Getting to Know Adobe InDesign

By Kelly Kordes Anton and Tina DeJarld
Jun 23, 2023

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In this lesson from Adobe InDesign Classroom in a Book, authors Kelly Kordes Anton and Tina DeJarld, you'll learn essential skills, including viewing layout aids, styling text, importing graphics and threaded text frames, manipulating objects, adding QR codes, automating formatting with styles, performing preflight checks, and previewing documents in Presentation mode. Master these techniques to effectively manage your creative projects with Adobe InDesign.

This chapter is from the book 

Adobe InDesign Classroom in a Book (2023 release)

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This lesson will take about 60 minutes to complete. To get the lesson files used in this chapter, download them from the web page for this book. For more information, see “Accessing the lesson files and Web Edition” in the Getting Started section at the beginning of this book.

The building blocks of an Adobe InDesign layout are objects, text, and graphics. Layout aids such as guides help with size and placement, and styles let you format page elements automatically.

Getting started

The document for this lesson is a standard-size postcard designed to be printed and mailed. In addition, the postcard can be exported as a JPEG to use in email marketing. As you will see in this lesson, the building blocks of an InDesign document are essentially the same, regardless of the output media. In this lesson, you will add the text, images, and formatting necessary to finish the postcard.

To ensure that the preferences and default settings of your Adobe InDesign program match those used in this lesson, move the InDesign Defaults file to a different folder following the procedure in “Saving and restoring the InDesign Defaults file” on pages 3–4.

NOTE

If you have not already downloaded the project files for this lesson to your computer from your Account page, make sure to do so now. See “Getting Started” at the beginning of the book.
Start Adobe InDesign.
When the InDesign Home screen displays, click the Open button at the left. (If the Home screen does not display, choose File > Open from the InDesign menu bar.)
Open the 02_Start.indd file in the Lesson02 folder, located inside the Lessons folder within the InDesignCIB folder on your hard drive.
If an alert informs you that the document contains links to sources that have been modified, click Update Modified Links.
Choose File > Save As, rename the file 02_Postcard.indd, and save it in the Lesson02 folder.
This lesson uses the default Essentials workspace. If necessary, choose Window > Workspace > [Essentials], and then choose Window > Workspace > Reset Essentials.

NOTE

To better view the interface onscreen or in print, the screen captures in this book reflect the Medium Light interface rather than the default setting of Medium Dark. In addition, some screen captures illustrate User Interface Scaling for a closer look at interface elements. You can modify interface settings in Preferences.
If you want to see what the finished document looks like, open the 02_End.indd file in the same folder. You can leave this document open to act as a guide as you work.
When you’re ready to resume working on the lesson document, display it by clicking its tab in the upper-left corner of the document window.

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