Adobe Indesign Document Setup !!!

[sayamish]

Hi Buddies...
I've been working as a web-developer for few years. I've never designed for printing purpose.Now I've been assigned to design a trifold brochure of a company. Here, all I need to know is about the document setup before starting the design. I'm thinking to use Adobe Indesign CS2 for this very purpose. Though I'm very new to Indesign, I've gathered some ideas from online resources which I think will be enough for completing the brochure design. However, I'm a bit confused regarding the document setup. Normally, as far I know, most of trifold brochures are designed in the Letter size paper. Hence, I also used the same size for my design. When I check the layout in Indesign workarea, I see the red rectangle boundry within the the black boundry. Black boundry reaches to 11 inches in width and 8 inches in height which is the exact size of letter size paper. Now the very thing confusing me is whether to design my entire work inside the red boundry or inside the black boundry. Please let me know about this thing and help me solve this problem. Any sort of suggestion would be highly praised. Thanx in advance.

sayamish

[texanpenguin]

I don't use InDesign personally so I can't really help much, but I can say that in print work, it's best to work a little beyond the boundaries of the paper (called bleed) to account for mis-registration of the printer inks.

Good luck!

I'm sure someone will reply with more specific InDesign help shortly.

[Natobasso]

Here's the specs you should use for your new document:

size: 8.5" x 11"
bleed: .25"
margins: .125
(when you enter this for a new document, save a preset for it so when you create another doc of this size, all these features will be in place.)

The great thing is your bleed lines will be there as well as your margin lines. Use bleeds to give your printer extra room when they cut your job, and use margins to give yourself space to not encroach on this "die cut". You don't want your important words and art getting cut off…

Red line: bleed line
Black line: trim line/die cut
Blue/Purple Line: margin

To split your page into three equal columns, the easy way is to create a text box and give it three columns (right click or control click to get "Text Frame Options", or hit command + b). Then draw guidelines to the column gutters and you're set!

[mdnky]

Originally Posted by Natobasso

To split your page into three equal columns, the easy way is to create a text box and give it three columns (right click or control click to get "Text Frame Options", or hit command + b). Then draw guidelines to the column gutters and you're set!

Since he's using ID, it would be easier to use ID's options for the new document. I've attached a screen shot of my standard tri-fold setup, easier to look off that than trying to explain it with just numbers. Picture 2 is the options, Picture 3 is what the new document looks like without content. BTW, the "slug" thing isn't necessary...something my printer and I use to keep things on track.

Remember to setup your gutter size as twice the margin size. So if your margins are 1/2 inch, then use 1 inch as the gutter. If your margins are 1/8 inch, then use 1/4 inch as your gutter.

[Natobasso]

What could be easier than taking a few numbers, entering them in the new doc window and viola, you've got your doc?!