- It's easy to get graphics into InDesign, and you may be tempted to copy them out of one program and paste them in here, but don't do it. Resist the urge. Instead, you want to place them. That is, go to the file menu and choose place. When you choose place, InDesign gives you a list of all the different files that you can place inside this document. In this case, I'm gonna place this logo file, the one labeled white. Now this is a .ai, or Adobe Illustrator file.
So then when I click open, InDesign loads what's called the place gun or the place cursor. This place cursor lets me insert or place this graphic inside of a frame that I already have or it can make a frame for me. But it's very important to pay attention to the place cursor icon. Right now, if you look closely in the upper left corner, I see the place cursor has little dotted lines that are sharp. But if I move it over here to the center of my page, I now have dotted lines that are curved, kind of like parenthesis.
The curved lines mean that if I click right now, the image is going to go into the empty frame behind the cursor. If I move out here on top of this locked object or out here where there's no frame, then I get those sharp edges, and that means it's gonna create a new frame for me. So here I can simply click. That makes a frame and puts the graphic into it. Or let me undo that. I'll press command Z or control Z on Windows, and I get back to my place cursor. Now instead of clicking, I can simply click and drag.
Now it made a graphic frame at that particular size and put the graphic into it. Let's go get another graphic. But before I do, notice that this frame, this graphic frame, is still selected. I'll head up to the file menu and choose place again, and this time I'm going to choose the color version of the logo. Then I'll click open. Well, what happened to my white logo? Well, you can see that the image that I placed actually replaced that original logo because it put that picture into the frame that was selected.
That's actually not what I intended to do. I wanted to put that logo down here inside this frame, but that's okay. InDesign has a very robust undo, so I'll just press command Z or control Z on Windows, and InDesign reloads the place cursor. And now I can click down here on this frame. Now that graphic that I've placed goes into this frame. It's much too large for the frame, but I'll deal with that later. Let's go ahead and grab the last image I want to place. I'm gonna click out here on the paste board where there's no objects, and that deselects everything.
Then I'll go back to the file menu and choose place. This time I'm going to choose this PSD file, that is a Photoshop file, and I'll click open. Once again, if I click, InDesign brings in the whole image at 100% size, and that's way too big. So I'm gonna undo and instead click and drag. Again, InDesign made the frame for me and placed the picture into it. Now one thing to notice here. You'll see that InDesign honors the transparency from this Photoshop file, that is where there's a checkerboard background in Photoshop, it's transparent here in InDesign.
So that means I can see right through that background area. But there's something else here that you don't see immediately, and that is that InDesign is linking to the file on disk. Every time you place an image into InDesign, it doesn't actually embed the image into your document., it links to it. It creates a link between the InDesign document and the high resolution file on disk. You can see that by going to the links panel. Way over here on the right side of my screen you'll see something called the dock that contains a bunch of panels that I often use.
In this case, I'm gonna click on the word links to open up the links panel. And here in the links panel we can see all the images that we've placed. Because that Photoshop image is selected on the page, it's also selected up here in the links panel. There's much more to say about pictures and graphics and links, but for now, we finally have a document that has text and graphics. But it's definitely far from finished. In the next movie, I'm gonna show you how to move these objects around and scale them to get just the look you want.
Author
Updated
1/12/2016Released
6/19/2015Want to learn InDesign in just 20 minutes? Watch the first chapter, which concentrates on the most essential skills: editing text, adding graphics, moving objects, and creating PDFs. Once you're ready to move on, InDesign insider David Blatner will show you the rest of what InDesign has to offer. Learn how to navigate and customize the workspace, manage documents and pages, format text and graphics, experiment with color and gradients, draw and transform shapes, create interactive documents, package your designs for print, and much more.
- Getting started with InDesign in just 30 minutes
- Setting up a new document
- Inserting text
- Placing graphics
- Formatting objects
- Creating color and gradient swatches
- Organizing InDesign projects with layers
- Transforming objects
- Incorporating drop caps, bullets, and numbering
- Applying character and object styles
- Building tables
- Creating an interactive PDF and exporting to EPUB
- Printing and exporting
Skill Level Beginner
Duration
Views
Q: This course was updated on 01/12/2016. What changed?
A: We added one new movie covering the revised InDesign CC interface, including the new Start workspace, released in November 2015.
Related Courses
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InDesign Secrets
with David Blatner38h 45m Intermediate -
InDesign: Beyond the Essentials
with David Blatner4h 54m Intermediate
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Introduction
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Welcome1m 4s
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Using the exercise files2m 21s
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How this course is updated1m 20s
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1. Learn InDesign in 30 Minutes
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Getting started2m 44s
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Adding or editing text3m 47s
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Adding or replacing graphics4m 22s
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Moving objects around4m 43s
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Printing and creating a PDF5m 45s
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2. Working with InDesign Documents
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Navigating and zooming8m 35s
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Selecting objects6m 50s
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Working with panels7m 24s
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3. Creating a Document
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New documents10m 40s
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Adding text frames5m 30s
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Typing and editing text3m 11s
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Importing graphics8m 51s
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4. Managing Pages
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Overriding master page items3m 52s
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Changing page size6m 43s
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Adding page numbering2m 45s
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5. Text
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Inserting special characters5m 40s
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Importing text4m 46s
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Threading text frames5m 1s
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Setting text frame columns5m 33s
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Putting text on a path7m 29s
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Using the Story Editor6m 42s
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Checking spelling6m 18s
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Using Find/Change7m 59s
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6. Graphics
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Using the Links panel9m 47s
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Inserting QR codes3m 48s
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7. Formatting Objects
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Colorizing images2m 35s
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Adjusting transparency4m 53s
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Adding drop shadows4m 31s
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8. Color
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Creating color swatches6m 2s
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Creating gradient swatches5m 10s
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Applying gradients6m 48s
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9. Frames and Paths
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Creating text outlines5m 10s
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10. Managing Objects
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Stacking objects2m 13s
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Grouping and locking objects3m 38s
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Nesting objects4m 53s
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Aligning and distributing5m 16s
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Understanding text wrap6m 41s
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Using anchored objects5m 37s
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11. Transforming Objects
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Duplicating objects6m 56s
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Rotating objects3m 3s
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Scaling objects5m 53s
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Skewing objects1m 55s
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Mirroring objects3m 35s
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12. Character Formatting
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Changing case4m 28s
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Using Find Font5m 43s
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13. Paragraph Formatting
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Using drop caps2m 50s
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Shading paragraphs and boxes2m 47s
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Setting tabs9m 7s
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Adding automatic bullets5m 45s
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Numbering paragraphs7m 12s
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14. Styles
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Using character styles6m 16s
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Using object styles4m 28s
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15. Tables
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Creating a table5m 33s
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Adjusting rows and columns4m 11s
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Formatting a table5m 31s
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Formatting cells7m 46s
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16. Interactive Documents
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Adding hyperlinks5m 17s
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Creating an interactive PDF7m 38s
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Exporting a reflowable EPUB8m 37s
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17. Packaging, Printing, and Exporting
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Packaging for output7m 11s
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Using the Print dialog box6m 28s
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Exporting a PDF10m 5s
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Exporting text4m 2s
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Conclusion
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Next steps1m 59s
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Video: Adding or replacing graphics