A couple of weeks ago we ran an online InDesign Training Newsletter Design Course for a lady who had a little experience with the software. Her objectives were quite clear she wanted to create and edit slim yet professional looking newsletters in InDesign. Having had a chat prior to the course she selected a few random samples she liked from the Web and we used them as training examples during the course.
Like many people she primarily works in Microsoft Word and is quite happy with that but recently has had to update the company newsletter which is developed in InDesign. She wanted a smooth transition between Microsoft Office and Adobe InDesign. Which actually made this a very interesting course to deliver.
We ran this as an Introduction to InDesign Course pitched at basic level but incorporating specific objectives which were, obviously, bringing content across from Office into InDesign. The company newsletter also included quarterly charts which also needed to be in the newsletter.
The charts appear in each issue and follow exactly the same format, look & feel every time. It is only the data itself that changes on a tri monthly basis which in this case meant a direct up-datable link to the chart in Excel.
Newsletter Setup
During the InDesign Course she learnt how to set up her newsletter from scratch using all the setup options such as page size, columns and bleed and slug. Once the document was open in InDesign she worked with Master Pages (Master Pages are now Parent Pages in InDesign 2022).
We added page numbering and other repetitive objects such as logos and web address to the pages and discussed setting grids, guides, margins etc to Masters or individually to pages as we worked.
Text Styles in InDesign
Following her company design guidelines we made sure that she knew exactly what styles were and how they worked making absolutely sure she know how to update existing styles and work with new ones where necessary.
InDesign & Microsoft Office
InDesign actually collaborates really well with Microsoft Office and we worked on this area in considerable depth looking at the various pro’s and con’s involved. In the end the delegate opted to link between InDesign & Excel so when the chart was updated in Excel the changes were replicated in InDesign.
We looked & discussed copying and pasting text across from Word and also bringing it across into InDesign via the ‘Place’ Command. Doing it the latter way meant we could map the existing styles contained in Word to the ones in InDesign and update in one swoop so saving her time.
InDesign Preferences >Clipboard – Quick Tip
Talking of bringing text across from Word into InDesign most people think you copy and then paste it in the form of plain text. This is not actually accurate you can easily tell InDesign how you would like your text pasted into a text frame by making a couple of simple changes in InDesign’s Preferences.
If you paste text directly into InDesign without creating a frame first then InDesign will automatically create a new frame for you.
If you paste text directly into an existing live frame where the cursor is flashing then text is pasted directly into that frame and will overwrite any selected text in that frame.
Pasting Text From Word or elsewhere
By default if you paste text from Word then the text will be in plain format with no prior formats held which is fine if you intend to format the text yourself directly in InDesign.
However you can opt to retain paragraph /character styles quite easily by changing your InDesign preferences
Go to Edit menu > Preferences and select Clipboard Handling
Once the box opens look down to the ‘When pasting text from other applications’ which is probably set to the default of text only. To change this simply make sure that ‘All information’ is ticked instead.
Once this is done simply paste into the text frames as normal.
Read more about text & text frames
InDesign & Images
We bought in various images to the designs and discussed the correct formats for the images for both print and PDF export.
During the course, as with all the InDesign Courses we looked at working with images including direct editing in Photoshop, fitting the images correctly and positioning them on the page.
Text wrapping is included on all out courses but we looked at the wrapping options in InDesign and how text interacts with images including both vectors & photo’s. On this particular course design guidelines called for a specific measurement between the text and the image. This is known as a text Offset as shown in the image on the left.. It can be applied to one or more parts of the image bounding box by either clicking on the spinners or changing the number in one or more of the boxes. Text Offset is measured in increments of 1 point.
InDesign Training Newsletter Design Course
If you are interested in an InDesign Newsletter Course or one of our customised InDesign Training Courses please don’t hesitate to get in touch for a an informal chat either by email or voice call.
Take a look at a few other examples here.
Online Adobe InDesign Course
This InDesign Course was delivered as an Online InDesign Course with a live instructor but it can be delivered at your premises as Onsite InDesign Training. Online InDesign Training has excellent flexibility as it can be delivered virtually any time of day, night, evening or weekends at times and dates to suit.
This is not a video training course. You have contact with a live instructor throughout your course are able to share both screens in real time.
Find out more about our Online InDesign Courses
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