Adobe’s Indesign is a desktop publishing tool for print designers. There is other software in the industry to create design and print (both personal and commercial printing), namely QuarkXPress.
Regardless of the brand of software used, these desktop publishing programs are best thought of as assembly tools. They alone will not create the projects with the visual quality designers want, nor the effectiveness this class demands.
Indesign is the primary software used in the class. The best analogy to consider is the comparison between the tools and assets in this class to that of cooking: Indesign is synonymous to a mixing bowl. The ingredients (words, illustrations, photographs) are first prepared elsewhere, then added into a common container and mixed together in particluar proportions to create a specific taste.
To sucessfully oeprate in the class students must have a working knowledge of the tools needed to make visually and intellectually engaging Promotional Designs. Among them are:
› Knowledge of the Macintosh OS
› InDesign
› Photoshop
› Illustrator
› Creative & Technical Writing
› X-Acto Knife
› Glue
› Effective verbal skills and the ability to learn new vocabulary
All of these skills are ingredients students will develop – and rely on -in this class.
Focus on the Process
The emphasis in this class is now how and why you arrive at the projects you create in class over what you create.A designer’s tools (a chef’s kitchen) are a means to an end. Without the creative process, these tools are simple and inhuman computer programs.
What is Creativity?
Consider: Creative thinking: Three basic principlesAn Introduction to InDesign
Getting Started
There are many decisions that need to be thought through about the entire process of your project before your first mouse click. Issues regarding printers, binding, folding, and layout are all addressed when starting a new document.
These settings may be changed after the document has been created by visiting the Document Setup options, and the Margins & Guides settings.
Page Setup
Margins
Margins are the visual boundaries on all four sides of your page(s). Bear in mind how your project will be finished. For example, if your project has multiple pages, the bound side of the pages will need extra space to accommodate the binding.Rulers and Guides
Grids
Baseline Grid
Character Palette
Toolbox
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