Mysterious artifacts in inDesign PDF export

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At every phase of this project there have been unexpected problems. Actually, all of my problems are unexpected because this is the first time I’ve every tried to create a picture book. In my mind, I thought I’d be finished four months ago. A seasoned pro would have experienced these growing pains enough times to be able to sidestep them and deal with bigger unanticipated problems, such as how to deal with movie deals, book tours, Internet fame, and how to invest all of the money that’s piling up in their bank accounts.

In the meantime, I’ve got to figure out how to get a clean export out of inDesign. I’m using a stroke on the text to create a bubbly text bubble, but there are some transparencies no matter how large I make the stroke. And, if a “y” is on the line above a tall character like a “d”, its descender is covered. I’ll have to tweak this some more tomorrow.

Creating a polygonal textbox in inDesign

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When a square text frame won’t do, I need to create a custom text frame. I use inDesign’s pen tool to create a box that fits into the image’s empty space, then use the text tool to add text. The pen tool works like the Photoshop and Illustrator pen tools. Just click the outline of the text frame you need. You can use the selection tool to grab a node to tweak the shape. It’s a simple task, but before I googled “polygonal textbox indesign” and found a solution, I struggled with trying to select and drag out the corners of the default rectangular text boxes. It’s amazing how little I know about inDesign. It’s even more wondrous, as ignorant as I am, I still know enough to generate a PDF that can produce a Kindle e-book.

The blue line shows the outline of the text box. The outline doesn’t appear in the exported PDF.

indesign_pen_tool_text_box.png polygonal text box,indesign

Nothing to show today

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Instead of drawing today, I worked with inDesign. I’ve got all of the images inserted, and now I’m synchronizing the story with the images. There are a few clumsy transitions that I may be able to repair by swapping the images around. If that doesn’t work, I’ll have to create new images that follow the text more fluidly.

In other words, I’m approaching the end of this project. Hip, hip, hooray! I say to that.

self-portraits