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InDesign How-To: Using the New Content Conveyer in CS6
How-Tos: Written by Anne-Marie "HerGeekness" Concepcion on May 9, 2012
A new feature in InDesign CS6 is the Content Conveyor that lets you collect elements from a layout and reuse them quickly and easily. It represents a new way to work with content in your designs.
Type How-To: A River Runs Through It
How-Tos: Written by James Felici on May 2, 2012
Rivers are eye-catching cracks in text formed by meandering trails of word spaces running from one line to the next. Here’s why they happen, how to avoid them, and how to fix them.
How-To: 10 Techniques for Copying Pages Between InDesign Documents
How-Tos: Written by Pariah Burke on April 11, 2012
There are many reasons why you might want to combine pages or objects from one or more InDesign documents into other InDesign documents. Perhaps you need to join unchanged pages from an old financial report with the new one; or use a previous design’s page geometry and elements as the template for a new project; or combine individual chapter INDDs into a single “book” that can be output as one long PDF; or... Whatever the case, InDesign has several paths to that end.
Web Design How-To: Get Started with Responsive Web Design
How-Tos: Written by Chris Converse on March 12, 2012
Responsive web design refers to making content that adjusts to the screen size on which it is displayed, making it the right choice for phones and tablets in addition to desktop computers. Following these three steps will put you on the road to designing websites that are flexible enough to handle many screen sizes.
InDesign How-to: Balance Columns with Vertical Justification
How-Tos: Written by James Felici on February 27, 2012
You need to align type to a baseline grid but you don't want any orphans. Making columns of type line up in InDesign is the job of vertical justification. Here’s how to make it work for you.
Photoshop How-To: Trace on Object without the Pen Tool
How-Tos: Written by Deke McClelland on February 22, 2012
Use simple geometries to create a vector outline of a complex shape.
Photography How-To: Add Painterly Effects to iPhone Images
How-Tos: Written by Dan Marcolina on February 20, 2012
iPhone apps do more than count calories or take down mercenaries. You can use imaging apps to turn your iPhone photos into rough sketches, oil paintings, and soft watercolors.
Construct a Color Wheel in Photoshop
How-Tos: Written by Nigel French on February 13, 2012
The color wheel is a simple yet powerful tool for understanding how colors work and how colors relate to each other. It can also be a gorgeous graphic you can use in print and Web design projects.
Create Picture Frames in Photoshop: Part 2
How-Tos: Written by Steve Caplin on February 6, 2012
In Part 1 of this tutorial, you learned how to create a picture frame, fill it with a photo, and change the perspective so the framed photo faces right or left. Now discover how to apply all those steps to any photo with one simple click. The secret? Automation courtesy of Photoshop's Actions and Droplets.
Create Picture Frames in Photoshop: Part 1
How-Tos: Written by Steve Caplin on February 3, 2012
Using Photoshop, you can create a silver, gold, or wood-grain picture frame, fill it with a photo, and transform both frame and photo so that they're skewed in different perspectives. The realistic results are easier to achieve than you might think!
Create a Table of Contents in InDesign
How-Tos: Written by Sandee Cohen on January 26, 2012
Don't create a table of contents (TOC) by hand! Let InDesign's automatic TOC feature generate it for you. The big bonus (besides no human errors): If your document changes, one click updates the entire TOC!
Make Text Look Like Chrome
How-Tos: Written by Mike Rankin on January 23, 2012
Using nothing more than a gradient swatch in InDesign, you can change text from a flat and boring object to a shiny metallic material that reflects the surfaces around it.
Get Rid of Red Eye
How-Tos: Written by Russell Brown on January 18, 2012
In this one-minute video, you'll learn how to remove red eye from any photo using a hidden tool in Adobe Photoshop.
Lights, Camera, Action, and InDesign!
How-Tos: Written by Steve Werner on January 9, 2012
While you may not think of InDesign as a video tool, you’ve actually been able to place video into InDesign since CS2. Here's what you need to know to place video in InDesign and output the results to PDFs, SWFs, ePUBS, and iPad apps.
Photography How-to: Learning to See in Black and White
How-Tos: Written by John Batdorff on January 4, 2012
Everything from portraits to landscapes can be more powerful when they're black-and-white photos. Once you know how to recognize tonal contrast, texture, shapes, and patterns, your images will be anything but monotonous!
Align and Space Objects with InDesign's Smart Guides
How-Tos: Written by Sandee Cohen on December 28, 2011
Everyone who has InDesign CS4 or CS5 can benefit from Smart Guides, which automatically pop up as you drag out or move objects on the page. Learn how to use them to align two or more objects to the page and to each other. You'll also be able to space objects equally, rotate them equally, and more. It's smart to use Smart Guides!
Plumb the Depths of Your InDesign Layout
How-Tos: Written by David Blatner on December 21, 2011
When an InDesign page gets complicated, knowing the tricks for selecting overlapping and/or grouped objects will save you time and frustration.
Introduction to Illustrator: Part 2
How-Tos: Written by Von Glitschka on December 19, 2011
See how easy it is to customize Adobe Illustrator with tweaks to Preferences and graphic styles. Once you know how to use these and keyboard shortcuts, you're on your way to making the program fit your working style like a glove.
Make Holly and Berries that Shine in Photoshop
How-Tos: Written by Steve Caplin on December 12, 2011
Whether you're scrambling to put together a last-minute Christmas card or are a planner who's already thinking about 2012 projects, this Photoshop how-to is just what you need. In it, you'll learn how to create a Yuletide composition of berries and a holly leaf. And to add a bit of sophistication, you'll give the elements a glassy sheen.
Introduction to Illustrator: Part 1
How-Tos: Written by Von Glitschka on December 5, 2011
Get back to basics with a tour of Adobe Illustrator's 12 core tools, which you can use to build precise vector graphics.
