80 Technique

02 Our call-out text will be sitting inside a box, so we’ll set some indents to keep it away from the edges. Set the left and right indents to 2mm each. Our call- outs will only ever be single paragraphs, so we don’t need to add any space after.

01 We’ll begin by setting up a base paragraph style. It isn’t the best idea to rely on InDesign’s default ‘Basic Paragraph’ style, for a number of reasons. Name this style ‘body’, set it up as shown in the screen grab and choose ‘No Paragraph Style’ from the Based On menu.

InDesign CS4

Work style magic in InDesign

Tony Harmer demonstrates how to harness InDesign’s various style options to speed up your work with both text and graphics InDesign’s styles are one of its most powerful features. Although most users are no strangers to Paragraph and Character Styles, few people actually explore their hidden depths. Not to forget, we also have GREP and Object Styles to play with, too. In this tutorial we will take a look at some of the things you should know about the various styles and their perhaps less obvious uses and features, which will hopefully whet your appetite for deeper exploration. GREP alone is – despite the learning curve attached – a worthwhile investment of your time, as it can help you to perform such a huge array of tasks automatically; the GREP styles introduced in InDesign CS4 make for a powerful ally indeed. You’ll also see how making use of paragraph rules in previously unexplored ways enables you to create flexible graphic effects without using extra frames or other elements.

Tony Harmer An Adobe-

Certified Instructor holding over 40 certifications, and chapter leader for the London and Cardiff InDesign User Groups, Tony’s blog on Design Premium topics is available at his site www.tony harmer.co.uk

Time needed 1-2 hours

Skills Set up an

Object Style Create a

Nested Style Learn about

GREP Styles Add an

anchored object

Computer Arts May 2010 www.computerarts.co.uk

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81

05 Naming this new style ‘bolder’, the only option we need to choose here is ‘Bold’ from the Font Style drop-down in the Basic Character Formats category. By not specifying a font family we have made this style flexible, as it will be applied to any font family providing that family has a bold variant.

04 A feature in InDesign CS4 – Line Styles – is what we’ll use next. In ‘Drop Caps and Nested Styles’, click the New Line Style button, which will apply a character style to the first line. We’re going to set one up from inside this dialog: click on ‘None’ in the Nested Line Style section and choose the option New Character Style.

03 Now to lay down the rules. We’re going to make use of the Rule Below feature to add a nice, thick border to the bottom of our box, so set that up as shown. The offset is the important number to make a note of here – we’ll be using that later.

www.computerarts.co.uk Computer Arts May 2010

08 Create a heading style called ‘header’ with the values shown in the screen grab. In the Indents and Spacing category, add type 4mm in the Space After box. Base this style on the ‘body’ style and also set the ‘body’ style as the Next Style option. This works when you’re typing but we’ll exploit a lesser-known trick shortly...

07 Create the ‘query’ that will apply the style. Replace the default \d+ option with the words ‘Computer Arts’, as shown in the screen grab. Type it exactly as it will appear inside your text. Now, any instances of those words that exactly match the pattern will have the character style applied to them.

09 Once again we’re going to exploit the paragraph rules, this time to create a top border for our heading. Set it up as shown in the grab above, and in addition choose [Paper] as a character colour. Set the indents to the same values as you did in Step 2.

06 GREP styles can do things far beyond the reach of nested styles. As a simple example, we’re going to set up a style that makes any instance of the words ‘Computer Arts’ bold and red. Click New GREP Style then, just as before, create a new character style to replace ‘None’. Make the font style Bold and choose a red colour from the character colour category.

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Computer Arts May 2010 www.computerarts.co.uk

82 Technique Style magic in InDesign

14 Copy your thumbnail from Step 10 to the clipboard, then with the Type tool click at the beginning of your header text and paste to create an anchored object. Exit the Type tool and select your callout box. Choose Style Options from the button next to the Object Styles drop-down.

15 The somewhat unintuitive Anchored Object options are really best learned by relentless experimentation. Once you do have the position you’re after, though, click OK to update the style. All you need to do is modify your original thumbnail, and repeat the first part of Step 14 as many times as necessary.

12 Create another object style called ‘tipBox’. Give it a yellow fill, and from the Paragraph Options category choose your heading style and check the Apply Next Style option. In the Text Frame General Options category, set the bottom inset to the same value as the offset in Step 3: 4mm.

11 Now for the stroke styling. Our callouts will have an arrow pointing to a location on the underlying illustration. We can set this up as an object style, too. Not only does this give us one-click formatting, but any modifications that we make later will be applied to every instance using the style.

10 Each callout will have a small thumbnail attached. Create a small rectangle frame and place a graphic inside. Keeping that selected, click the button in the control strip to create a new object style (called ‘sidePic’) and, using the categories on the left of the dialog, add a fill, stroke and effect. Select Drop Shadow from the Effects list.

13 Select a text frame that has suitable content and choose your ‘tipBox’ style from the Object Style drop-down menu. Now select Object>Fitting>Fit Frame to Content (Opt+Ctrl+C/Alt+Cmd+C). You should now see the benefit of your set-up.

Tame the Anchored Object dialog box Although you could create a whole tutorial on what might be InDesign’s most confusing and unintuitive dialog, the best way is to get in there and experiment to gain your own understanding. Once you have, it opens up possibilities for a range of layout tasks.

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