Print documents generally contain various elements, including text, images, and other graphic components. Aligning the objects of a document is important both to manage its order and to make it, graphically, appealing. Designers who are proficient in InDesign, a graphics software developed for manipulating documents in various formats and sizes, know how to manage, thanks to the program's tools, a well-aligned print layout.
Steps
Step 1. If you don't already have one, purchase the Adobe InDesign license
Follow the instructions proposed on the Adobe website and install the program: at the end of the installation, a restart of the PC may be required.
Step 2. Start practicing with the InDesign workspace to familiarize yourself with the program's features and tools
Step 3. Launch InDesign on your pc
Step 4. Open the file you want to edit
From the top menu, click on File> Open.
If you do not have an existing file to use, directly create a new one, selecting from the top menu, File> New> Document, and set the parameters you prefer
Step 5. From the tools panel, usually located to the left of the workspace, activate the Selection tool and click on the objects you want to align
If you intend to select multiple items at the same time, hold down the CTRL / CMD key while selecting the various items. If your document does not yet contain selectable items, create or import them now.
- To import an image, go to the top bar menu and click File> Place. Search for the file you want to place in the document and, once found, double-click on the file itself. Drag your image with the mouse, and place it where you prefer, free in the document or inside a box, then release the mouse button. You can resize the image using the Selection tool, and adjusting its size with the handles of the selection box. If in this operation, holding down CTRL / CMD resizes the image without maintaining the aspect ratio, if, on the contrary, you want to keep it, you have to press the SHIFT key. Using the Transform panel, you can indicate the height and width of your image, setting the parameters in the appropriate fields.
- To insert a different object: a line, a circle, a rectangle, or a polygon you have to select the Shape tool. Click where you want to place your shape. Keeping clicked, drag the cursor to create the chosen shape. Keeping the selection on the newly created object, go to the right panel, to the "Swatches" tab. Select the "Fill" item and choose the color of your object. If you want to add a frame around the object, click on "Outline", still in the "Swatches" panel, and select the border color.
- Inserting text requires creating a frame using the "Text" tool located in the Tools panel. Also using this tool, you can position yourself inside the frame, and start typing the textual content.
- You can take the text from an external file, just select File> Insert, and search for the file on your pc: double click to select it. Once you have entered the text, use the mouse to position it where you want, and click to confirm. Particularly full-bodied texts will be divided into multiple text frames. If necessary, just click on the red "+" symbol in the lower right part of the frame, move the mouse to the desired position, on a new page or in another column, and click. This operation must be repeated until all the text is displayed.
Step 6. Go to Window> Object and Layout> Align to be able to access the Alignment panel of the program
At the bottom of the panel, you can set whether objects should be aligned based on selection, margins, page, or distribution
Step 7. Select one of the available alignment options:
top, bottom, right, left, center.
Step 8. These steps can be used for any group of objects you wish to align
Method 1 of 1: Align Text Inside a Frame
Step 1. Select the text frames you want to align:
you can use either the "Select" tool or the "Text" tool.
Step 2. Click on Object> Text Frame Options
- To vertically align the text, from top to bottom, select Top.
- To center the text, select Center.
- To vertically align text, starting at the bottom, select Bottom.
- To distribute the text evenly from top to bottom, select Justify.
