Phoenix InDesign User Group

02/12/2025

Hey fans and friends, here is a tip of the week from Nigel French @ CreativePro Network

Creating Color Palettes from Blends in Illustrator

For an old school approach to creating color palettes, use the Blend tool in Illustrator. Create your start and end colors, apply them to simple objects, then create a stepped blend between them. When you’re happy with the result, duplicate the blend object and choose Object > Blend > Expand to convert it to individual shapes, from which you can create a Color Group. Reuse the original blend object to repeat the blending process with different sets of colors to create multiple palettes.

01/25/2025

Hey fans and friends! Are you interested in professional development in accessibility design... the Brand Girls are here and ready to teach!

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/baking-the-blueprint-for-accessible-design-tickets-1109722282219

Baking the Blueprint for Accessible Design crafts inclusive solutions with key principles and techniques for accessible, successful designs.

01/24/2025

Yall! this one was in the same CreativePro Network newsletter:

Multi-Find/Change!!
https://www.automatication.com/product/mfc/

Free Multi-Find/Change for Adobe InDesign and InCopy Multi-Find/Change (MFC) is an Extension for Adobe InDesign and InCopy and later to manage and execute batches of saved Find/Change queries. MFC is the ideal tool for those who rely on Find/Change queries to correct and/or format text.   Download ...

01/24/2025

Starting from most recent from:
CreativePro Network

Starting a Document on a Left-Hand Page:
Want to change your document so it starts on a left-hand page (so that the first two pages make a two-page spread)? One way is to double-click the little triangle over the first page in the Pages panel and set its page number to 2 (or any other even number).

Another way is to disable Allow Document Pages to Shuffle in the Pages panel menu, then drag the page thumbnail for page 2 over next to the first page.
—David Blatner

Send a message to learn more

01/23/2025

Welcome new followers! Sorry it's been a bit. I will try to post more next week.

12/02/2024

Super basic but very necessary productivity tip from CreativePro Network Sandee Cohen

Changing Values With Arrow Keys
When you have a field is highlighted in any panel or dialog box, pressing the up/down arrows on your keyboard increases or decreases the value in the field.

Holding Shift while you press the arrow keys multiplies the amount of change in most cases by a factor of ten (tracking and kerning are notable exceptions to this rule).

When you have a font list targeted, you can select a different font family or style by pressing your arrow keys. And don’t forget this works in other Adobe apps like Illustrator and Photoshop!
—Sandee Cohen

Send a message to learn more

11/13/2024

If you do a lot of print work, you are going to want to attend Trish Boyle Witkowski's 4-part webinar series for Sappi

Part 1 is tomorrow Thursday November 14, 2024

https://app.webinar.net/OWwo1PVneR5?mcc&mc_cid=fac08b6415

Join Sappi Presents: Direct Mail in the Digital Age at https://app.webinar.net/OWwo1PVneR5

11/06/2024

Adobe Illustrator: What to do when "Paste Remembers Layers" but forgets the appearance.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cPpQnheT-Cg

from Monika Gause at

When copying a layer structure to another document you can keep the layer structure. But this sometimes still does not work.About this channel: My name is Mo...

10/02/2024

This is at least a little comforting:

Learn more about Adobe's core commitments to creators and it's approach to generative AI development behind Adobe Firefly.

10/02/2024

Y'ALL! It is finally here! You can use Find/Change to change case!

If you are a CreativePro Network member, this article is in the latest issue of CreativePro Magazine, but I just had to share the feature announcement. Since the magazine and its articles are a paid member benefit, I will only give a snippet but do yourself a favor and get a subscription.

Using Find/Change Case in InDesign

By Peter Kahrel

"… a new version of the feature—known as case folding—is now available in the

Find/Change dialog box, in a new Change Case section of the Change Format Settings dialog box in both the Text and the GREP tabs.… the new Change Case offerings, the characters are replaced ([sic - in previous versions], when you apply all caps to some text, for example, the appearance of the text changes but the underlying text does not change.)—from uppercase to lowercase or the other way round. Uppercase is truly uppercase.…"

Send a message to learn more

09/18/2024

The biggest accessibility design mistake

by Colleen Gratzer.

I do my best but some clients' brands have limited contrast built-in. It is no longer about age or market. As Colleen says, the percentage of folks with vision impairment or colorblindness is much higher than you think. Marketing folks, we need to do better and ya'll need to not push back when designers suggest using more accessible contrast.

https://creativeboost.acemlna.com/lt.php?x=3DZy~GDEI6Si55N9_dM6WORrAK3UkATuvxgvjKTMJIKaEH_~_ky.zedt242pi_E~k_YzZHHI

Find out the biggest accessibility mistake when it comes to document design, web design or infographic design and how to avoid it.

09/04/2024

Here is another CreativePro tip from Bart Van De Wiele at CreativePro Network

Must-Know Table Techniques in InDesign

Put your text cursor inside a cell. Press the Escape key to select the cell, press Escape again to select the cell contents, press Escape again to select the cell, etc.

Using the Type tool:

Hold down the Shift key and click and drag the right outer edge of the table to make the whole table grow and shrink like an accordion.

Hold down the Shift key and click and drag the inner edge of a cell to redistribute the available space across the current cell and its neighbor.

Hold down the Alt key (Option on Mac) and click and drag the edge of a column to add additional columns. This also works on rows.

Send a message to learn more

09/04/2024

I had to use this just recently.
Thanks Laurie Ruhlin CreativePro Network!

Aligning Lists with Double-Digit Numbers
When you’re setting up a numbered list and want to make double-digit numbers line up on the period, use the settings in the screen shot below, then adjust accordingly to your liking. Notice the - (negative) number in the First Line Indent and the Alignment is set to RIGHT.

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08/22/2024

Your friendly moderator has DEFINITELY messed these up due to the person introducing them to these fonts and the creators not knowing the correct pronunciation. Let's all do better.

https://creativepro.com/so-how-do-you-pronounce-that-font-name-and-does-it-really-matter/

A guide to tricky pronunciations of font names and type designers

08/18/2024

https://youtu.be/k9Re5otW-v0?si=mjiDOPcATGfsSt7m

Let's explore this lot: ?!-".',(); and... 🌏 Get Exclusive NordVPN deal + 4 months extra here → https://nordvpn.com/robwordsVPN It’s risk-free with Nord’s 3...

08/14/2024

OK, this tool is helpful to ANYBODY trying to design for accessibility, online or in print. Thanks to Colleen Gratzer at https://creative-boost.com/ for this resource. Check out VennGage accessible color palette generator.


https://venngage.com/tools/accessible-color-palette-generator

Discover beautiful color combinations your whole audience can appreciate with the click of a button. Try our free accessible color palette generator today.

08/13/2024

One of my favorite tips by one of my favorite experts! Anne-Marie Conçepcion with the ID gap knowledge!
https://www.linkedin.com/learning/indesign-tips-for-design-geeks/set-an-exact-gap-measure-without-the-gap-tool/