Adobe InDesign Training Courses

Adobe InDesign is the industry-standard publishing application that lets users design and publishes high-quality documents across a full spectrum of digital and print media.

InDesign is built for designers, prepress and production professionals, design firms, advertising agencies, book publishers, and more. It is also used in a corporate design, commercial printing, and other publishing environments. Learn more about InDesign.

InDesign also integrates tightly with other Adobe products, such as Photoshop, Illustrator, Acrobat, and more. Learn more about Creative Cloud.
Key features of InDesign:

• Extensive Typography Control
• ePub Support
• Liquid Layout
• Linked Content
• Interactive Form Design

These are just some of the features in Adobe InDesign, but it’s a huge application so of course there are many more.

Have you ever wondered why the Dummies books are so popular? Well, it’s probably because so many of us are self-taught, using Google to find out how to use a function, or we are shown how to use software by someone at work. Although this can be useful, it also means we tend to spend a lot of time with trial and error, or we are just picking up somebody else’s bad habits. Trial and error, unfortunately, involves a lot of error, and the bad habits you pick up will probably be passed on to the next person, so soon they spread across the business, meaning entire teams can end up working inefficiently.

At this point, you might head to the bookstore or do an online search to find an InDesign for Dummies book to help solve some of those tricky issues. That’s a step in the right direction, and we sometimes use reference manuals ourselves. The problem is that trying to learn by trial and error may cost you many times the cost of a good training course.

Our Adobe InDesign courses are designed to target the key features and tools included in the application to help you get back to work and apply them right away.

Attending an Adobe InDesign with Keystroke Learning will show you how to use the most efficient methods to achieve your daily tasks. Not only that, but you will discover best practices and shortcuts to make your business tasks even quicker, so you can get on with your day. Our goal is to help you get to the point where you are focussed on the task at hand rather than the tool you are using.

Typically, one of our experienced trainers will walk you through the features and functions of the software, then you will try them out on your own, with tips and guidance on getting the best out of the features. We also encourage participants to ask lots of questions to help you get the most out of your learning experience.

You’ll receive a manual to take away at the end of the course, as well as exercise files so you can practice later, or just to jog your memory when you need.

Great question, especially when you consider the price difference between the two applications.

InDesign has precise control over typography and images, the ability to create a Table of Contents automatically, and top-quality output. It does, however, have a steeper learning curve.

InDesign will run on either a PC or a Mac, Publisher is designed for Microsoft Windows only, so if you need to run it on a Mac you would need to run it in a virtual environment like Parallels.

InDesign can be used for print and digital publications such as eBooks. Publisher has no eBook capabilities. These are just a few of the differences to consider.

A snippet is a little piece of an InDesign layout that can be saved for use over and over again. Think about a logo, a button, or even a text block. Anything that can be placed into an InDesign page can be saved as a snippet. There are two ways to create them. The first is to simply select the item(s) and drag to the desktop.

The second, and more effective, is to select the item(s) and use the File > Export command to export the snippet. This opens a dialog box allowing you to choose where to save the snippet and what to name it.

Once your snippet has been saved, it can be used in any InDesign file whenever you need it. Another nice feature of snippets is that they can be shared with other users, so they are fantastic when you’re collaborating on a project.

Not at all. In fact, this is a standard workflow in many environments. You or your colleagues can write the content in Microsoft Word, taking advantage of the tools of a word processor, then port your content across to InDesign.

When you are working with InDesign, the technique of placing text and images is one you should familiarise yourself with.

To place content, click where you need it to be inserted and choose File, Place, then select the document containing the content. In the dialog box, you can also choose import options such as whether you want to import the styles from the original document. Once this is done, the content is placed and you can continue working with InDesign.

Layers are used with Adobe InDesign files for several reasons. The first is to help you organise your page layouts. For example, you can place all your text on one layer and your images on another. Once this has been done you can show just the text layer so you can focus on the text without distraction.

You can also use layers to achieve transparency effects such as placing images behind text for a watermark effect. You could also use layers to design a multi-language brochure to be used for international clients. Each layer might have the same text written in a different language, and the layer visibility can be changed to display the appropriate language when needed.

If the amount of text in a text box is more than the size of your text frame (called overflow), a little red plus sign will appear in the lower right corner.

If you want to flow to a new text frame, click the plus sign, then start to draw a new frame, and your text will automatically spill over into the new frame.

If you have a bunch of pages to flow textboxes through, instead of having to draw your new text frame on every single page, hold Shift and click once in the top left corner of your margins. A new frame will appear on that page and every page after it to the exact size of your margins until your text runs out. This can save a huge amount of time!

Your learning doesn’t stop once you have completed your course. We hope you will continue your experience by taking some time to practice what you have learned and apply it to your own situation and environment.

If we have done our job well, you may be inspired to learn even more by attending another course. If you are looking for something other than Adobe InDesign, we have a comprehensive range of courses available for you to choose from.

We are here to help, so please don’t hesitate to contact us if you need any further advice.