Scrubby Sliders

In all Adobe programs scrubby sliders let you have the option of setting a value or dragging a slider without having to actually grab the slider. Simply place your mouse over the name of the value (for instance the Opacity value in the Layers palette), click and drag from left to right to set the value. This works with most values, not all, and is really a great time saver if you get the hang of it. You can also hold SHIFT while dragging to set the value by ten.

And a related tip: To set the value of a setting using the keyboard simply click the name to highlight it (or click the number), and use the up & down arrows on your keyboard to increment the value up and down. Hold SHIFT to increment values by ten.

Shortcuts to styles

InDesign: To speed up your workflow, you can easily create your own custom shortcuts for your character and paragraph styles. Open up the edit style dialog box by double clicking the desired style (or right-clicking and selecting ‘Edit…’). In the ‘General’ tab there is an option to insert your own custom shortcut. Insert your handy shortcut and away you go.
NOTE: InDesign will dispay if- or if not the desired shortcut is in use by some other action.

Eyedropping

InDesign: The eyedropper tool in InDesign behaves a bit differently than the eyedropper in other programs, especially regarding text. For instance you can pick up character and paragraph styles from a formatted text and apply it to the text you have selected.

Also, when you pick up a text style, the eyedropper cursor changes to a filled eydropper. With the eyedropper filled you can drag and select pieces of text you want to format with that style. While the eyedropper is filled, to avoid having to select the eyropper tool over and over again to pick up new styles, you can hold ALT to temporarily set the eyedropper to the default state (empty eyedropper) and pick up a new style.

Working with tables and styling tables is really easy with the eyedropper tool in InDesign, as you can pick up a style from a whole cell within the table, and drop the style to another cell or a row of cells at once by dragging.

Placing Text

InDesign: You can place text into InDesign and have it thread over pages and have InDesign create new pages as needed. To place a textfile for multiple pages simply hold SHIFT while placing, and place it on the disired page.
On the same note, you can have your text placed in threaded columns also. Just create textboxes (columns) on a master page and remember to thread them on the master page. Then hold SHIFT while placing and place the text into the first column on the page in the document (do not place it on the master page). InDesign will place your text in the threaded columns and add pages as needed.

Scaling contents with frame

InDesign: InDesign places all imported graphics into frames. If you drag the frame to scale it your graphic will normally not scale with the container. Also in text frames, when you drag and scale them, you only scale your boxed container but the font size is intact.

To scale frame contents with the box container, hold SHIFT+CTRL (SHIFT+Command) while scaling. This will scale your contents along with the frame. If the frame contains text this will scale the font size along with the frame.

PDF settings for print

InDesign: InDesign offers a good way to create a press production pdf similar to Acrobat Distiller. However, often you have to create these settings yourself so they are compatible for any print studio, similar to creating a custom profile for Acrobat Distiller. The following settings should be applied to create a highly compatible PDF export in InDesign, ideal for print production (not for your office BubbleJet).

To begin with you should go to File>PDF Export Presets>Define. A window pops up showing all the pre-defined settings shipped with InDesign. The ‘Print’ setting in the pre-defined settings can be used for print production but might not be compatible for every print studio.
Click ‘New’ to add your custom preset and set it just like shown here:

Name your profile anything you like, be sure to set Compatibility to ‘PDF 1.3′ and select ‘Optimize for fast web view’ but do not select the other options. Advance to the next tab:

Be sure to set your settings as shown here in the Compression tab. For Color and Grayscale images, set it to ‘Bicubic downsampling to’ and the number to 300 pix per inch for images over 450 pix per inch. Set your Compression to Automatic and Image Quality to Maximum. This means the PDF produced will contain full quality images, but images that are over 450 pix per inch will be downsampled to 300 (300 ppi is in most cases the highest printing quality available). Set ‘Do not downsample’ for monochrome images and the compression to ‘CCITT Group 4′.

Set the PDF to include printer marks and bleed (optional) and set the Transparency Flattener to High Resolution.

When you have completed these settings click OK to save them. Now when you go to File>PDF Export Presets, your profile should be in the bottom of the list.

More or less Nudge

InDesign/Illustrator: Nudging a few pixels or units using the cursor keys during design is extremely useful. Furthermore you can hold SHIFT while nudging to nudge even further (normally one Nudge times ten). Hold SHIFT+ALT (SHIFT+Option) to copy your object that distance. This will work for most graphic programs including Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign and Flash.
In InDesign you can also hold SHIFT+Ctrl (SHIFT+Command) while nudging with the cursor keys and you will move your object even shorter than a normal nudge (one Nudge / 10)

You can also set your nudge distance:

In InDesign: Open ‘Preferences’ and select the ‘Units & Increments’ tab, under ‘Keyboard Increments’ you can insert a number for ‘Cursor Key’. The number you set is the distance an object is moved with the cursor key (based on your unit settings).

In Illustrator: Open ‘Preferences’ and select the ‘General’ tab, there you can insert a number for ‘Keyboard Increment’. The number you set is the distance an object is moved with the cursor key (based on your unit settings).

Paste editable shapes from Illustrator

InDesign: By default, copying from illustrator and pasting into InDesign, InDesign will handle your clipboard as PDF and your pasted vector shapes will not be editable. This can however easily be set, so you can keep your Illustrator drawings editable in InDesign.

Open ‘Preferences’ in InDesign and select the ‘General’ tab. At the bottom of the page are settings that control how your clipboard is handled by InDesign. To keep your clipboard fully editable, deselect ‘Prefer PDF When Pasting’.

Now you have to set your Illustrator clipboard settings to be able to copy your shapes intact. Open ‘Prefenrences’ and select the ‘File Handling & Clipboard’ tab. In the settings for ‘Clipboard on Quit’ you have to keep ‘AICB’ and ‘Preserve Paths’ selected, but deselect the ‘PDF’ option.

Now you can copy your shapes from Illustrator to InDesign and keep the shapes fully editable.

Creating default styles

InDesign: You can create default Character Styles, Paragraph Styles and Swatches that will always be included in new documents.
To create a default style or swatch, you need to open InDesign without opening a document. You add a new style or swatch like normally, and set all options within styles as you whould like them to appear. When done you should see your style or swatch in the list, and every time you create a new document that style or swatch will be in the list.
NOTE: This technique will not insert styles by default in documents you have already created. To delete a style or swatch from your default list, open InDesign without opening a document, and trash the style from the list.

Changing various settings in InDesign wihout having any document open will make those settings default. This also works for other programs in the Adobe Creative Suite bundle. You can try it with default brushes in Illustrator or even default master page settings in InDesign.

“þ” changes to “fl”

InDesign: Using the new ‘OpenType’ standard, the ‘Ligatures’ option is on by default. This option will replace certain characters with alternate glyphs. In some languages this can be a slight problem (like in Icelandic, my mother language), as it will change some language-specific characters into OpenType glyphs. A good example of this is the repalcement of the icelandic letter “þ” into an OpenType “fl”.
Obviously, removing this option is a must for some languages.

Open InDesign without opening any document, select the ‘Character’ palette and on that palette click the little arrow for more options. In the option drop-down list, deselect an option named ‘Ligatures’. Now when you create new documents you should see all your language specific characters as they should be.

NOTE: Changing attributes like these in InDesign without opening any document, makes a default setting for new documents. Deselecting this option for documents you have already created, you need to open your document, select all textboxes and follow the same procedure (caharcter palette>options>de-select Ligatures).