- Having your objects straight up and down on the page is no fun. Let's learn how to rotate them. I'm gonna rotate this image here. So I'll select it on my page and zoom in to 200% by pressing cmd 2 on the Mac or ctrl 2 on Windows. The easiest way to rotate this image is to come up here to the control panel and click on one of these two rotation arrows. When I click the right one, it rotates it 90 degrees counterclockwise. Click on the left one, and it rotates it back. Now if I want to rotate this in more fine increments, I'll move to the left just a little bit and change the rotation field.
There's a little pop-up menu here, and I can choose a rotation out of that if I want. For example, I'll choose minus 45. Negative numbers rotate clockwise. Positive rotate counterclockwise. Let's change this to something else. Instead of pulling a number out of the pop-up menu, I'll simply change the number here to, say, 25 degrees. Hit Enter or Return, and it's rotated. But there's an important question here. Why is this rotating around the upper left corner of this object? Why wasn't it rotating around the center or some other point? Well, the answer to that can be found on the far left side of the control panel in what's called the reference point.
The reference point tells InDesign where the anchor should be. So I'll set the rotation back to zero, and now we can see over in the reference point that the upper left corner has been selected. If I click in the center of the reference point instead, and now rotate to something like 25 degrees, you'll see it rotates around the center of that object. Now, if you like working more interactively rather than typing numbers in, you can also move your cursor just outside one of the corners of any selected object. When you do that, the cursor changes to a double headed arrow.
That's the indication that I'm now going to start rotating this. Once again, as I drag, it's rotating around the center of this object because that's where the reference point was. If you squint, you'll notice a little indicator just to the right of the cursor that shows me what the angle currently is. Now, if you want even more control over how you rotate objects, you could use the rotation tool. You can find that down here in the tool panel hiding underneath the Free Transform Tool. You'll see, I just click and hold for a moment, up comes this pop-up menu, and now I can choose the Rotate Tool.
Now if you really squint, you'll notice right in the middle of the object, there's a tiny little crosshair. That crosshair reflects the reference point that was up in the control panel, but with the rotation tool, I can put this anywhere I want just by clicking. For example, I'm just going to click on this little point at the top of the globe. When I click, the crosshair moves there. Now I can click and drag anywhere on my page to rotate around that point. Once again, the cursor indicates what the current angle is as I'm dragging.
So now that we know how to rotate objects, the obvious question is how can we scale them bigger or smaller? And that's what I'll cover in the next movie.
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: Rotating objects