Adobe Indesign is the world-wide leader for creating professional-looking publications and, as such, it's used by graphic designers, fashion designer and magazine publishers the world over. Indesign, in conjunction with Photoshop and Illustrator, is used widely in the fashion industry, for creating publications like brochures and flyers, storyboards and price books, posters and banners for websites.
Like in many other contexts, you use the tools which are best for their respective jobs. So, in the fashion context, Adobe Photoshop would be used to adjust and retouch images of models, garments and accessories. It's very easy to make multiple variations of garments, with various fabrics and colours. Colour-matching and the creation of colour swatches is also very easy to do in Photoshop.
Adobe Illustrator is a different type of program, known as vector-based, in which images are created mathematically. This ensures their solid line-work and flat colours. Illustrator is be used for creating the type of line art used in garment production and fashion mock-ups. It's also used for logo creation.
The final document layout, whether for print or web, is conducted in Adobe Indesign. After the initial document setup, we create master pages for items like headers, footers and page numbering. This is where we would add the company logos and colour side bars or borders. Photographs, drawings and logos are then imported from our folders of images. We would also create text styles within the Indesign document and possibly save it as a template for future efficient workflow. Many Indesign users will, after some time, have a raft of templates which they use for different purposes. Once created a template can easily be modified, so that the creation of documents becomes afster and more efficient over time. There are also many effects and automated features we can employ to add dynamism to our publications.
Indesign can be used either for print media or to create documents for web or screen viewing. These are exported via Adobe's Acrobat extension, which means that anyone with a computer can view and print the brochures you send them. In the case of documents created for print media, we would add printer's marks and bleed guides to assist the printer in producing the job. These will also include trim guides and registration marks where the document is being sent to an offset printer.
The process of learning to use the software starts with downloading the free trials from the Adobe website. In times past we had to buy each program, which would be a costly process. Adobe has recently released the Creative Cloud, which is a subscription-based portal. When you pay your monthly fee you have access to all of the Adobe programs. The files you create are your own, however, and are stored on your computer or network. Every couple of weeks or so Adobe will check to make sure your subscription is valid, whereupon you may continue to use the software. There are various subscription rates, but on the whole it is a very economic way of using software for educational or commercial purposes.
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Tom Gillan has been training Indesign to corporate clients in Sydney for seven years. You can learn more about Indesign at http://www.designworkshopsydney.com.au/adobe-indesign-courses/ .
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