Tutorial Details
- Program: Adobe InDesign CS4, CS5
- Difficulty: Intermediate
- Estimated Completion Time: 1 hour
Download Source Files
Final Product What You'll Be Creating
A few times a each month we revisit some of our reader’s favorite posts from throughout the history of Vectortuts+. This tutorial by Otto Coster was first published on August 4th 2010.
Have you ever wondered how professional designers strike the perfect balance between text and image? Using InDesign’s powerful type tools, you will learn techniques to help you set and arrange a magazine layout.
Step 1 Setting up the Document
We’ll be using a standard A4 size document for this tutorial. Start with setting the number of pages to 8, the bleed to 2 mm so we have some space for images to overlap, the margins to 10 mm for top and bottom, the inside margin to 13 mm and the outside margin to 20 mm. The reason for these different margins is that in a spread with 2 pages a slightly larger margin on the outside of the page looks better and provides space to hold the printed version. It is also useful for the page grid in the next step.
Step 2 Creating a Grid
To set up the page grid, go to the "A-master spread" and choose Layout > Create Guides. A grid is used to keep consistency in the page layout and provides a framework for positioning content. A well-used grid is the first thing you need to give your layout a professional look. For this tutorial we’re going to use a 12 rows by 12 columns grid with 3 mm spacing. Choose Fit Guides to Margins to create a grid with a column width of 12 mm.
Why? Our page width is 210 mm, with 20 mm outside and 13 mm inside margins we have 177 mm left for 12 columns and 11 gutters. 12 columns of 12 mm plus 11 gutters of 3 mm is 177 mm.
Step 3 Placing a Background
When creating a magazine layout, you’ll want to keep a good balance between the white space, images and text. A good technique is to use an image with a lot of ‘empty’ space, space around the subject has the same function as white space. I’m using a photograph called, Summertime Sunshine by Stewart, it has a nice blurry background that we can place our text on.
Go to page 2–3 and place your photograph in the bleed space so that the entire spread is covered. Move the photograph in the frame so that the subject is within the margin of the first page and the top of the cocktail is at the edge of a grid row.
Step 4 Creating Body Text
Make a text frame that is placed at the same vertical and horizontal position as the cocktail on the other page, here in the third row, fifth column of the grid. This creates a imaginary line that connects the image with the text. I’ve used the title of the photograph, ‘Summertime Sunshine’ as the heading and filled the rest of the frame with the "Fill with placeholder text" function of InDesign.
Step 5 Setting up a Baseline Grid
To make our text look good we need to set up a baseline grid. Go to the Preferences > Grids and set an Increment Every to 8 pt. In this tutorial we’ll be using a text size of 12 pts and a leading of 16 pts. A baseline grid of 8 pts,which is half the leading, provides flexibility because we can also use it for smaller text sizes.
Step 6 Changing the Basic Paragraph Style
Go tot the paragraph styles palette and change the style of the Basic Paragraph. I’ve used FF Meta Book Roman with a size of 12 pt and a leading of 16 pt. You can also leave the leading at the auto setting because our baseline grid will make sure all the text is nicely aligned.
Step 7 Alignment
Go to Indents and Spacing and set the Alignment to Left Justify. On the web, good looking justified text is almost impossible to achieve, but InDesign makes it very easy to do. Also, change the Align to Grid setting to All Lines, and add 16 pts of space after a paragraph. This is not necessary and you can also use First Line Indent for separating the paragraphs.
Step 8 Hyphenation
Hyphenation is very important for justified text. It breaks up long words at the end of a column so that the column has a straight edge instead of containing a large amount of gaps. The default hyphenation settings in InDesign need some adjusting to improve the look of our body text. I’m changing the settings to use hyphenation only for words with at least 6 letters, and after the first and before the last 3 letters. The hyphen limit sets how many lines in a row can have a hyphen on the end. I think 3 is way too many and a maximum of 1 looks much better. Further, you should disable the checkboxes for Capitalized Words and Last Word.
Step 9 Justification
By default, the justification settings are a bit to loose. Set the word spacing to a minimum of 85% and the maximum to 105%. This way the words don’t have large or small gaps between them. For letter spacing, set the minimum to -2% and the maximum to 2%. This improves the justification a lot. You can experiment with glyph scaling as well if needed.
Step 10 Text Color
I’m using white as the color for the text because of the dark background. Choose what looks best but keep the text readable.
Step 11 Text Columns
Open the Text Frame Options with right click on the text frame and change the columns to a number of 2 with a 3 mm gutter. This way the line length is reduced and the readability increases.
Step 12 Heading
For the heading, we want to use a larger text size of 42 pts and a negative tracking value of -50 to decrease the spacing between the letters. Headlines can often benefit from tracking adjustment.
Step 13 Span Columns
A new function in InDesign CS5 is the possibility for a paragraph to span across columns. We’re going to use that here to make the heading span across both the columns of the text frame. Set the Paragraph Layout to Span Columns and Span to All.
Step 14 Heading Adjustments
Because of the tracking adjustment, the letters "r" and "t" are touching each other now. This is something you want to avoid in general. To solve this I’ve set the kerning to 75 between the letters which creates enough space to separate them.
Step 15 Optical Margin Alignment
The last thing you want to do is a small setting in InDesign’s Story palette: Optical Margin Alignment. This pushes the hyphens, quotation marks and wide characters such as the W and A outside the text frame. This increases the look of the edges. Click on the text frame, enable Optical Margin Alignment and set the value to your the size of the body text.
Conclusion
You have now created a simple, but well balanced page with good typography and use of white space. You have the basics set up for a consistent magazine layout.
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I like this tutorial for a couple of reasons:
• Grid system
• Use of extra space to draw attention to the body copy and image
• The use of style sheets
All of which are important when laying out any magazine or editorial medium
Suggestion: Perhaps darken up behind the text, i could see the text getting lost a little. I would also get a little more attention to that drink.
Other than that i think this is very well put together.
I love the fact you are doing an InDesign tutorial. The world could definitely use a few more of these.
My only complaint is that this layout is fairly boring….
I think the design is not really boring, but could have definitely used a bit more to it. When I saw the title, I guess i expected a lil’ bit more than what it is. I Mean its not really everywhere in a magazine that the design takes up both pages. So i think this is more like “How to Design a Professional Two Page Ad IN A MAGAZINE.”
Other than that the outcome is really nice. Thanks for the InDesign tutorial
Please keep doing the InDesign tutorials here!
Thank you Otto Coster
Very nice, I love to see the methods and reasoning behind other designer’s work. This tutorial, however simple, shows that there is more thought and process going on than meets the eye. Some people don’t understand the complexity of simple designs. I really liked this tutorial!
Totally agree with you here. I was pondering the exact same thing, ” ah this is so easy to do” and then I saw all the steps about the typography.
Nice tutorial showing the complexity of simple things.
This is good tutorial explaining the tools and thanks for including inDesign tutorials here.
Unfortunately there are several issues with the typography (“widows”, awkward spacing between words, hyphenation, overall readability, etc)
Thanks for the comments on my first tutorial. I always wondered why there weren’t more InDesign tutorials on Vectortuts+, so I decided I’d write one myself.
I agree this tutorial isn’t a full layout for a magazine article. My goal was to show what you need to properly set up for even a small, two column article. When you’ve got a page grid and all the typographic basics, it’s much easier to add more pages. I have planned to write a follow-up on this tutorial covering more pages with different layouts if this tutorial is received well.
Thanks Grafiko for pointing out the widows, I forgot about those. Some adjustments in the hyphenation / justification settings can solve that. I’m not sure what you think is wrong with the other things you mention, I’ve tried to make the text look as good as possible. Please let me know what you think can be improved.
I like that you’re doing InDesign tutorials, I just wish there was more to this. It seems pretty plain, and I’d have to disagree with the balance of the piece. I feel like the glass should be farther to the left, right now it’s leaning into the arch of the spine.
As a student, this helps me out a lot. We were never taught about the grid system in class.
Nice tutorial. Very easy to follow. I agree there should be more InDesign tuts. For someone new to InDesign this is very helpful. I strongly encourage you Otto to do some more. I am very appreciative of the effort. For those nit-picking the composition, create your own tutorial based on design elements and principles.
Love this tut! Please do more InDesign tuts!
I agree, love this… thank you! Please do more InDesign tuts.
I totally dig your tut and I would really like to see more Indesign tuts.
However, as I’m a newbie concerning working with Indesign, I did not get the header part right. And I would like to know how you managed this. Thanks in advance!
I think it’s a great tutorial for the mechanics of how to get it right. I think consistency in long documents is a real must, and this shows a number of good ways to achieve that.
Not what to decide on your layout, but how to apply your decisions.
(For the record, I think the grid it a bit too small and distracting for my taste, but I see that it really gives a great way to mirror the photo with the text.)
Great tutorial.
This is awesome considering I’m doing a 4 page magazine spread for class next week! Thanks, tutsplus!
Is it possible to use CS3 for this tutorial? Thanks a lot.
as a newbie, i love this one… do you have some tutorials about how to layout a yearbook? i mean the balance of the pictures and the like in a yearbook.. cause right now i’m so confused on how to do it…
Do you have an example? In Australia (where I live) I had a different style of Yearbook, it’s more like a scrapbook. I think my school made it with MS Word :P
Bleed – should be a minimum of 3mm, anyone in the industry knows this – but you always have to check with the printers as some prefer more than 3mm but rarely more than 5mm.
Font – reversed out type should always be considered in a slightly bolder version, either a medium or bold version of the font. Also the leading should be a little larger than what you’ve got there, perhaps 17 or 18pt.
You’ve got white type on a 4 colour image – think about the registration here! It’s probably best to put a thin sans serif font on a 4 colour photograph in Roman type, bold or medium fonts work best. The 4 colour background will encroach the text with a 4 colour image behind it (or even a solid dark colour). What can happen is the thin strokes break up when imaged on plate or during the printing process when plate meets blanket on the press – or if it’s plate direct to sheet? Thus, choosing a thicker font offers more resistance to breaking up on plate or during printing. If there were any italics in that passage of text it could pose problems set in Roman typeface.
Tracking of type: Also the tracking in reversed out text should be widened – in the justification settings you have letter spacing to adjust by -2 and increase by 2 – can cause issues at print when the justifications settings aren’t correct – where letters are so close that they appear to join together!
Sometimes broken up text is blamed on bad prepress or press work, but there are things you can do to prevent issues! Like choosing a slightly bolder version of the font in reversed out type.
Changing the Basic Paragraph Style – this is really bad practice! You should always create a NEW paragraph style and NEVER change the basic paragraph style. This goes for ALL STYLES, character, table, object, etc. LINK – http://indesignsecrets.com/beware-basic-styles.php
Hyphenation Settings – you should always AIM for FEWER hyphens, hyphens look really bad if at all avoid these altogether.
Justification Settings – this entirely depends on the text, I bet if you went to Preferences>Composition and ticked H&J Violations there would many a yellow tinted lines.
Watch out for that widow….
It’s not a bad tutorial, but I kind of expected a little more. Having that said, it’s nice looking…for certain aspects of design. If I was a beginner on in-design I’m not sure how much it would help for further follow-up pages. But the tutorial is good.
I use InDesign almost daily as the main focus of my job is a bi monthly magazine. This is a great one for beginners. Would love to see more InDesign Tuts!
Not a bad layout but rarely is it good to use forced justified text like this, There are rivers and an orphan, both typographical enemies. Forced justified text is something you would see in newspapers and low quality magazines. Here if you didn’t force the text it would be more organic and I think would fit nicely with the flower.
I like that you tried to mimic the glass but what if you took it a step further, made the text the same light peach color and either added a transparent darker blue square behind or just an opaque Navy square, it doesn’t have to be a solid picture behind it. It makes reversed text hard to read. We want the viewer to read the text and with this they are likely to skip over it and go on to the next page. You also may want to add some type of simple ornamentation down below the text. There is nothing of interest coaxing the viewer to the end. Even a few simple squares right below the bottom right of the text.
To each his own really, I know this is just my opinion, and we all know what opinions are like and everyone has one :)
It has been a while since I wrote this tutorial. Let me give an update to the comments here:
@Eugene:
Bleed – should be a minimum of 3mm
I agree, 3mm bleed is considered the standard in Europe.
Font – reversed out type should always be considered in a slightly bolder version, either a medium or bold version of the font. Also the leading should be a little larger than what you’ve got there, perhaps 17 or 18pt.
In this tutorial I’m using a body text size of 12pt, which is kinda large. Normally magazines go with 10 pt or even smaller for the body text. In that case I agree that you have to be aware of lines that are too thin. In this case, it shoudn’t be much of a problem.
Changing the Basic Paragraph Style – this is really bad practice!
I don’t think this is a problem. If you don’t copy text frames to other documents there is nothing to worry about. I’ve used the Basic Paragraph, Basic text frame styles in almost all of my InDesign documents and never had any problem with it.
Hyphenation Settings
Fewer hyphens = better, that’s why I think the default settings of 3 consecutive hyphens is way to much. I’ve chosen for 1 max here. Hyphenation is required I think when you’re using justified text.
@Amanda:
The justified text was a choice, if flush left alignment works better with your content, do it. I agree with the colored frame behind the text, excellent solution if the text is a bit hard to read.
Don’t you love having to defend your work a year after it’s initial release?
This is actually a good tutorial. The layout is quite boring but the steps is well done. For those who are considering producing a magazine, read this tutorial and you quickly realize that a magazine of 80-120 pages means a lot of work and many sleepless hours.
Thanks i got new thing
Many thanks for this tutorial. Focussed on important things and reduced to the relevant information. I wish that every tutorial is built on your “template”. All the Best from Switzerland.
Great tips, thanks for sharing, keep up the good work.
Great tute man. Nit pickers can sometimes be helpful. Most of the time not.
ini sangat membantu ( i from indonesia )