Adobe InDesign Beginners and Intermediate - 2 day course

You should have good computer skills. Some previous knowledge of design software will be helpful, particularly Adobe Photoshop for image resizing and colour correction.

Day 1 - Introduction to Adobe InDesign and desktop publishing

1) Creating a new InDesign Document

Starting a new document - setting size and margins, columns and other options
Using guidelines to help control layout
Modifying document properties
Saving a document and organising files

2) Tools & InDesign Basics

Overview of the main tools and palettes in InDesign

Selection Tools : Selection, Direct Selection

Shape tools & Frames
Creating shapes (rectangle, ellipse, star or polygon)
Setting precise shape dimensions

Set fill colour
Set line colour and line weight

Line tool
Create a line, set line weight and colour
Set line style and arrows

Zooming in and out
Zoom tool, keyboard shortcuts, menu

Moving around the document

Floating palettes : opening and hiding palettes

3) Shapes and Selected Objects

Using the Control Palette to set size and position of a selected object
Shape Modifying (transform, rotate, scale)
Duplicating selected objects
Grouping objects
Locking objects
Align & Distribute
Create multiple identical objects with equal spacing using Step & Repeat

4) Pictures and Graphics

Place a picture on the page
(discussion of correct file types, image resolution and image size)
Placing an image inside a frame

Resizing the frame (cropping the image)
Resizing the image
Resizing both image and frame
Changing image position within the frame
Using the Control palette to modify image or frame properties

Putting a border around an image
Checking linked images with the Links palette and Info palette

5) Colours

Choosing RGB, CMYK or Pantone Spot colours
Mix a new colour and save in the Swatches palette
Create a tint of a swatch
Make a new gradient swatch and apply to object
Modify the gradient with gradient palette and gradient tool.
Editing and deleting swatches

6) Text & Type

Text Tools
Create a text frame
Type in the frame or add placeholder text
Importing a text document (changing import options)

Basic typography (Leading, Kerning, Tracking, Indents, etc.)
Set type colour

Threading type between two or more text frames
Setting options for the text frame
Changing the number of columns of text in a text frame

Checking Spelling

Using with Text Wrap to wrap text around a picture or shape
Using the Eyedropper tool to pick up attributes from another block of text

8) Pages

Adding new pages, organising pages, deleting pages
Basic overview of how a master page works and adding content to the master page

9) Create a small document

Create a small simple document such as a single page newsletter, with text and images. This could be a simple document of your own - e.g. a poster, leaflet, postcard, magazine advert, simple newsletter or other small document.

Day 2 - Intermediate Adobe InDesign training

Use the techniques below to create typical documents which you will normally produce.
This is a typical course outline but may be modified to suit your requirements.

1) Pages & Master Pages

Working with multi-page documents
Creating a spread of 2 or more pages

Creating Master Pages
Applying a master page to document pages
Editing and duplicating master pages

Automatic page numbering

2) Working with Text Frames and Type

Threading text between text frames
Viewing and changing text threading

Using the Story Editor to edit text

Inline graphics (using graphics inside a line of type )

Using Find & Replace to change or replace repeated text elements in a document

3) Typography

More text formatting and typography:
drop caps, baseline shift, paragraph rules, keep options
Using the Control palette, the Character palette or Paragraph palette to format type

Controlling line breaks, paragraph breaks and column breaks

Glyphs and special characters e.g. • © ™  etc.

Showing hidden characters (paragraphs, tabs, spaces, etc.) within the text

Tabs - hanging indents and tabbed lists
Bullets and Numbering options

4) Style Sheets

Style Sheets to format type ( font, colour, alignment, indents, tabs, etc.)
Character and Paragraph Style Sheets
Applying and editing Style Sheets
Importing styles from other documents

5) Tables

Designing tables
Formatting cell colours and cell stroke properties
Resizing cells, merging cells, adding or removing rows or columns
Importing table data from spreadsheet documents
Creating a table from existing text
Formatting text, setting cell inset spacing
Adding images to table

6) Objects, Images and Colours

Adding a drop shadow to an image or other object
Transparency and blending effects between objects
Automatically loading a predefined set of colours with every new document
Using a clipping path in an image file

7) Layers

Using Layers to organise images, graphics and text
Creating, deleting, and changing stacking order
Visibility and locking layers
Moving selected objects between layers

8) Printing and Output options

Preflight
Checking images, fonts and colours used in the document

Package
Collecting together all files and fonts needed for printing

PDF creation basics

9) Create a document of your own design

Create a multi-page document of your own design or based on your own examples.

2 day course from £950 at your office.

Please 'request information' for pricing specific to your requirements.

Design Training

One to one and small group computer training courses for professional design software at your premises around the UK.

Design Software Training Courses

We specialise in short courses for professional web design, image editing, desktop publishing and graphic design software (including Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Dreamweaver, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe InDesign and QuarkXPress).

We can arrange courses in some of the more specialised design software such as Adobe Flash and Actionscript, Adobe Premiere, 3ds Max & AutoCAD.

We also now offer Microsoft Office courses, including MS Word, MS Powerpoint & MS Publisher.

•     Short intensive courses.

•     One to one training and training for small groups.

•     Custom courses - tailored to your requirements.

•     On-site training - delivered at your office or home, on Windows PC or Apple Mac.

Training Locations

The courses are available as on-site training at client's premises (home or office).
Courses are available in areas including Birmingham, Solihull, Redditch, Bromsgrove, Worcester, Malvern, Hereford, Stourbridge, Kidderminster, Wolverhampton, Walsall, Stafford, Shrewsbury, Derby, Coventry, Warwick, Leamington Spa, Stratford upon Avon, Banbury, Oxford, Northampton, Leicester, Nottingham, Manchester, Leeds, Sheffield and other parts of Yorkshire, Bristol, Gloucester, and other areas around the UK.

Customised Courses

Customised courses are available for most applications. Most intermediate and advanced courses are intended to be customised to include working with some of your own designs and projects.
If you just need help with a particular project that you are working on at the moment, then the training can be based around the skills required to achieve successful completion of the project.

If you are interested in design courses and training for you and your business please 'request information'.