InDesign Printing Pages Out of Order

I recently found one more small useful tool for printing in InDesign. It's not a major feature, and I don't think it is used that often. However, someday you may want to print your pages in a non-sequential order. It's very easy to do.

1) Make sure you have an InDesign document with multiple pages. Next, pull up the "Print" dialogue box from the File menu.


2) Click on the "Range" button. You can type in the pages you want to print. The order you key them in as, will be the order that they print. Notice that I will print page 3,1, pages 4 through 6, then page 2. You can include ranges (4-6) or individual pages (5,2,8) in your range field.

Outline text or fonts in Illustrator

In Illustrator fonts remain editable text by default. You can change the text, delete the text or kern it. If you so desire, you can convert your text to outlines. By doing so you can then manipulate the text curves and paths. However, once you converted to outlines, it is no longer editable with the text tool.

Here is how to convert your text to outlines:

1) Draw a text box and type your word, phrase, sentence, paragraph, etc. Here is my sample text. Notice the thin blue line directly under the baseline of the text. This is Illustrators way of indicating editable text with the text tool.


2) With your text selected, go to Type > Create Outlines.


3) Notice that your text is now outlined. There is no thin line under the text and all the individual anchor points for the characters are visible.



Once you convert your text to outlines, you may not undo. There is no "convert to text" option in Illustrator. I recommend finalizing your layout and text and only convert to outlines at the end. You can also make a duplicate of your text(simply copy and paste), so if you need to make an edit, you still have the original text.

Here is Adobes tutorial for CS3, CS4, CS5

Ikea Cookbook

Ikea makes some wonderful home furnishings. I came across a cook book from Ikea portraying the ingredients as well as the finished product. It isn't often that cookbooks display the raw ingredients, especially in this manner. In fact, I enjoy looking at the triangles of sugar, cubes of butter, and crumbling blocks of flour more than the tasty desert they will become.

Check out more of the products, both before and after:

The person who finds the egg timer in their cracker wins!


Would you like some cookie with your butter?

http://demo.fb.se/e/ikea/homemade_is_best/

Indesign Layer Visibility Override

Objects that are place into InDesign may loose some of their visibility settings when placed into an InDesign document. The example I encountered was an Illustrator file which was comprised of 3 layers. I had intentionally turned off the top layer before saving and placing it into InDesign. However, the layer was turned on during the import and I could see the unwanted layer.

The fix lies within InDesign. On the Links Panel you will see listed the links in your document. All my links are linked, however one has an eye icon next to it. On mouseover the icon reads "Object has layer visibility override".



1) On your canvas, select your placed object, and right click on it. Select "Object Layer Options..."


2) You will see the layers that make up the original file. In my example, I have a Illustrator file with 3 layers. All 3 layers are visible, but I only want the bottom 2 layers to be seen. To turn this top layer off, click the eye in front of the layer you do not want to be visible. I circled that layer in the image below.



3) Now the bottom 2 layers are visible, and the top layer is not. The object will display correctly in InDesign.




NOTE:
Turning these layers on and off in InDesign does NOT affect the layer visibility within Illustrator. Once you open the original Illustrator file, your layers will remain the same way you saved them in Illustrator. This InDesign tutorial only changes how it displays within InDesign.

Pecha Kucha Pittsburgh

Pecha Kucha, or PKN for short is a fast paced forum for artists. The format allows for 20 slides, and the speaker gets 20 seconds per slide. The audience may heckle the presenter, interjecting their opinions; praises, or arguments. The Pittsburgh forum is sponsored by the AIA and AIGA every 4 months, rotating venues throughout the city. You can see some examples of past Pittsburgh PKN events here.

This past week I presented for the first time at a PKN night. I presented a talk on leadership entitled "How to Get People to Do What You Want and Have Them Enjoy Doing It (A Crash Course in Leadership)". The topic is broad enough for the architects, graphic designers, and guests to all relate to. In the past, I found that talks on a specific concepts specialized to a persons field was a little too technical for the general audience. The talks I enjoyed the most were the ones which discussed broad topics, and probed questions; where the audience was engaged or thinking deeply about the idea.

I wanted my talk to be encouraging and entertaining. I researched many leaders, their styles, and juxtaposed some controversial and well-loved popular leaders. My audience wasn't stiff upper-management of a large company - they were my peers. I wanted it to be for the everyday person and how leadership plays a role in their day to day activities. At almost every interaction, there is a leader and follower. When in a group of friends it may be less obvious, but still a gathering at a local bar had to be organized by someone.

After the talk, several people asked me "What do you do? Do you teach this or do leadership training?" I'm a graphic designer - junior level, and no I do not teach this. I volunteer with local organizations often leading events, but it's a hobby, not paid career.

I have always enjoyed observing group dynamics. I became aware how people adopted(or were assigned) different roles and how successful or how unsuccessful their tasks were. Although I do not have a career specifying in leadership training, I believe that everyone can benefit from understanding the roles of a good leader and followers. After all, getting people to do what you want and have them enjoy doing it is no easy task. It's an art form.

Custom Photoshop Brushes

I found a tutorial for how to make your own Photoshop brushes. It allows you to make your own unique, customized brushes.

I tried the tutorial and found a few modifications you can make to the brushes.

Follow the first 5 steps of the tutorial:

1-4) Create a mark, design, or stroke.

Instead of using a brush and paint,I drew a design with a pencil.

Here's what my design looks like.

5) Scan the images into Photoshop and save as high resolution PSD's.

In my image the the color of the paper did not scan in as pure white.

I want to eliminate some of the grey background so that it doesn't show up on my brush. I created a step 5a to make the background white and the design darker.

5a)Adjust the levels of the drawing to increased the contrast. My preferred method is to go the the layers palette and create a new "Levels" layer.

Check the box that says "Preview" so you can see what your image will look like. Adjust the Levels sliders - the positioning of the level controls will probably look similar to the image below.

Now the grey background is gone and I'm left with only the circles.

On your Layers Palette select the layer that contains your artwork and the layer that has the adjustment levels. Right click on the either layer name and select "Merge Layers".

6) Select your new layer and go Edit > Define Brush Preset. Save your brush. It will now appear in your brush palette.

To change the appearance of your new brush, go to your brush palette. If your brush palette is not visible go to Window > Brushes.

With this palette you can change the brush size, opacity, rotation, etc. Experiment and see what kinds of effects you can get!

LEGO reels in its designers

This article discusses the LEGO brand and the struggle for it to stay on top. Giving designers creative freedom seems to have backfired rather than helping the company grow. Read on to find out more.

Article Here.

Knife Tool In Illustrator

The Knife tool in Illustrator can be used to cut a shape into smaller segments. The tool can be used to cut straight lines, or make more freehand cuts.

The Knife tool is located in a different place depending on which version of Illustrator you have. Below, I have shown where the knife tool is located in CS2, CS3, CS4, & CS5.

CS2 CS3 CS4 CS5

I'm going to go over how to do 3 things with this tool:

I) Make a freehand cut

II) Make a straight line cut

III) Make a straight line cut on 90º angles

For all of these steps we're going to need to create a shape. In this example, I'm using a green box with a pink stroke.

I'm going to select the box, and then select my knife tool.

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I) Making a freehand Cut

Click and drag your knife tool over your shape.

Notice that you will now have two segments. In my example this is evident by the pink outline, around my newly created 2 shapes. You can now use your selection tool(the normal arrow) and move the pieces around.

II) Make a straight line cut

Hold down the Option keyand click and drag your knife tool over the shape. Notice that the line you are drawing is straight. No matter how wobbly your hand is, your line will be straightened. If you are a Windows user, press the Alt key instead of Option.

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III) Make a straight line cut on 90º angles

Hold down Option + Shift and click and drag your knife tool over the shape.

If your line is close to vertical, then it will snap to a perfectly vertical line. If it is close to 45º then it will snap to that angle. In my example the line I drew was closeto vertical, and I ended up with a perfectly vertical line! If you are a Windows user, press the Alt key instead of Option.

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Note:

Above, I stated that you must first select your shape. You do not have yourobjects selected for the knife tool to work. Simply dragging the knife tool over an object, selected or not, it will break that object into segments.

If you have 2 objects overlapping, or close to each other, the knife tool behaves differently.

With both objects selected, and you use the knife tool, they will both be cut as seen below.

In this example, I selected only the blue circle. When I drag the knife tool over the shapes, only the blue circle is affected.

The CS5 instructions are the same, but if you'd like to read for yourself, here's the Adobe Site.

If Dr. Seuss were a graffiti artist

Sofia Maldonado is a Cuban born mural painter with a whimsical and capricious style to her murals and figures. They are reminiscent of Dr. Seuss, yet Sofia makes them all her own with with distinct urban attitudes and attire.

Sketches

I was flipping through an old sketchbook and I found some drawings that looked interesting.
This is a sage plant that I had at my old apartment. Very aromatic, and tasty with pork.


This is a fern that I had. The fern died soon after I drew this, and the plant with small leaves took over the pot. I don't know what kind it is, nor how it seeded itself indoors.
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Sanna Annukka

I just found a new artist. She puts a twist on Finnish folk and gives it a contemporary appeal. If you enjoy her as much as I do, pick up one of her screen prints, or one of these little soul birds.