeding word or in the space between the two final words of the paragraph is a more elegant solution.

In InDesign, use the Type Tool (T) to highlight the whole paragraph, the final sentence or the final few words of the paragraph. From either the Controls panel running along the top of the workspace or the Character panel (Window > Type & Tables > Character), reduce the Tracking (symbolised by a VA on top of an arrow) to -5 initially. Reduce the Tracking further to -10 etc, until you’re happy with the result.

To adjust Kerning, place your type cursor between the two letters you’d like to draw slightly together, then look for the V/A symbol in the Controls or Character panel. Adjust to -5, and repeat between other letters until the widow or orphan is pulled onto the previous line.

Looking for more quick typography tips? These quick and simple tutorials will turn you into an InDesign pro in no time.

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Here, we’ll look at some quick and effective tips for fixing overset text, making your documents error-free in no time.

1. I have an error, is it overset text?

The problem: “I have a red ‘error’ flagged up; but how do I know it’s overset text?”
The solution: Identify the root cause in the Preflight panel

You may have noticed a small red circle at the bottom-left of the InDesign workspace, next to ‘x errors’ text. When you go to File > Export an InDesign document, InDesign will also alert you at this point if there are any errors in your document that require attention before exporting.

Errors come in various forms—from missing font files to missing image links—but one of the most common errors you will come across is overset text.

Usually, this is because you’ve been happily occupied tweaking font sizes and leading, without realising that a couple of lines of text have slipped beyond the edge of the final text frame. In more extreme cases, you could have pages of unwanted overset text brought in from a placed Word file, or simply a case of Edit > Paste clicked one too many times.

But there’s no need for tears. Overset text is easy to fix. It all starts with identifying it as the problem in the first place.

Click on the red ‘error’ circle at the bottom of the workspace to open the Preflight panel (or go to Window > Output > Preflight).

In the panel that opens, you’ll be able to see areas of errors capitalised, in the case of overset text this will be ‘TEXT’. Click on the arrow symbol to the left of ‘TEXT’ to expand the error.

Expanding each ‘Overset text’ in turn will reveal the source of the error, i.e. ‘Text Frame’, with a page reference highlighted in blue to the right.

Click on the page number to bring up the culprit on screen.

Now we’ve located the overset text, you can fix it quickly and easily. Read on to find out how…

2. How to find the overset text

The problem: “I can’t see the overset text!”
The solution: View ‘invisible’ overset text

Sometimes it’s difficult to know whether you’re dealing with a single paragraph of overset text or several pages.

To make the overset text visible, place your cursor in the text frame and go to Edit > Edit in Story Editor.

And voila! All the overset text is marked by a red line.

From here, you can edit the overset text, highlight it, Copy or Cut it, or Delete it.

3. How to fix overset text

The problem: “I can’t get rid of all this excess text”
The solution: Ctrl+Shift+End

Manually highlighting text in the Story Editor and deleting it from here is a good solution for removing small amounts of overset text. But what if you’re dealing with pages upon pages of unwanted text?

This is where a simple keyboard shortcut comes in handy. First, place your text cursor at the end of the text you want to keep. Then:

(Windows) Ctrl + Shift + End to select all overset text, then hit Delete to remove it

(Mac) Cmd + Shift + fn + Right-arrow to select all overset text, then hit Delete to remove it

Problem sorted! Now you can get on with exporting your document, and generally get on with your day.

Want more InDesign quick tips? These quick and simple tutorials will turn you into an InDesign pro in no time.

The post Quick Tip: How to Fix Overset Text in InDesign appeared first on InDesignSkills.

Baseline grids are super simple to use and instantly make layouts look ultra-professional. Let’s look at how to activate them and snap text to the grid lines.

Why Do I Need to Use a Baseline Grid?

A baseline grid is a grid of horizontal lines that are evenly spaced across your document. Without the grid visible it can be tricky to make your text perfectly aline across your document.

A baseline grid is particularly handy for multi-column or spread-based layouts, like magazines, flyers or EPUBs, where you have multiple text frames lined up next to each other. Overall, it promotes a more uniform, professional look across your InDesign documents, so it’s well worth doing.

How to View the Baseline Grid in InDesign

Before making the baseline grid visible you can edit its settings by going to Edit > Preferences > Grids (Windows) or InDesign > Preferences > Grids (Mac).

From here, you can adjust where the grid starts on the page (from the Relative To menu you can select whether you’d like the grid to start from the top of the page or the top margin), and how far apart you want the lines to be spaced (measured in pt; you can set this to match your desired Leading setting).

With your preferences defined, go to View > Grids & Guides > Show Baseline Grid.

The grid will now be visible on all pages of your document. If it doesn’t appear initially, you may need to zoom into the page to make it visible.

How to Snap Text to the Baseline Grid in InDesign

Open up the Paragraph panel (Window > Type & Tables > Paragraph).

To snap text to the grid either place your Type Tool (T) cursor into one of the text frames or highlight all the text you’d like to apply the action to.

Then click on the Align to Baseline Grid button at the bottom-right corner of the Paragraph panel. All the lines of text will snap into place, aligning perfectly with each other.

If you save your formatted text as a Style (Window > Styles > Paragraph Styles), the same baseline grid alignment settings will apply to all text you go on to apply that style to. This is really useful if your document is very long.

Want more InDesign quick tips? These quick and simple tutorials will turn you into an InDesign pro in no time.

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While they may look elaborate, these text effects don’t take long to put together using Adobe InDesign. This method also keeps the text editable, so you can quickly and easily change the letter while preserving colors and effects.

Ready to get started? Let’s dive in…

What You’ll Need to Create Your Decorative Letter

All you need is access to Adobe InDesign and a font of your choice.

Serif fonts with a more traditional style tend to work best with this vintage-inspired look. For the lettering designs pictured here, I’ve used Didot (Bold) and Mr Darcy (Regular).

Here’s what we’ll be creating*.

*You can adapt the design to a letter of your choice; simply follow the same steps below, tweaking details to suit your letter choice.

Step 1

Open up InDesign and go to File > New > Document.

Create a new document to any size you prefer. Here, I’ll be working on an A3 single page. Click OK to create your document.

Step 2

Begin by using the Type Tool (T) to create a large text frame in the center of the page.

Type in your letter, here ‘C’, and set the Font to your chosen style (here, Didot Bold) from either the Controls panel running along the top of the workspace or the Character panel (Window > Type & Tables > Character).

Make sure the Font Size is generous, here I’ve increased it to 600 pt*.

*If you want to incorporate your letter into another design, you can later vectorize your letter by going to Type > Create Outlines, and scale the whole design more easily.

Step 3

You’ll need a palette of four color swatches to create your decorative letter. For this particular design, I’m going to use four of the default colors already provided in the Swatches panel.

But if you’d like to use different colors for your design, you can create new swatches by selecting New Color Swatch from the Swatches panel (Window > Color > Swatches).

Step 4

Select the letter by highlighting it with your Type Tool cursor, or use the Selection Tool (V, Escape) to select the text frame. Head up to Object > Effects Inner Glow. This will add an inner color to your letter.

Click on the colored square to the right of the mode menu at the top of the window that opens. From here, you can choose one of your color swatches to apply to the glow. Here I’ve gone for red.

Back in the Effects window, under the Options section below, set the Technique to Precise, Source to Center, Choke to 100% and Noise to 20%. You can tweak the Size of the glow depending on the size of your text.

Step 5

Click on the Drop Shadow option at the top of the Effects window’s left-hand menu. This will add a colored shadow to the outside of your letter.

Choose a contrasting color for the Effect Color. Here I’ve gone for cyan.

Tweak the Distance, Angle and Size until you’re happy with the position of the shadow. Increase the Spread to 100% and add about 10% Noise.

Step 6

Click on Outer Glow in the Effects window menu. This will add a highlight shadow to the outside of your letter.

Adjust the Mode to Normal, and you can either keep the Effect Color set to the default [Paper] (white) swatch, or choose a different contrasting swatch.

Add about 20% Noise and increase the Spread to 100%, before clicking OK to exit the window.

Step 7

You can add extra decorative elements to your letter by using the drawing tools in InDesign’s Tools panel, which is docked to the left-hand side of the workspace.

Use the Pen Tool (P) to create curved elements, holding down your cursor to create curved lines, and allowing the shape of the letter to guide the design.

To tweak the shape of your drawing, use the Smooth Tool to smooth out kinks, and the Direct Selection Tool (A) to directly select anchor points and adjust their position.

Step 8

You can combine shapes to create decorative elements. Here, I’ve used the Ellipse Tool (L) to draw a circle over the top of the letter, meeting the curved line I’ve already created, creating a simple tear shape where the two shapes meet.

Use the Scissors Tool (C) to cut away unwanted parts of shapes…

…and go to Object > Paths > Join to unite shapes.

Step 9

Give your shape a contrasting Fill Color (here, cyan) from the Swatches panel.

Go to Object > Effects > Inner Glow to add an inner color to the shape. As before, set the Choke to 100%, and Source to Center. Tweak the other options until you’re happy with the effect.

Step 10

You can Edit > Copy, Edit > Paste shapes and flip or rotate them by Right-Clicking > Transform.

You can also use the Ellipse Tool (L) to create quick and easy polka dot decorations for your design.

Step 11

Your decorative letter is finished! Great job!

You can easily change the letter and preserve the colors and effects by typing in a different letter into the text frame. All you have to do is adjust the decorative elements on top to complete the effect.

Here are a few other letter designs I created using the same technique.

This ‘S’ uses a bold color combination of cream, mustard, pink and green. The Font used is Mr Darcy Regular. I’ve used the Pen Tool (P) to create arrow embellishments, and the Ellipse Tool (L) to create a polka dot effect.

This ‘E’ is set in Didot, with a color palette of cream, orange, pink and white. I created the inner stripe on the design using the Rectangle Tool (M).

Next in this series

Looking for more typography tips? These quick and simple tutorials will turn you into a typography pro in no time.

The post Quick and Easy Decorative Lettering in InDesign appeared first on InDesignSkills.

What is Kerning?

Kerning is the process of increasing or decreasing the space between individual characters, adjusting the position of letters in relation to others. It’s commonly used on prominent pieces of text, such as headlines and logos. Note that tracking, on the other hand, is used to adjust the letter-spacing uniformly over a range of characters (read more about tracking).

Why Do Designers Use Kerning?

Although the process of tweaking kerning may be very subtle, it can have significant effects on the legibility and overall presentation of text.

Designers kern letters to improve the overall symmetry of a word or phrase, which the default tracking settings provided in the font file may not be able to achieve alone.

As well as having an instant beautifying effect on text, kerning can also have an effect on the readability of the text. When done well, words just read better.

However, a note of caution! There are many infamous examples on the web of kerning gone wrong, when poorly kerned letters have formed unintended or, in some cases, downright rude, words.

How Do I Apply Kerning?

In InDesign, you can adjust kerning from either the Controls panel running along the top of the workspace or the Character panel (Window > Type & Tables > Character).

Select the Type Tool (T), click your cursor to the left or right side of a letter, and increase or decrease the kerning (which is measured in thousandths of an em) by choosing from the default options (which jumps in sequences of 5’s, 10’s, 25’s and 100’s) or typing in a number.

Pro Tips

Observe these top tips whenever you kern to keep your text looking as professional as possible.

• Certain letters require more kerning attention than others. Slanted letters like W, V, K and A tend to sit too far away from other letters when kept to their default spacing. Letters with arms or large serifs, such as T, L and K may suffer from the opposite problem, tending to sit too close to other letters, creating an overcrowded effect. So make sure to comb your designs for these problem letters.
• Flipping your text upside down (or click on a page in the Pages panel, and Right-Click > Page Attributes > Rotate Spread View > 180°) before you kern is an age-old tip beloved of typographers. This allows you to asses the spacing between letters on a purely visual level, without being distracted by the meaning of the word. It’s an eccentric tip that works surprisingly well.

Want more typography tips? These quick and simple tutorials will turn you into a typography pro in no time.

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Here, we’re going to find out more about letter-spacing or Tracking, including what it is and how you can adjust letter-spacing to improve your own design work.

What is letter-spacing / Tracking?

Tracking is the typographer’s term for letter-spacing. Sometimes confused with kerning (which is used to adjust spacing between individual letters), tracking adjusts the letter-spacing uniformly over a range of characters.

Tracking affects the visual density of a word, phrase or paragraph. Decreasing the tracking makes the words appear more compact, while increasing tracking increases the amount of white space between letters and words, creating a more airy effect.

Why Do Designers Use Tracking?

Designers apply tracking for two main reasons:

• Firstly, when tracking is increased it can improve the readability of text. Letters and words are more visually distinguished from each other, allowing the eye to process them more easily than if characters were pushed closely together.
• Many designers apply tracking to improve the look of typeset text. Increasing or decreasing tracking has the power to reduce the amount of hyphenation in a paragraph, and banish widows (lone words at the end of a paragraph) and orphans (lone words at the top of a page, which should belong on the previous page).

In the second image the tracking has been reduced. This pushes all the letters closer together, causing the same number of words to fit onto less lines (which removes the widow ‘eat’).

How Do I Apply Tracking?

In InDesign, you can adjust kerning from either the Controls panel running along the top of the workspace or the Character panel (Window > Type & Tables > Character).

Use your Type Tool (T) cursor to either highlight the text or use the Selection Tool (V, Escape) to select the whole text frame*.

The tracking option is indicated by an ‘A V’ symbol with an arrow sitting below, and is found alongside the other most commonly used text formatting options in the Controls or Character panel. Measured in thousandths of an em, you can either choose a positive (to increase the spacing) or negative (to decrease) value from the drop-down menu, or type in a numeric value in the text box.

*For a linked sequence of text frames selecting the first text frame will apply the tracking settings to the text flowing across all the frames.

Pro Tips

Tracking may be simple to do, but professional designers still have a few tricks up their sleeve for making the most of this type technique.

• Tracking may be a quick-fix for line-spacing, but combining tracking with kerning will really lift your typography to a professional standard. As tracking affects the spacing between all characters, it won’t take into account specific spacing requirements between particular letters. So make sure to combine these two techniques for maximum effect.
• Tracking goes hand-in-hand with leading, which is the space between lines of text. Generous tracking requires generous leading; otherwise you may end up with paragraphs that appear stretched horizontally and look disproportionate.
• Sometimes it just doesn’t look right to apply negative tracking to your text, which can make paragraphs appear squashed. If this is the case but you still have widows or orphans ruining the look of your typesetting, apply optical margin alignment to try to shift outlying elements, like serifs and apostrophes, to the outside of your text frames, giving yourself a little more breathing room. Go to Window > Type & Tables > Story and check Optical Margin Alignment.

Want more typography tips? These quick and simple tutorials will turn you into a typography pro in no time.

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Here, we’re going to find out more about leading (or line spacing), including what it is and how you can apply it in your own design work.

What is Leading?

The definition of leading is: the distance between two baselines of lines of type. The word ‘leading’ originates from the strips of lead hand-typesetters used to use to space out lines of text evenly. The word leading has stuck, but essentially it’s a typographer’s term for line spacing.

Why Do Designers Use Leading?

Leading is one of the quickest and simplest tweaks you can do to make your text look instantly better.

If you’re working in design software like InDesign, the program will set a default leading value whenever you type up more than one line of text. However, this is not usually generous enough, and can make paragraphs look squashed. This works fine if you’re creating a crammed front page for a newspaper, but less well for most other purposes.

Increasing the leading allows the text to breathe and makes it appear instantly more attractive. For readers it has practical advantages too—increasing leading makes text easier to read, and it’s also kinder on reader’s eyes over longer periods of reading.

So if you’re designing a book or magazine layout, increasing your leading will ensure your audience is captive for longer.

How Do I Apply Leading?

When working in InDesign, once you’ve created a piece of text using the Type Tool (T), you can adjust the leading from either the Controls panel running along the top of the workspace or the Character panel (Window > Type & Tables > Character). To edit the leading across a whole section of text, either highlight the text or click on the text frame to select it.

Leading is always positioned below or next to the Font Size option. Setting the leading to Auto will apply InDesign’s default leading for the font size you currently have applied. You should see this as a minimum value for your leading. Increasing the leading (which is measured in points, pt) will increase the line-spacing across your paragraph.

To apply a particular leading value to just one line of text (e.g. if you want to separate a paragraph visually from a heading positioned above), highlight the line you want to shift downwards and increase the leading.

Pro Tips

Leading may seem straightforward enough but designers have all sorts of tricks and tips for making the most of this simple type technique.

• While generous leading can improve the look of paragraphs, making the leading overly generous can disrupt the flow of the text and impact on legibility. Print out different leading settings before going to print, to make sure you can read the text comfortably.
• Setting text against a colored or dark background? Apply slightly more generous leading than normal to make the text ultra-clear to read.
• Different fonts will suit different leading settings, as the x-height (the height of lowercase letters) will vary between fonts. Fonts with shorter x-heights won’t require as much leading as those with taller lowercase letters.

Want more typography tips? These quick and simple tutorials will turn you into a typography pro in no time.

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This guide shows you five easy ways* to create a failsafe font combination every time, and suggest appropriate ways to use each font pairing style. Read on to find your font dream team…

* These five font pairings are based on using one font for the headline (the main title on your page) and another font for the body text (the longer paragraphs which make up the bulk of content on your page). If you want to add sub-headings or pull-out quotes setting text in an italic weight is always a wise move, or try using a bold or condensed version of your body text font to add contrast while keeping the typography looking polished.

1. Sans Serif Headline + Serif Body Text

This is the most common font pairing style designers will use when they want to make their typography look instantly more polished and professional. Why does this font pairing work so well? Firstly, the pairing has high contrast, which creates interest and stimulates the eye. Secondly, this pairing feels at once both classic and contemporary, which makes it suitable for all sorts of layouts. Finally, bookish serifs tend to be easy to read, while sans serifs add a more modern, sophisticated flourish, making it a pairing that’s both functional and stylish.

Within this font pairing style, you’ll find that certain sans serifs look better teamed with particular serifs. A good starting point is to decide on a headline sans serif that you really love, and then rotate the serif body text through several options until you find the font that looks just right.

One of our favourite font pairings is headlines set in Bebas Neue, with body text set in Caslon. A sub-heading set in Adobe Caslon Pro Italic adds the perfect finishing touch.

2. Headline + Body Text Fonts From the Same Font Family

Most fonts belong to a typeface family—a group of fonts which vary in weight (e.g. bold, italic, book etc) but ultimately have the same base design. A family may also include more stylised variations of the original roman weight, such as condensed, outlined and expanded.

Some font families contain as few as three fonts, while others might extend to include dozens of fonts. These larger font families are known as ‘superfamilies’.

Pairing two fonts taken from either the same family or superfamily is a quick route to creating a design that feels pulled-together and elegant. The success of this sort of pairing rests on the shared similarities between the chosen fonts, rather than contrast, which has a calming effect on the eye. For layouts which require a more traditional, formal or conservative style, this sort of font pairing is the perfect choice.

That’s not to say that sourcing two fonts from the same family needs to be dull. In fact the vast range of font styles you can track down within a superfamily can give you plenty of variation, to keep your design looking playful. We love the combination of a Roboto Slab headline with Roboto body text. These fonts have very different weights but share the same rounded-geometric form.

3. Headline + Body Text Fonts Which Share the Same Mood

All fonts have a personality, whether it’s the bouncy optimism of a rounded sans serif or the serious conservatism of a traditional serif. Each font brings its own personality to a design, helping to give the whole layout a certain mood or vibe.

Professional typographers call this evasive sense of mood that a group of fonts share a ‘sub-category’. Some serif fonts, such as Bembo and Garamond, fall into the Old Style sub-category, with these fonts tending to have an old-fashioned, dignified personality. These work well paired with Humanist sans serifs like Frutiger and Gill Sans, because these too have an old-fashioned, serious mood.

Here a Garamond headline and sub-heading makes a great team alongside Gill Sans body text.

Transitional serifs have a more modern mood than Old Style typefaces, which makes them a suitable pairing for Geometric or Rounded sans serifs, like Futura and Avenir. Here, a headline set in Mrs. Eaves is stylishly offset by Futura body text.

Modern serifs, such as Didot and Bodoni, have a classic elegance but feel more fun and fashionable than their Old Style relatives. Because they are more contemporary in style, they team best with Geometric sans serifs.

In this example, Bodoni and Open Sans make for an elegant font pairing.

4. Display Headline + Humanist or Transitional Body Text

You don’t always need to rely on blowing your headline up to large size to make an impact. Display or Headline fonts are specially designed to make text really shout for attention. These heavily stylised or chunky display fonts, such as FF Scala and Eczar, look fantastic paired with Humanist or Transitional body text, whether in serif or sans serif styles.

If you’re putting together a more design-forward layout which needs to grab a viewer’s attention, such as a poster or magazine cover, this font pairing won’t fail to turn heads, and it looks super-stylish too.

Here a headline set in Scala Sans Black is the perfect foil to the simple charms of Gentium Basic.

5. Round Sans Serif Headline + Old-Style Serif Body Text

Rounded fonts are youthful, and used alone give an almost childlike quality to a design. Pairing a rounded sans serif headline, like Woodford Bourne or Quicksand with more traditional serif body text exaggerates further the contrast that we looked at with the serif/sans serif font pairing at the start of the article.

This is a more space-age version of that pairing rule, giving layouts a futuristic spin that feels clean and cutting-edge. In this example the exaggerated tracking of Quicksand as the headline makes the ultimate contrast with neat and pulled-together Garamond.

Still feeling overwhelmed with the sheer choice of fonts on the web? Check out our pick of the best fonts for every purpose and budget.

The post The Beginner’s Guide to Font Pairing appeared first on InDesignSkills.

Here at InDesignSkills we’re all about making your life easier, while picking up some awesome new design skills along the way. Read on to find out how you can create a light-up neon text effect directly in InDesign in under 5 minutes.

How to Create a Neon Effect

Light-up neon type is fantastic for adding nighttime glamour or a moody 1980s feel to your designs. This sort of text effect would look great on a poster or event flyer, and it’s so easy to do!

Step 1

I’ve set up the effect pictured here on a landscape A3 page (go to File > New > Document), though of course feel free to adapt the page size to suit your own purposes.

Expand the Layers panel (Window > Layers) and rename Layer 1 as Background. Use the Rectangle Tool (M) to create a shape that extends across the whole of the page.

For the text effect to have impact, you’ll need to give the rectangle a dark fill. Opt for [Black] in the Swatches panel (Window > Color > Swatches), or to recreate the color used here, click on New Color Swatch in the panel’s drop-down menu. Double-click the new swatch to edit it, setting the CMYK values to C=85 M=76 Y=61 K=93.

Step 2

In the Swatches panel create a further two new swatches:

Dark Pink – C=10 M=100 Y=0 K=0

Pale Pink – C=5 M=12 Y=0 K=0

We’ll use these to layer up the dark and light tones of the neon effect. If you want the neon effect to be a different color, say blue, create two swatches in the same way, one dark blue, one pale blue.

Step 3

Head back to the Layers panel and lock the Background layer. Create a new layer above and name it Typography.

Take the Type Tool (T) and create a large text frame in the center of the page. Type in your text, and from either the Controls panel at the top of the workspace or the Character panel (Window > Type & Tables > Character), choose your preferred Font. To create a more authentic neon sign effect, I’ve gone for a script font, Burtons Script.

From the Swatches panel, set the Font Color to Dark Pink. Once you’re happy with the size, position, font and color of the text, you’re ready to outline the text. Note that this means you won’t be able to adjust the formatting of the text, so Edit > Copy, Edit > Paste the text frame, moving the copy over to the pasteboard to preserve a copy of your text if you like.

Step 4

Select the original text frame and go to Type > Create Outlines, to vectorize the text.

Edit > Copy, Edit > Paste the vector, moving the copy over to the pasteboard. We’ll be using this a little later.

With the vector selected, go to Object > Effects > Outer Glow. Set the Mode to Screen, Opacity to about 20%, Noise to 3% and Spread to 70%. Click on the colored square to the right of the Mode menu to open the Effect Color window. Choose Dark Pink from your list of Swatches.

Click OK to exit the Effects window.

Step 5

Select the vector and Edit > Copy, Edit > Paste in Place, layering it directly over the first vector.

Go to Object > Effects > Outer Glow and increase the Opacity to 80% and bring the Spread down to about 40%.

Step 6

You can now start to build up the lighter tones in your neon effect.

Head over to the pasteboard and select the vectorized version of the text you pasted over there back in Step 4. Select it and Edit > Copy it, moving the copy over onto the page and positioning it directly over the top of the other text vectors.

Adjust the Fill of this new vector to Pale Pink.

Then head up to Object > Effects > Transparency. Set the Mode to Screen and pull the Opacity down to 70%.

Click on Outer Glow in the window’s left-hand menu and set the Mode to Screen and Opacity to about 65%. Choose Pale Pink for the Effect Color.

Click on Drop Shadow at the top of the window’s menu and set the Mode to Multiply, Opacity to about 40% and the Effect Color to Dark Pink.

Add a final effect to this vector by clicking on Gradient Feather at the bottom of the window’s menu. Choose Radial for the Type, and then click OK to exit the Effects window.

Step 7

To make the neon effect really pop, we can add a final layer of light over the top of the text effect.

To do this go to Edit > Paste to drop another copy of the vectorized text onto the page. Position directly over the top of the other vectors, and adjust the Fill to Pale Pink.

Go to Object > Effects > Transparency, and set the Mode to Screen and Opacity to 50%.

Click on Outer Glow and choose Screen for the Mode and Pale Pink for the Effect Color. Reduce the Opacity to about 50%, and increase the Spread to 40%. Click OK to exit the window.

And you’re done! This cool neon text effect will really make your designs pop—why not try using it on a gig or club flyer for extra impact?

Want to pick up some new typography skills? Browse beginner tutorials to find simple tips and tricks to make your type designs look super professional.

The post Create a Neon Text Effect in InDesign appeared first on InDesignSkills.

Here at InDesignSkills we’re all about making your life easier, while picking up some awesome new design skills along the way. Read on to discover an incredible stone text effect you can create directly in InDesign in under 5 minutes.

How to Create an Engraved Stone Text Effect

Looking to channel Game of Thrones in your designs? This engraved stone effect brings drama and ancient appeal to text, making it a fantastic match for advertising and poster work.

Step 1

We’ll set up all of the effects here on a landscape A3 page (go to File > New > Document), though of course feel free to adapt the page size to suit your own purposes.

Expand the Layers panel (Window > Layers) and rename Layer 1 as Background. Use the Rectangle Frame Tool (F) to create an image frame that extends across the whole of the page.

For this effect you’ll need to find a stone background image, preferably one that’s not too dark, to allow the shadows to stand out. Here I’ve used this grey stone background image from Shutterstock. Go to File > Place, choose your image, and click Open, allowing it to fill the whole image frame.

With the frame selected, go to Object > Effects > Gradient Feather. Set the Type to Radial and allow the gradient to extend from darker around the outside of the image to lighter at the center.

Step 2

Lock the Background layer and create a new layer above, renaming it Typography.

Use the Type Tool (T) to create a large text frame on the center of the page, and type in your text.

From either the Controls panel running along the top of the workspace or the Character panel (Window > Type & Tables > Character) choose a Font for your text (here I’ve used Simplo Bold) and set the text in All Caps.

Step 3

Select the text frame and Edit > Copy it, preserving a copy on the pasteboard.

With the text frame selected go to Type > Create Outlines to convert the text to a vector format. Then go to File > Place, choose your stone background image as before and Open it, allowing it to fill the outlined text.

Step 4

Now you can start adding effects to your text, to add depth, shadow and highlights.

Select the vector text and go to Object > Effects > Transparency. Set the Mode to Multiply.

Then click on the Bevel and Emboss option in the window’s left-hand menu. Set the Style to Inner Bevel and Technique to Smooth. Play around with the Size, Depth, Angle and Shadow and Highlight Opacities until you’re happy with the effect.

To give the impression that light is being cast from above over the stone, you can add an Inner Shadow. Click on this option in the window’s menu. Adjust the options until you’re happy with the depth, direction and strength of the shadow.

Click OK to exit the Effects window.

Step 5

If you want to make your effect even more graphic and strong you can add stronger shadow effects at the top and bottom of the type.

To do this, Edit > Paste in Place your earlier text frame on top of the existing type effect.

Use the Eyedropper Tool (I) to pick up one of the darker shades from the surrounding background image. Double-click the picked-up color which is now visible at the bottom of the Tools panel. Click into one of the CMYK text boxes, and then choose Add CMYK Swatch. From the Swatches panel (Window > Color > Swatches) you can now apply the swatch to the text color.

Select the text frame and go to Object > Effects > Transparency. Set the Mode to Multiply.

Click on the Gradient Feather menu option, and apply a Linear gradient at a 90 degree angle, extending from darker at the top of the text, to lighter at the bottom.

Select the text frame and Edit > Copy, Edit > Paste in Place. Go to Object > Effects > Gradient Feather and click on the Reverse Gradient button to the right side of the Gradient Stops slider.

And you’re done! This high-impact stone text effect has a cinematic feel—why not try using it on a poster for extra drama?

Want to give your typography skills a refresh? Head to the beginner tutorials page to find fun and simple tips and tricks to give your text the wow-factor.

The post Create an Engraved Stone Text Effect in InDesign appeared first on InDesignSkills.

How to Create and Format Vertical Text

Step 1.

I’ve prepared a single-page document in InDesign, set to a standard ‘Architectural D’ poster size, 610 mm (24 in) in Width and 914 mm (36 in) in Height, with a 5 mm Bleed around the edges of the page.I’ve also placed an image of a ballet dancer onto the page, and locked this layer, creating a new layer above from the Layers panel (Window > Layers). When creating your own vertical text effect, you may also want to edit this on its own layer, so you don’t mistakenly move around any other elements sitting below.

Image of a ballet dancer from Shutterstock

Step 2.

Once you have your page and layers prepared, you can get started with creating your vertical text effect.

From the Tools panel select the Line Tool (\) and, holding down Shift, drag your mouse down from top to bottom, creating a vertical line.

Step 3.

Select the Type on a Path Tool (Shift+T), which you can find in the Type Tool’s drop-down menu in the Tools panel.

Click once onto the top of the line to convert the line into a text path. Now you can type in the text you want to appear vertical.

Using the Type Tool (T), you can highlight the text and apply formatting like font, size and color from the Character Formatting Controls panel (running along the top of the workspace) and the Swatches panel (Window > Color > Swatches). The font used here is Charlevoix Pro.

You can also remove the automated black color of the line by selecting the line with the Selection Tool (V, Escape), and choosing [None] from the Swatches panel.

Step 4.

Open the Paragraph panel (Window > Type & Tables > Paragraph), highlight the text with your type cursor and set the alignment to Justify All Lines. This will pull the text across to fill the full length of the line. You can adjust the height of the line by dragging the horizontal lines which appear at the top and bottom of the line when the Selection Tool is active.

Step 5.

To switch the text to a vertical orientation, head up to Type on the top menu and choose Type on a Path > Options.

Under Effect, choose Stair Step. From the Align options choose Center. Click OK to exit the window.

Step 6.

Now your text is aligned vertically you can tweak the formatting to suit your layout.

Here, I’ve adjusted the kerning between certain characters to reveal the dancer’s face on the poster and create a more interesting typographic effect. You can adjust this from the Character panel (Window > Type & Tables > Character).

I’ve also created a faded effect to the text by repeatedly copying and pasting the vertical text line, and reducing the opacity by going to Object > Effects > Transparency.

I also applied a gradient (Object > Effects > Gradient Feather) running at a 0 degrees angle to enhance the fade effect.

Building a complete layout around your vertical text effect can be really fun—try teaming vertical text with rotated type and standard left-to-right text to create contrast and interest. Alternatively, creating a layout solely with vertical text can look amazing, and is a technique that was often employed by the Swiss School, who were interested in the qualities vertical text brought to grid-based layouts.

Want to update your typography skills? Our beginner tutorials page is a great resource for fun and easy-to-follow typography tips and tricks.

The post How to Create Vertical Text in InDesign appeared first on InDesignSkills.

Read on to find out how to create a simple drop cap in InDesign, and how to take your designs to the next level with stunning scale, color and graphics…

1. How to Set Up a Simple Drop Cap

Step 1

With your InDesign document open, you should first prepare a text frame on your layout using the Type Tool (T). Fill the frame with the paragraph of text you would like to add a drop cap too.

Highlight with your type cursor the first letter of the paragraph, or simply place your cursor somewhere into the paragraph.

From either the Paragraph Formatting Controls panel running along the top of the workspace or from the Paragraph panel (Window > Type & Tables > Paragraph), locate the Drop Cap Number of Lines option (indicated by an uppercase ‘A’ in the corner of a sequence of lines).

By clicking the arrows up or down, or by manually typing in a number, InDesign will set the drop cap to extend a specified number of lines, increasing the size of the character as it does.

You can also adjust the number of characters included in the drop cap by increasing the value of the Drop Cap One or More Characters, an option which you can find in the bottom-right corner of the Paragraph panel. This is perfect for when you want to pull out a whole word or phrase as part of your drop cap effect.

Step 2

A trio of simple tweaks will help you to get the most out of your drop cap and give it a professionally polished look:

First, go to Window > Type & Tables > Story, and check the Optical Margin Alignment box. This shifts any straggly serifs or apostrophes to outside of the text frame, giving the whole paragraph, including your drop cap, a cleaner appearance.

Is your drop cap crowding some of your paragraph text? Here, the tail of the ‘R’ is overlapping some of the body text. You can rectify this by placing your cursor between the drop cap letter and the first letter of the body text (here, between the ‘R’ and ‘o’ of ‘Romanticism’). Then, from either the Character Formatting Controls panel at the top of the screen or the Character panel (Window > Type & Tables > Character), increase the Kerning value, until the drop cap is separated sufficiently from the paragraph text.

Finally, you can shift the baseline of the drop cap to allow it to be more nicely framed by the surrounding body text. Highlight the drop cap with your type cursor, and then increase the Baseline Shift from the bottom-left option in the Character panel.

And there we have it! A simple, super professional drop cap which looks fantastic. Try pulling out the drop cap in a contrasting color using the Swatches panel (Window > Color > Swatches) to add even more drama to the effect.

2. How to Create an Advanced Drop Cap Effect

Step 1

You can give your paragraph’s text frame more of a creative look by creating a custom shape for the text to fill. You can create a range of shapes using the shape or drawing tools in InDesign, or use Adobe Illustrator to create something more unique.

Here I’ve used the Arc Tool and Line Segment Tool in Illustrator to create a curved rectangle shape.

I then Edit > Copy the shape, return to InDesign and Edit > Paste the vector shape directly onto the page.

Right-Click (Windows) or Ctrl-Click (Mac) > Content > Text to transform any vector shape into a text frame.

Step 2

Fill your text frame with text, making sure to remove the first letter of the paragraph (so here, I type ‘omanticism’, dropping the first ‘R’).

Create a second square text frame using the Type Tool (T), and type your intended drop cap character into the text frame (here, ‘R’).

Enlarge the character to your preferred size, and move into position over the top-left corner of the body text frame.

Step 3

Highlight the drop cap letter, and then head up to Type > Create Outlines. The character will be vectorized.

Then, with the vector drop cap selected, go to Window > Text Wrap. Set the text wrap option to Wrap Around Object Shape and tweak the Offset values to push the text away a little from the very edge of the letter.

Step 4

If your letter has any completely or partially enclosed areas, like the round counter of the top of the ‘R’ or the gap left behind the sweeping tail of the bottom of the ‘R’ here, you will need to ensure the body text is pushed out of these areas. This will add to the overall look of the drop cap and improve the readability of the paragraph.

To do this, take the Ellipse Tool (L) and drag over the drop cap letter, roughly filling any gaps.

With the ellipse shape selected return to the Text Wrap window and set the option to Wrap Around Bounding Box.

Select the shape and Edit > Copy, Edit > Paste if you need to push text out of any other gaps. Rescale and rotate the ellipse to fit the area best.

You might now need to move your drop cap letter (along with any ellipse shapes) up or down a little until the paragraph text flows around the shape evenly.

Step 5

Your advanced drop cap effect is basically finished, and if you choose to keep it set in a classic black color that can look very elegant.

However, you can also jazz up your drop cap with color by switching the Fill Color of the letter shape in the Swatches panel. This is a great way of making your drop cap the focal point of your layout.

Another creative technique is to fill your drop cap with an image, making it into an even more interesting feature of your design.

This is really quick and simple to do. Simply Right-Click (Windows) or Ctrl-Click (Mac) on the letter shape, and choose Content > Graphic. InDesign will now treat the letter as an image frame.

Then go to File > Place and choose an image. Patterns and landscapes look lovely, but close-up portraits of models and still-life shots can also look really impactful. Once you’ve chosen your image, click Open.

And there we have it! Drop caps are a fantastic technique for adding elegance and creativity to your magazine, stationery and book layouts.

Whether you opt for a simple style using InDesign’s inbuilt Drop Cap function or create your own custom design you’ll find that drop caps really are the cherry on the cake of a professional typographic layout.

Want to update your typography skills? Our beginner tutorials page is a great resource for fun and easy-to-follow typography tips and tricks.

The post Creating Beautiful Drop Caps in InDesign appeared first on InDesignSkills.

The best thing about them? They’re hiding inside some of your favorite fonts. Discover where you can find cool (and often free!) glyph sets…

 1. Adobe Caslon Pro 

Who knew there were so many gorgeous glyphs hiding away in one of our best-loved typefaces? These intellectual, vintage-style graphics would be perfect for adding to book page designs.

Adobe Caslon Pro:

2. Veneer Extras

These grungy, stamp-style glyphs will add a perfect hip-vintage twist to your print designs.

Veneer Extras (FREE):

3. IM Fell Flowers

Looking for medieval-style romance? You’ve found the perfect glyph font! These two sets of glyphs provide you with stylish, vintage-inspired floral borders and icons.

IM Fell Flowers I (FREE):

IM Fell Flowers 2 (FREE):

4. Floralia

Floral glyphs will always look feminine and elegant, and are ideal for wedding stationery.

Floralia (FREE):

5. Rhomus Omnilots

Stars, stars…and more stars. Add a celestial edge to your designs with these stylish glyphs.

Rhomus Omnilots (FREE):

6. Adobe Wood Type Ornaments

A set of classic-inspired glyphs from Adobe, including typography elements, borders and crests.

Adobe Wood Type Ornaments:

7. Nymphette

An extremely versatile set of scroll elements, borders and dividers, with an elegant, ornate look.

Nymphette (FREE):

8. Davys

Quirky, woodcut-style glyph graphics that would look great on book interiors.

Davys (FREE):

9. Zapf Dingbats

No-fuss, simple symbol glyphs with a clean, modern design. Great for digital projects or print designs that have a more contemporary style.

Zapf Dingbats:

10. Victorian Free Ornaments

These historical-inspired glyph sets provide beautiful, ornate graphics for adding a touch of Victorian grandeur to borders and dividers.

Victorian Free Ornaments (FREE):

Victorian Free Ornaments Two (FREE):

11. Adhesive Nr. Seven

These grunge-style ribbons and banners look great set behind type on designs that are looking for a bit of added detail. Try them out on menus, posters or flyers.

Adhesive Nr. Seven (FREE):

Can’t get enough typographic inspiration? Discover some of the best fonts for magazine and book design. Or take a tour of our Inspiration page to get your creative juices flowing.

The post Typography Secrets: Fonts with the Best Glyphs appeared first on InDesignSkills.

Read on to discover our selection of the best free and classic typefaces whose ampersands are the star of the show…

1. Classic Italic Ampersands 

Looking for elegance, formality and a touch of romance? These ampersands are classically beautiful, and will look fantastic adorning wedding invites, book covers or business cards (the InDesignSkills team’s personal favorite is the Fournier Italic ampersand)…

Adobe Caslon Pro Italic ampersand:

IM FELL French Canon PRO Italic ampersand (FREE):

Goudy Modern MT Std Italic ampersand:

Top pick – Fournier MT Italic ampersand:

2. Modern Sans Serif Ampersands

On the hunt for something a bit different—more clean, more contemporary? These sans serif ampersands might cut the mustard.

Note of caution: when using a contemporary-style ampersand, make sure that the glyph is still instantly recognizable as such—when a typeface tries to be different it can look too abstract for some purposes.

Lane Narrow ampersand (FREE):

Top pick – Museo Sans Rounded ampersand:

Sofia Pro Light ampersand (FREE):

Nikaia ampersand (FREE):

Molot ampersand (FREE):

3. Traditional Ampersands

Sometimes you just need an ampersand that looks traditional, respectable and sturdy—these guys do just that. If you want something that will be universally recognized and suit all manner of purposes, take one of these for a spin…

Baskerville ampersand:

Alegreya ampersand (FREE):

Top pick – Sorts Mill Goudy ampersand (FREE):

Adobe Garamond Pro ampersand:

 4. Script Ampersands

For an ultra-romantic style, look to flowing script typefaces for some of the most beautiful, French-inspired ampersands (our top pick is the Kuenstler Script ampersand)…

Linotype Zapfino ampersand:

Mutlu ampersand (FREE):

Great Vibes ampersand (FREE):

Top pick – Kuenstler Script ampersand:

Looking for more typographic inspiration? Check out our pick of the best fonts for magazines and books. Or delve into our Inspiration page to discover lightbulb ideas for your design projects.

The post Typography Secrets: Fonts with the Best Ampersands appeared first on InDesignSkills.

In this series of tutorials, How Did They Do That?, we dissect the tricks used by graphic design pros and share surprisingly simple tips that will make your InDesign work look ultra-professional, even if you’re a beginner to the software!

Examples of the Type on a Path Tool

We’re going to focus on how the Type on a Path Tool can be used in magazine design. Image + typography might be the consistent formula for selling issues, but this doesn’t mean the formula needs to be conventional. Magazine designers are always on the lookout for new ways to reinvent their covers.

Layering text in interesting, fluid ways over the top of striking photography is an attention-grabbing way to make covers look more artistic and exciting. It’s also a great technique for making the text interact more naturally with the curves, lines and shapes of an image.

Text is positioned along the curves of Sophie Hicks’ head, from Fraulein Magazine

Graffiti-style headers sit on irregular baselines, from Elle Indonesia

A chalkboard-style cover, from Milwaukee Magazine

This technique might look tricky, but it’s anything but. You can recreate the style easily in Adobe InDesign with the Type on a Path and Pen Tools.

It all comes down to a few simple steps…

Step 1: Create a New Layer for Your Typography

Create a basic cover in Adobe InDesign, to a size that you prefer. On the existing layer, use the Rectangle Frame Tool (F) to create a new image frame, and File > Place a photo in the frame.

Look for photos with strong shapes and curves—portraits of people work well, as do aerial photos with plenty of white space in-between items on the photo (this doesn’t have to be actually white, just one plain background color which will allow text to appear legible).

I’ve used this aerial shot of rolls of bread on a wooden board. There’s plenty of curves and lots of space for placing text, without being interrupted with too much detail beneath.

Create a new layer from the Layers panel (choose New Layer from the panel’s drop-down menu), and rename the layer Typography.

Lock the bottom layer, to avoid moving the photo around by mistake. You can make room for a header, and subtitle at the top of the page.

Step 2: Use the Pen Tool (P)

From the Tools panel choose the Pen Tool, or hit P on the keyboard.

You can use the Pen Tool in two ways. One, by simply clicking onto the page and creating a series of joined straight lines. The second way, which we’re going to use here, is to click and drag onto the page to create a curved line, then click again to create a second curve joined to the first and so on

Move across to the pasteboard, next to the page, to experiment with creating curved lines with the Pen Tool. You can do this quite easily without a graphics tablet, but it might take a little bit of practice to get the curves looking really smooth and fluid.

Move back onto the page, and use the Pen Tool to draw smooth curves around one section of your selected photo.

You can use the Direct Selection Tool (A) to select the anchor points and handlesof the line, and adjust them by either dragging or using the arrows on the keyboard. You may also find it useful to set the Stroke Color of the line to a bright, contrasting color for now, to make it easier to see.

Step 3: Use the Type on a Path Tool (Shift+T)

Once you’ve created your line, head back over to the Tools panel. From the Type Tool drop-down menu, choose the Type on a Path Tool (Shift+T).

Hover your cursor over one edge of the line and click once. The curved line will be transformed into a type path. You can now type in text, and apply formatting in the same way as you would for text in a text frame.

Remove the color of the Stroke and set it to [None].

Here, I’ve used two fonts to create a bold, uppercase effect, set in a white, [Paper], color—Aachen Std…

…and Return to Sender.

Repeat the process, using the Pen Tool (P) to draw curved lines around parts of the photo, and then transform them into text paths using the Type on a Path Tool (Shift+T).

Format the text using the Formatting Controls panel at the top of the workspace, or from the Character panel (Window > Type & Tables > Character).Vary the Font Size, Font and Color to create an eclectic, interesting look.

Great work! Try applying the technique to different photos and layouts—this effect also looks great on posters and cards.

Craving more pro design tips? Discover how to design a movie poster, or how to create an impressive 3D effect for magazine design.

The post Type on a Path in InDesign Tutorial appeared first on InDesignSkills.

Discover these simple tips for enhancing your photographic layouts by playing with scale, color and typography.

Tip Number 1: Don’t Be Afraid to Go Black-and-White

Sure, full-color photos can look amazing, but if you’re looking for something all-together cooler in your layouts, don’t be afraid to use black-and-white photography.

Greyscale images make a superb backdrop for punchy typography, which looks great on magazines, posters and flyers.

To recreate the layout design shown here, just follow the steps below.

Step 1

First up, create a New Document in InDesign (go to File > New > Document) and create your page or spread at the size you would like. Use the Rectangle Frame Tool (F) to draw a frame and expand across the whole page.

Step 2

Download a ready prepared black-and-white image like this one of a desert road, or open up a color photo in Adobe Photoshop and use the Black & White Adjustment available in the Layers panel to desaturate the image of color. Resave the image, and then return to InDesign.

Step 3

With the rectangle frame selected, go to File > Place to drop your black-and-white image inside the frame; then choose Fill Frame Proportionally from the top control panel to fit the image nicely in the frame.

Step 4

Expand or open the Layers panel (Window > Layers) and lock Layer 1. Create a new layer on top of this by choosing New Layer… from the panel’s drop-down menu.

You can experiment with your typography on this layer, without worrying about shifting the position of the photo frame below.

To mimic the style of the text pictured here, download and install the free font Sanchez. Using the Type Tool (T) set each individual letter of the heading in its own separate text frame. Set the Font to Sanchez Regular, and vary the size of the letters to give a sense of movement.

For this particular photo it makes sense that the letters would decrease in size towards the horizon to give the impression of distance, but you might find that a different arrangement will work better for your particular photo choice.

Step 5

Acidic, neon colors work so well against black-and-white photos. Here, I’ve used a zesty, pure yellow. Create a new CMYK swatch from the Swatches panel (Window > Color > Swatches) and set the values to C=0 M=0 Y=83 K=0.

To recreate the hazy effect used across the heading, drag your mouse across the page to select a number of text frames and Right-Click (Windows) or Ctrl-Click (Mac OS) > Group. Then with the group selected, go to Object > Effects > Transparency. Under the Transparency settings set the Mode to Overlay.

Move down the left-hand menu in the Effects window and select Gradient Feather. Adjust the angle and harshness (by adjusting the slider stops) of the gradient.

Then click OK once you’re happy with the result.

Tip Number 2: Take a Closer Look…

Playing with the scale of your photos can make a huge difference to the impact of your layout.

If you have a very high-quality image, like this one…

…try zooming into the details to give the photo a more interesting focus. Getting really close-up to the details of a photo is a fantastic way of getting the reader to notice the quality and beauty of a particular photograph.

To edit the scale of images in InDesign, first File > Place your image into an image frame; then double-click inside the frame to directly select the image. Hold down Shift while you drag the corners outwards to maintain the proportions of the photo.

Tip Number 3: Make Photos and Type Interact 

It’s all very well placing text beside or on top of a photo, but sometimes it can look, well, a little dull.

Look out for photos which allow you to place text on top in an interesting, interactive way.

Take this example layout. With the woman positioned centrally on the layout, we have plenty of room to get creative with text. To the left side, the text is set in Adobe Caslon Pro Regular and has a conventional horizontal format.

To the right, to exaggerate the snow being blown from her hands, letters in Adobe Caslon Pro Italic are set in individual text frames and rotated slightly to create a jaunty, animated appearance.

A gradient (Window > Effects > Gradient Feather) applied to the letters as a group adds to the overall effect.

Ready to start using photos in your layouts? First discover breathtaking photo layout inspiration here, or get back to basics with our InDesign images tutorial.

The post InDesign Magazine Layouts: Working With Photos appeared first on InDesignSkills.

This easy-peasy tip is the secret weapon of professional typographers, and will impress your designer friends without a doubt!

1. What is Hanging Punctuation?

There are a couple of tricks up the sleeve of a professional graphic designer or typographer to make their text formatting look particularly spectacular, and Hanging Punctuation is one of them.

Hanging Punctuation refers to the shifting of small punctuation marks, such as apostrophes and commas, and elements of characters, such as pokey serifs, to outside the normal boundaries of a block of text.

Without applying hung punctuation, paragraphs of text can appear visually uneven, and not seem completely symmetrical or straight. Typographers know that hung punctuation is a subtle but incredibly effective technique for achieving an ultra-professional look in their designs.

2. InDesign to the Rescue: Optical Margin Alignment

You can achieve the hung punctuation effect with next-to-no effort by using InDesign’s handy Optical Margin Alignment function.

Take a look at this magazine spread for the article Spirit of Adventure.

Hmm, OK, it’s looking alright; but that apostrophe at the start of the first paragraph sure is taking up a lot of space.

Head up to Window on InDesign’s menu, and go to Type & Tables > Story. This opens up a little-know panel called the Story panel, and in this panel we have an option called Optical Margin Alignment.

Just take a look at the difference it makes. Here, we have no Optical Margin Alignment applied.

Ta-dah! With the text frame selected and the Optical Margin Alignment checkbox ticked, that great big apostrophe is shifted to outside the boundary of the text frame, and the whole body of text on the rest of the article is subtly shifted; with punctuation marks and serif elements pushed to sit outside the line of the text.

Doesn’t it look so much nicer?

And it’s as simple as that!

Try to get in the habit of applying Hanging Punctuation to any design where you’re dealing with longer paragraphs of text—guaranteed it will make a world of difference to the quality of your typography.

To pick up some more typography tricks and access our library of InDesign articles and tips why not pay a visit to our InDesign tutorials page?

The post Typography Skills: Hanging Punctuation appeared first on InDesignSkills.

Let us guide you through the recommended sizes for typesetting books, and make sure nobody’s going to need to strain their eyes.

1. Why Does Font Size Matter?

Typesetting is an unsung hero in the publishing world. When you read a book that has high-quality typesetting, you probably won’t even notice it. Good typesetting will make the book more legible, easy-on-the-eye and be superbly suited to the genre and context of the book.

Font size is the most crucial factor in typesetting a book, but it can be tricky to get it just right. The ‘ideal’ font sizes listed at the bottom of the article are given as part of a recommended range. Whether you lean towards the smaller or larger end of the range will depend on some of the following factors. Take note, and choose your type size in accordance:

Q: Is the book long or short?

A publisher might want to be economic with the number of pages if a book is going to be long. If that’s the case, edge towards the smaller end of the size scale. You can also reduce the size of the Margins on your pages to squeeze more text onto the page.

If the book’s short, a publisher might want to increase the number of pages to make the book look fatter, and therefore appear to be of higher value to a browser. Increase your font size (and your Leading [the space between lines of text]) if this is the case.

Q: Who is the Readership?

Who is the book aimed at? This ties in with the genre of the book as well. Will the audience be intellectual (literary and classic fiction), or will they be looking for a quick, absorbing read (‘airport’ fiction, romance, thrillers, young adult fiction)? Are they adults or children (children’s books will often need a much larger font size)?

Some genres go hand-in-hand with a particular font size. It seems like an unspoken rule that more intellectual fiction requires a smaller font size, and therefore more concentration (or eye-strain, whichever way you see it) to read it. Nonetheless, a very slightly smaller font size communicates intelligence and seriousness, and will suit modern literary fiction and classic novels equally well.

Larger font sizes are more digestible, and will be more suited to typesetting 50 Shades of Grey than a Franz Kafka reprint.

So make sure to consider your readership, and the sort of font sizes they will be expecting to encounter.

2. The Perfect Font Size for Books

Of course, everybody has different preferences for book font size, and quality of eyesight can be a factor in shaping these preferences.

But assuming most people will fall in the middle of the spectrum (neither eagle-eyed nor poor-sighted) these font size ranges for headings and body text should cut the mustard each and every time…

Body Text:

Minimum 10 pt — Maximum 12 pt

Chapter Headings (‘A’ Headings):

Minimum 14 pt — Maximum 16 pt

Sub-titles (‘B’ Headings):

Minimum 12 pt — Maximum 14 pt

Make sure to think about your Leading too—as a general rule, try to make it a little more generous than the Auto leading value in InDesign.

Once you’ve decided on your perfect font size, you’ll need to find the perfect font too! Discover our pick of the only 5 fonts you’ll ever need for books or brush up on your skills for creating books in InDesign.

The post Choosing Font Sizes for Books: Get Your Typesetting Size Right appeared first on InDesignSkills.

Panic not! Here are 5 ways to spice up your designs super quickly and easily, and make them look instantly more attractive, polished and professional!

1. Make your Margins Wider

Never underestimate the transformative power of a generous margin around the edges of your page(s). It really is the simplest tip for making layouts look instantly more visually appealing, and giving text and graphics more breathing space.

Adjust your margins in InDesign by going to Layout > Margins and Columns, accessible from the top menu. Try increasing your existing margins by an extra 5 mm, and see your layout look more attractive pronto!

2. Limit your Colour Palette

Colour has the power to transform the mood of your designs, but introducing too much colour can make a layout appear cluttered and messy. Try to limit your use of colour to no more than three colour swatches to a page—you’ll be amazed how bold and punchy your design can become!

Another colour tip to make your posters and brochures look ultra-dramatic and to draw attention to headers and logos is to use just one colour on an otherwise monochrome layout. In the example below, white and black tones allow the red text to really pop and draw the eye.

Edit colour in InDesign using the Swatches panel (Window > Color > Swatches). Learn more about using colour in InDesign with our handy beginner’s guide to colour.

3. White Space is your New Best Friend!

Whenever you design your layouts remember this mantra: less is (almost) always more (I say almost because ornate layouts can look lovely in the right context; see Tip 5 below…). Even layouts that have a lot going on—text, graphics, colour, the lot!—will always benefit from a bit of breathing space.

This is what graphic designers call ‘white space’, which is effectively space on the page that’s empty of visual content. It doesn’t necessarily need to be white in colour; just a blank bit of background with nothing on it. This helps focus the eye on the content you want to draw the viewer’s attention to, and it makes the layout much less stressful to look at.

Introduce more white space on your layout by cutting down on the quantity of content or resizing elements to create more room on the page. Try to stick to a maximum of two main focal points on the layout, like in this example, where the image and header are the only things seeking your attention.

4. Tweak your Typography…

…Is your text looking a little lacklustre? Adding a Drop Cap to the start of your opening paragraph or increasing your Leading (the space between lines of text) may be subtle changes, but they can work wonders for improving your designs. Setting your headings and sub-headings in different Weights (Bold, Italic, Light, Black etc) can also create visual separation in text-heavy layouts.

Another tip used by design professionals is to apply Optical Margin Alignment to paragraphs of text. This creates ‘Hung Punctuation’, shifting punctuation marks outside the boundaries of a text frame, creating a more uniform block of text. InDesign will also subtly move any overhanging serifs on letters, so your text looks more perfected and polished.

You can find the Optical Margin Alignment option in the Story panel in InDesign (Window > Type & Tables > Story).

5. Get Fancy with a Border!

Minimal layouts can look beautiful—clean, uncluttered and easy on the eye. But what if your layout’s looking more bare than minimal? Sometimes, a little touch of something fancy can lift your layout and transform it into something special.

The easiest way to give your layouts a touch of the ornate is to introduce a Border. Borders frame your content, drawing the eye inwards, just as a picture frame helps to focus the eye on the image it contains.

Create a border in InDesign by using the Rectangle Tool (M), accessible from the Tools panel. Use your margin lines as guides for getting the border perfectly sized; then adjust the look of the border using the Stroke panel (Window > Stroke) and Corner Options (Object > Corner Options). Here, I’ve used a ‘Thin-Thick-Thin’ Stroke Type and a ‘Fancy’ Corner Shape.

Take note of these five tips when you create your own layouts—you’ll be amazed how a few subtle tweaks can transform your designs! And remember, above all, have fun with creating layouts. Design is meant to be fun; so feel confident with experimenting and breaking the rules (in moderation!).

Enhance your layout designs with some fresh font inspiration for magazines, books, or print design; or check out our beginner InDesign tutorials page for more tips and tutorials!

The post Five Ways to Improve your Layouts Instantly… appeared first on InDesignSkills.

In this, the second part, we’ll delve further into the world of typography and look at the ‘Big Four’ – the four special typographic effects you can apply to your InDesign layouts to make them really stand-out…

1. Leading

Leading is the unsung workhorse of typography. If you’re looking at a paragraph of type and thinking “That looks great, but I can’t put my finger on why it looks so great”, it’s probably because the designer has applied some generous Leading to the text.

Leading is the word used to describe the space allocated between the lines of text in a block of type. Take a look at this example – at the top you’ve got a body of text with a default amount of leading applied, but the text on the page below that has a more generous leading. And it’s clear to see which one looks more clear and legible…

Leading is super simple to edit in InDesign; you can find the option to adjust it in the Character Formatting Controls panel, below the Font Size option:

2. T r a c k i n g

Tracking is the second of the typography ‘Big Four’ you should make a note of. Tracking defines the space between all characters (letters) in a section of text.

Upping the Tracking of type can make it instantly more legible, attractive and high-impact, without needing to increase the Font Size or adjust the Font Weight (e.g. to Bold or Black). Take a look at these two example chapter headings from the typesetting for an edition of Moby Dick. The lower example, with its increased Tracking, looks a bit more interesting, no?

You can find the option to adjust Tracking in InDesign, up in the Character Formatting Controls panel (when you have the Type Tool (T) selected), just along from the All Caps section. It’s symbolised by a two letters, ‘AV’ and a double-ended arrow. Hover over the icon and you’ll see that InDesign reminds you that this is for increasing or decreasing Tracking. 

By default, when you create any new text, the Tracking will be set to 0. But you can pick from a range of options for the spacing of your letters. You can reduce the space by picking from the negative values, giving the text a more compressed appearance, or you can choose to increase the spacing.

3. Kerning

Kerning is a much more subtle typographic technique, but it can really transform your type, and elevate it to a super-professional level. Kerning increases the space between individual characters, and it’s a great technique for evening out text that looks a little off-balance. It’s a particularly useful feature for transforming logos and headings.

Take a look at this example and play a game of ‘spot-the-difference’! If you think the lower heading looks a little more even and symmetrical you’d be right – a little bit of kerning between a couple of the letters has helped space out some of the characters that were a bit closer together.

To adjust Kerning in InDesign, set your type cursor between the two letters, head back up to the Character Formatting Controls panel and find the Kerning option just above the Tracking option. Click the arrow to the right of the text box to increase the space between the two letters by 10 units at a time.

4. Drop Caps

Another really cool typography feature in InDesign which can really pull your designs together is the option to apply a Drop Cap to your text.

A Drop Cap pulls out the first letter or few letters of a paragraph to a larger size, in units of lines of text. You can find the Drop Cap Number of Lines and Drop Cap One or More Characters options in the Character Formatting Controls panel, just along from the alignment and indent settings.A Drop Cap is a great technique for drawing attention to the start of a large body of text, and gives books, magazines and brochures a formal, elegant appearance. In this example, I’ve set the Drop Cap Number of Lines to 4.

For a quirkier typographic effect, you can increase the Drop Cap One or More Characters to pull more characters into the Drop Cap. Here, I’ve increased the Drop Cap One or More Characters to 4.

PRO TIP: Give your Drop Cap more breathing space by pushing the rest of the text further away from the Drop Cap. Set your cursor between the Drop Cap letter and the first letter of the remaining text, and increase the Kerning to move all the text adjacent to the Drop Cap.

Refresh your knowledge of typography basics with Part One of this tutorial or find some font inspiration for magazines, books, or print design to get started with using your typographic skills!

To learn more about using InDesign and expanding your skillset pay a visit to our beginner InDesign tutorials page.

The post Crash Course: How to Format Text Part 2 appeared first on InDesignSkills.

In the first part of this two-part tutorial, we’ll give you a crash course in the basics of typography in InDesign, and find out:

• What ‘Typography’ actually is, and how you can create it in InDesign
• How you can format your text using the Character and Paragraph Formatting Controls panels

1. What is ‘Typography’ and How Do I Create it in InDesign?

InDesign is designed to give you flexibility and professional control over your typography.

What do we mean by ‘typography’? Well, typography is a term we use to describe text that has been specially formatted to create a particular look—typography can transform text from dull and illegible to beautiful and clear to read.

Here, the designer has transformed the text on this magazine cover to give it a playful, lively and 3D appearance. Check out more examples of creative typography in print design here.

Magazine: Harper’s Bazaar España; Publisher: SpainMedia

InDesign is designed to give you flexibility in formatting your typography. Because it’s a publishing design application, InDesign’s main focus is on helping you to create layouts, and text is a fundamental element of any layout. Master the basics of typography and there’s no limit to what you can produce in InDesign.

To create typographic effects in InDesign, you first need to select the Type Tool (T) from the Tools panel, and drag onto the page to create a text frame.

Place your type cursor into the frame to type some text, or import a Word document. Now you’re ready to apply formatting, and transform your text from simple type to extraordinary typography!

2. Get Familiar with the Character Formatting Controls panel…

…Let’s take a good look at the Controls panels which are going to allow us to apply formatting to text. You can find these up at the top of the InDesign workspace.

Just below the Application Bar, where you can see the InDesign logo, is the Controls panel. With just the default Selection Tool active, the Controls panel just shows navigational options, such as the position of your cursor on the page.

If we go over to the Tools panel, which is docked on the left-hand side of the Workspace, and click the ‘T’ symbol to select the Type Tool (T), and then click and drag on the page to create a text frame, you’ll notice that the Controls panel has suddenly changed.

Now there’s a small ‘A’ symbol to the far left of the panel. This indicates that the panel is now showing all the Character Formatting Controls. This includes all the options you need for formatting type.

So if I click into a text frame I’ve created and type in the word ‘Foodie’ and then highlight the word, I can start to play around with the look of the text using what’s available to me in this control panel.

First up, you can change the Font of the text. Click on the little arrows symbol to the right of this box, which should have Minion Pro set as its default, and you’ll find a long drop-down menu of all the fonts you have installed on your computer.

Let’s scroll down to ‘G’ and pick Gill Sans. And then just below the menu of fonts, or from the drop-down menu next to the font itself in the font list, we can also pick the Weight of the font – such as Bold, Italic, Light, SemiBold, etc.

We can adjust the Size of the text from up here too, which is measured out in points, by either selecting a value from the drop-down menu or by manually typing in a size directly into the box. 

3. Expand your Typographic Know-How with the Paragraph Formatting Controls panel…

…Now take a look at the far left of the Controls panel, where you can see the ‘A’ symbol. Below that there’s a little paragraph icon. Click on that and the Controls panel shifts again. Now we’re viewing the Paragraph Formatting Controls panel.

This panel has everything you need to use to format a whole paragraph of text. There are some things that are repeated here with the Character Formatting Controls panel, things like Font and Font Size options are still here, but they’ve been shifted over to the right side of the panel. Back over to the left-hand side, we’ve got all these new options to play with.

There are lots of new options that apply to larger sections of text. So if I just click my type cursor into this ‘New equipment and fittings for the home’ section of text in a text frame I created earlier, from the Paragraph Formatting Controls panel we can adjust things like the Alignment of the text, from this first section of the panel, and also apply things like Indents from the next section along.

Further along, you can also see a little check-box next to ‘Hyphenate’ which you can uncheck if you don’t want InDesign to split your words with hyphens, and instead tell it to push whole words onto the following line.

Basically whatever you set here, up in the Controls panel, will apply to just the paragraph of text that you have either highlighted or positioned your cursor into.

To recap, if you want to format isolated pieces of text, whether that’s several characters, words or phrases, you can use the Character Formatting Controls panel options, which will appear automatically when you select the Type Tool from the Tools panel.

If you want to format larger portions of text, like whole paragraphs, and be able to effect things like Alignment of text and Indents, you should click the paragraph symbol in the panel to switch to the Paragraph Formatting Controls panel. 

Get friendly with both of the Controls panel, and you’ll be able to format your typography really quickly and easily!

Check out Part Two of this tutorial to find out why you should get friendly with the Big Four of Typography: Leading, Tracking, Kerning and Drop Caps.

For more useful InDesign tutorials and tips pay a visit to our beginner InDesign tutorials page.

The post Crash Course: How to Format Text Part 1 appeared first on InDesignSkills.

Read on to find out how you can quickly and easily delete excessive text without compromising your sanity…

1. The Tip That Will Banish Overset Text from your Documents…

We’ve all been there—perhaps opened up a document from a third party to find huge amounts of overset text errors or simply made the mistake of importing too much text in the first place. Rather than spending the time manually accessing and deleting the overset text…(I mean, seriously, who has time to highlight and delete pages upon pages of text?)…you can use a simple keyboard shortcut to select all the text sitting past where you place your type cursor.

First up, you may want to find out how much overset text you’re dealing with here; which is when the InDesign Story Editor feature comes in handy.

But you may just want to get rid of that text asap, and give your InDesign Preflight the green light. If that’s the case, take the Type Tool (T), then place your cursor at the end of the section of text you want to keep. Then use this keyboard shortcut to select all the remaining text, even text that isn’t visible on the document:

Use Ctrl if you’re using a Windows system, and Cmd if you’re on a Mac OS. If you can’t find an ‘End’ key on your mac keyboard, hold down the down arrow for a few seconds instead, to select all the text to the end.

Then simple hit Delete to banish the text forever, and make your Preflight panel very happy!

Discover more about threading text in InDesign efficiently through your InDesign documents, and how to create a book in InDesign. Looking for more tutorials and tips? Head on over to our InDesign tutorials page.

The post InDesign Secret: How to Get Rid of Excessive Overset Text appeared first on InDesignSkills.

• Learn how to thread text across text frames

• Cut or Delete unwanted text frames

• Learn how to troubleshoot problems, including overset text, using the Story Editor and Info panel

Step 1: Thread Text Across Frames

Once you have created a text frame and inserted text into it you may find there is too much text to sit in the frame without overflowing. You will see a small red + symbol at the bottom right-hand corner of the text frame.

The first thing to do is to set up a series of text frames to allow the text to flow into. Select the Type Tool (T) and drag to create new frames across the page(s) of your document.

Return to the first text frame and click once on the + symbol to load the cursor with text. A tiny script symbol will appear next to your cursor.

Hover over the next text frame and click once inside it. The text will flow into the frame. Continue this process until all your text is contained within text frames.

A green No errors notice will appear at the bottom left of the screen (from the Preflight panel) once all the text is visible in the document.

To view how the text frames are connected go to View > Extras > Show Text Threads.

In Normal Mode (View > Screen Mode > Normal, or tap W on the keyboard), when you select a text frame, you will see the Threads connecting the frames, showing how the text is ordered throughout the document.

If you have loaded your cursor with text, but have no text frame prepared to flow the text into, you can click anywhere on the page. InDesign will create a text frame automatically, and channel the text into it. You can then choose to resize the text frame.

Step 2: Delete or Cut Threaded Frames

You may want to delete or cut a text frame from a threaded sequence.

To cut (and optionally paste elsewhere, complete with a copy of the text from that point forward), select the text frame(s) with the Selection Tool (V, Escape) and go to Edit > Cut.

To delete, simply select, as above, and hit the Backspace or Delete key.

Step 3: Help! My Text Has Disappeared!

Sometimes you might encounter problems with threaded text. For example, if you have received a third party InDesign file which includes some text that you know is in the document (or should be) but may not be showing up on screen.

To check the text is definitely there in the document, go to Edit > Edit in Story Editor. The Story Editor function allows you to view all the text content in the document, regardless of whether it’s overflowing any text frames, or is set in an invisible color or opacity. It will also highlight any problems, such as if any of the text is overset (overflowing the text frames).

You can also open the Info panel (Window > Info) to view how much text is overset. This is shown next to the number of Words, indicated by a + sign.

So in the document example here, we have 308 words, plus an additional 141 words which are not visible as they are overflowing a text frame.

If you’re concerned about missing any incidents of overset text, particularly in you’re working with a long document, don’t be!

When you go to Export or Package your InDesign file, ready for print or for handing over to a colleague or client, InDesign will flag up a Warning window, notifying you if you have any overset text, and on which page(s) the error occurs.

Simply click Cancel to return to your document; navigate to the indicated pages to rectify the problem.

Next step, find out how to wrap text around images. You can develop more basic skills from our beginner InDesign tutorials page.

The post InDesign Basics: ‘Threading’ Text appeared first on InDesignSkills.

In the second installment of How Did They Do That? we’ll look at how to recreate the epic typography effect beloved by movie poster designers. It’s surprisingly simple to achieve, and will be guaranteed to transform your layouts from dull to dramatic in no time.

Exaggerated Spacing in Movie Poster Typography

Movie posters are a fantastic canvas for designers to get creative. The poster needs to sell the movie, so it needs to look as appealing as possible. It can also be a challenging medium, as the 2D, non-moving, silent poster has to convey the mood, scale and dynamic qualities of a moving image film.

A very common method of introducing an epic vibe to a movie poster is to apply exaggerated spacing to the text. This creates a sense of oblivion, giving an epic feel to posters. This technique works particularly well for the sci-fi and action/thriller movie genres.

The technical term for this typographic technique is ‘tracking’, in which the letter-spacing within a whole word or phrase is increased. Tracking gives designers the advantage of making the text more prominent, without compromising on vertical space. So that means images can still take up the bulk area of the poster.

Take this example, of the Maleficent (2014) poster. The actor’s name, ‘Angelina Jolie’, is set at a relatively small size, but the exaggerated tracking, contrasted against a starkly pale background, ensures the text is prominent and enhances legibility.

Increasing the tracking of text also makes text appear super stylish. Because the technique is so simple, spaced text won’t look dated, unlike some currently popular design trends. The technique has been used across classic and iconic movie design; it has certainly stood the test of time. Take these iconic examples of typography, for example – the brand identity for Alien (1979) and the opening credits for Fargo (1996).

Now let’s learn how to create our own version. This technique will apply particularly well to poster design, but you can also try it out on magazine layouts, brochures and book covers.

This is what we’ll be creating:

Step 1: Set up the Layout of your Poster

Open InDesign and set up a New InDesign Document for Print, Width 27 inches (685.8 mm) and Height 40 inches (1016 mm), the North American standard size for a movie poster (also known as the ‘one-sheet’).

Set the Margin on all sides to 35 mm, and introduce a Bleed on all sides of 10 mm. Click OK.

Create an image frame which extends across the whole page, using the Rectangle Frame Tool (F). File > Place a photo within the image frame, selecting Fill Frame Proportionally from the control panel running along the top of the screen.

Open the Layers panel (Window > Layers). Double-click on the default Layer 1 title and rename the layer as Image. Click OK. Lock the layer before proceeding.

Step 2: Pick a Typeface

With the Layers panel still open, click on the Create New Layer square icon at the bottom right of the panel. Rename this second layer Typography. Click OK.

Now it’s time to pick the typeface you’re going to use on the poster. Both serifs and san serifs will look equally good with exaggerated spacing. To replicate the Maleficent serif, try something with a classic look like Adobe Caslon Pro, Shango Gothic or Trajan Pro. For the sans serif look, favoured by the Gravity poster, try a typeface with a clean, very modern look, like Futura orDrescher Grotesk.

Step 3: Prepare Your Poster Typography

Select the Type Tool (T), dragging to create a long text frame. Rest this between the margins at the top of the poster. Type ‘Epic movie poster’.

With the text frame selected, or the text highlighted, navigate up to the Character Formatting Controls panel running along the top of the screen. Pick your chosen typeface from the drop-down list of fonts. Here, I’ve gone for Futura Medium. Set the Size to 70 pt, Fill to [Paper], All Caps and adjust the text to Align Center.

Top Skills Tip: You could also use the Eyedropper Tool (I) to lift a pale colour from the image, before changing it to a CMYK Swatch if needed.

Now you can start to get playful with the letter-spacing.

You can adjust Tracking directly from the Character Formatting Controls panel when you have the Type Tool (T) selected.

You can also alter Tracking from the Character panel (go to Window > Type & Tables > Character to open the panel).

With the text frame selected, set the Tracking to 940.

Move down the page to the centre of the poster. Create a second text frame using the Type Tool (T) and type ‘The’. Set the Font to Futura Medium, Size 400 pt, All Caps and Align Center. Adjust the Colour of the text to [Paper].

With the text frame selected (use the Selection Tool [V, Escape]), go to Object > Effects > Transparency. Keep the Mode as Normal, and reduce the Opacity to 30%.

Layer another text frame over the top, and type ‘Search’. As before, set the Font to Futura Medium, All Caps, Align Center and adjust the Colour of the text to [Paper]. This time, set the Size of the text to 220 pt and increase the tracking to a generous 800.

Continue to build up text on the poster – the names of the cast, the date of release, director’s name etc. Remember to contrast the colour of the text against the background. Use dark swatches against the lighter parts of the image.

For contrast, you can also set some of the text in a serif typeface, like Adobe Caslon Pro, or try a more condensed version of Futura (try Futura Std Light Condensed) for the bulkier sections of text.

Your movie poster is looking stunning!

And it’s such an easy effect to achieve, by simply increasing the letter-spacing, tracking, of your typography. Have fun experimenting further with poster typography to create your own epic effects!

Fancy learning another pro effect? Take a look at this ‘How Did They Do That?’ 3D text effect InDesign tutorial.

Or browse all of our awesome quick tutorials for InDesign.

The post How Did They Do That?: Exaggerated Spacing for Epic Movie Posters appeared first on InDesignSkills.

In this first installment of How Did They Do That? you will learn how to recreate a simple 3D effect commonly used across magazine publishing. It’s super simple to do, and at no point do you need to do any fiddly photo editing in Photoshop.

3D Effects in Magazine Cover Design

Magazine covers are the perfect place to get really creative with design. After all, they’re meant to attract the reader to buy the magazine. Some magazine designs get playful and showcase some fantastic optical illusions, turning a 2D medium into a 3D work of art. Here are some inspirational examples, where typography and images interact and appear to ‘jump’ off the page:

A high-contrast design with subtle 3D effect starring Lupita Nyong’o from V Magazine

Stylish 3D graphics from GIA Magazine
A creative cover starring Tilda Swinton from Zembla Magazine

Now let’s create our own version…

Step 1: Set up the Layout of your Magazine Cover

Here, I’ve set up a New InDesign Document for Print, Width 203.2 mm and Height 276.22 mm, a standard size for Condé Nast magazine covers. I’ve set the Top Margin to 12 mm, Bottom Margin to 11 mm and Left and Right Margins to 9 mm.

I then placed a photo within an image frame, using the Rectangle Frame Tool (F), which extended across the whole page.

I then created a new layer (Window > Layers, to open the Layers panel, > Create New Layer) and used the Rectangle Tool (M) to create a frame with no Fill colour and a solid Stroke set in [Paper], with a Weight of 2 mm (edit these from the Character Formatting Controls panel running along the top of the screen). I’ve adjusted the size of the frame so that it sits on the Margin lines.

I then added a few text frames on another New Layer using the Type Tool (T), setting the Font to Didot in [Paper], and have placed the magazine title so that it sits very snugly against the top right corner of the white frame.

What would make our cover really ‘pop’ is to create a 3D effect, to give the impression that the white frame is interacting with the woman, and the woman is stepping outside of part of the frame.

Left: The cover before the effect is applied; Right: After the 3D effect is applied

Step 2: Use the Scissors Tool

Select the Scissors Tool (C) from the Tools panel (go to Window > Tools if not shown by default).

Zoom in to the area indicated below, and snip the edge of the white frame just above the top of the woman’s leg.

Repeat for the section of frame just below the woman’s leg.

Select the section of the white frame lying across the woman’s leg and press the Delete key on the keyboard to remove the section of frame.

Step 3: Use the Rectangle Tool (M)

Select the Rectangle Tool (M) from the Tools panel.

Drag to create a small long rectangle, at a similar width to the width of the white frame. Set the Stroke colour to [None] and the Fill color to [Paper].

Sit this new frame on top of the existing white frame, so that the bottom edge of the rectangle is almost touching the top of the woman’s leg. You might need to zoom right in and adjust the width of the rectangle so it fits perfectly on the edge of the white frame. You can also adjust the Width of the rectangle to exactly 2 mm from the top control panel.

Deselect the rectangle and then choose the Direct Selection Tool (A) from the Tools panel. Select the bottom right corner of the rectangle and drag the point down until it touches the woman’s leg. Select the bottom left corner of the rectangle and drag the point until it touches the edge of the woman’s leg also, being careful to keep the vertical sides of the rectangle very straight.

You can select the white rectangle and Edit > Copy and Edit > Paste, before adjusting, as above, for the lower part of the woman’s leg.

Step 4: Repeat the Process Above

Repeat the process described in Step 3 and Step 4 above until you have created an effect on the parts of the white frame you want to appear 3D. For this image, this is where I made all the cuts with the Scissors Tool (C), as an example.

And you’re finished! It’s as simple as that!

There’s no need to do any fiddly photo editing to achieve this simple, high-impact effect. Have fun creating your own 3D effects in InDesign!

Explore more awesome quick tutorials for InDesign.

The post How Did They Do That?: A Simple 3D Effect appeared first on InDesignSkills.

• Become familiar with the Text Wrap Panel

• Apply different types of Text Wrap to a shape or frame

Step 1: Create a Frame or Shape and run Text behind them

The easiest way to set up your document for text-wrapping is to position your text frame(s) behind the image frame or shape you want to apply the text wrap effect to. This means you can easily select your frame/shape.

In this example, I have created two columns of text using the Type Tool (T), threading the text between them by clicking once on the bottom right corner of the left-hand column, then once again in the right-hand column.

Then I selected the Rectangle Frame Tool (F) and dragged to create an image frame, before going to File > Place > Open to place an image in the frame. I selected the Ellipse Frame Tool and, holding down Shift, dragged to create a perfect circular frame before placing a second image in this new frame.

Step 2: Open the Text Wrap Panel

Select the image frame or shape and go to Window > Text Wrap to open the Text Wrap Panel.

Across the top of the panel there are five icons, each of which indicate a different way of applying the text wrap. The icon to the far left, selected by default, has No Text Wrap applied to your frame/shape. Click on the second icon along from the left to apply a wrap around the Bounding Box of the frame/shape.

You can adjust the Offset values to increase or decrease the distance between the text and the edge of your frame/shape.

You can also adjust the direction of the wrap from the Wrap Options drop-down menu.

Experiment with different ways of applying a wrap using the icons in the Text Wrap Panel. You can wrap text around an Object’s Shape to give a more closely fitted appearance to the wrap. This can work particularly well with outlined text (Type > Create Outlines), which gives a dramatic typographic effect.

Read for more, check out our whole range of quick InDesign tutorials for beginners.

The post InDesign Basics: Wrap Text around Shapes and Images appeared first on InDesignSkills.