In this week’s InDesign FX video, I show you how to add fancy ornamental frames to placed images in Adobe InDesign.

More than any clever technique, this effect highlights the idea of using the resources you already have handy to create unique and interesting graphics, so you don’t have to draw them. Specifically, the fancy frames are made from a simple solid stroke embellished with a series of characters from the Adobe Wood Type Ornaments font.

In the video, I start by making a copy of the frame containing the photo. This way I can place the ornaments in the duplicate frame and know they will be positioned precisely where I want them over the photo.

Then it’s time to find a suitable ornament. Here, you can think of the Glyphs panel like a library of clip art. You probably already have several dingbat, symbol, or ornamental fonts at your fingertips, each containing hundreds of interesting shapes.

After selecting a single interesting glyph, you can scale and duplicate it to make a series of ornaments, and then use a frame as a vector mask to crop the glyphs and show just the parts you want for the picture frame.

Use a frame that contains your favorite glyph as a vector mask.

With that basic set of steps you open up a million other possibilities by incorporating different fonts, glyphs, scaling, and so on.

Use the InDesign Character panel to adjust the settings for each glyph you use.

Another example of using a frame as a vector mask for your selected font.

The final effect, created entirely in InDesign.

I also have a member-exclusive video in the lynda.com library this week called Framing photos in letters. It shows you how to use merged letter shapes as photo frames.

Interested in more?
• The entire InDesign FX biweekly series
• Courses by Mike Rankin on lynda.com
• All InDesign courses on lynda.com

Suggested courses to watch next:
• InDesign Secrets
• InDesign CS6 Essential Training
• InDesign CS6 New Features

In this week’s InDesign FX video, I show you how to use one of the Type on a Path options in Adobe InDesign to skew text to match other elements in your page compositions.

In this case, I wanted to skew type to match the perspective in a background photograph to emphasize the height of some very tall trees. There are no official 3D perspective tools in InDesign, but for type there is a very handy substitute: the Type on a Path option called Gravity.

When text is placed on a path and the Gravity option is applied, the letter shapes are skewed along an axis that goes from the baseline of the text through the center of the frame.

There are two practical effects of this behavior. First, you can use the Gravity option to simulate one point perspective applied to text. Second, you can adjust the amount of skewing (and thus perspective) by changing the height or width of the frame.

In the video, I place a rectangular frame over the background photo, and use the Type on a Path tool to place the text on the edge of the frame. With the text at the bottom of the frame (and the Gravity option applied) I drag the top of the frame to change its height until the angle of the skewing matches the perspective of the trees in the photo.

I also have a member-exclusive video in the lynda.com library this week called Creating and revealing a hidden object. In it, I show how to use the animation tools in InDesign to make one object look like it is revolving around another.

See you here again in two weeks with another InDesign effect!

Interested in more?
• The entire InDesign FX biweekly series
• Courses by Mike Rankin on lynda.com
• All InDesign courses on lynda.com

Suggested courses to watch next:
• InDesign Secrets
• InDesign CS6 Essential Training
• InDesign CS6 New Features

In this week’s InDesign FX video, I show how to use the Bevel and Emboss feature in combination with the Hard Light blending mode to simulate translucent objects like soap bubbles.

As its name suggests, the Hard Light blending mode is meant to create an effect of a strong light being shined on an object. When Hard Light is applied to colors lighter than 50% gray, the effect will lighten an underlying object. When Hard Light is applied to colors darker than 50% gray, the effect will darken an underlying object. And when Hard Light is applied to exactly 50% gray, it becomes transparent. You can observe this by filling an object with a white to black gradient, then applying Hard Light, and placing the object over something else in your document.

So, if we want to create something like a translucent bubble, we can start with a circle filled with 50% gray and use the Bevel and Emboss effect to create a highlight and shadow.

Then apply Hard Light to make the 50% gray fill disappear, while retaining the shadow and highlight created by Bevel and Emboss.

It’s also worth noting that this use of Hard Light works best with documents that use RGB Transparency Blend Space. This does not mean that you can’t create translucent objects in documents destined for print output. But in order to retain the look of those translucent objects, you must not flatten transparency or convert to CMYK when you export a PDF from InDesign. You can perform flattening and color conversion tasks in the PDF in Acrobat, or you can rely on your print service provider to do these jobs. For more information on how to get InDesign FX to print correctly, read my blog post Getting Effects into Print.

I also have a member-exclusive movie in the lynda.com library this week called Mocking Up a Film Strip. In it, I show how to add details around a series of photos to make them look like a strip of film.