Photoshop File Browser & InDesign
You can drag files from
Photoshop CS’s File
Browser right onto an
open InDesign CS document.
This places the file
(or files!) into picture boxes
on the InDesign document
page.
Terry White
Mac Design May/June 04, pg.38
Tip
2
Smooth Jaggy Line Art
One easy way to smooth
the edges of jaggy line art
in Photoshop is to convert
it to grayscale mode, then
apply a Gaussian Blur of
1–5 pixels. Choose Image>
Adjust> Threshold
and move the slider until
the line art is as “thin” as
you like it. Finally, convert
back to Bitmap mode at
your required resolution,
selecting 50% Threshold
as the Method.
Tip 3
More Memory
for Classic
If you run several
memory-hungry applications
in Panther’s Classic
environment, and Classic
complains that you don’t
have enough memory, you
can adjust the memory
that Mac OS X gives to
classic: in System Preferences>
Classic, hold down
the Option key when
clicking the Memory/Versions
button. An Adjust
Memory button appears at
the bottom of the window.
Click it, and a sheet drops
down containing a slider:
“Application Temporary”.
Move the slider toward
Temporary.
Ted Landau
Tip 4
Force Startup from Hard Drive
Sometimes, after starting
up from a CD and then
restarting, your Mac won’t
eject the CD and still
wants to start up from the CD. To force your Mac to start up from the internal
hard drive, hold down the D key just after hearing the startup chime. (Hold down
the C key to start up using the CD.)
Tip 5
Select Layers
in InDesign
To select everything on a
Layer in InDesign, hold
down the Option key and
click on the name of the
layer in the Layers palette.
To select everything on
the page (on all layers),
just press Command-A.
Terry White
Mac Design May/June 04, pg.38
Tip 6
Eliminate Blank
First Pages
If you’re designing a single,
two-page spread, you
can avoid having a blank
first page by starting your
document with page 2.
In QuarkXPress, activate
the first page of the document,
go to the Page
menu, choose Section, enable
the Section Start
checkbox, then enter an
even number in the Number
field.
In PageMaker, put an even
number in the Start Page
Number dialog box when
you create the document.
In InDesign, click the
Pages palette, click the
side menu, and choose
Numbering & Section
Options. Also be sure that
Allow Pages to Shuffle is
enabled in that side menu.
Tip 7
Flatten When
Converting to CMYK
When creating images to
be printed on a printing
press, two things will improve
your result: 1.)
Work in RGB mode until
you’re ready to save your
document for final output.
Your last step should be to
change the color mode to
CMYK, using the CMYK
color settings your printing
company provides. 2.)
When converting to
CMYK, allow Photoshop
to merge your layers. Photoshop
does a more accurate
job converting layers
to a flattened state in RGB
mode than it does in
CMYK mode.
Lidka Schuch Tip 8
Easily Scan Oversized Documents
If your scanner is too
small to scan a large document,
you can use Photoshop
CS’s Photomerge to
automatically stitch pieces
together. Scan pieces of
the document, being sure
to include plenty of overlapped
area in each piece.
then, open all the pieces in
Photoshop and choose
File> Automate> Photomerge.
Align and adjust
as necessary.
Dave Cross
Mac Design May/June 04, pg.39
Tip 9
Gradient Lines
in QuarkXPress
In QuarkXPress, any item
can be converted to another
shape through the
Shape submenu of the
Item menu. This feature
also applies to lines, so
you can convert a line into
a narrow box and then fill
it with a gradient!
David Blatner
Tip 10 Why QuickMask?
QuickMask mode is another
way to look at a selection
that you made using
the Lasso or Marquee
tools. After you’ve created
a selection, just type “Q”
to convert the selection into
a red overlay. Now you
can use normal painting
tools to modify the selection
by painting with
black to add to the overlay,
or with white to take away
from it. Once you have
everything the way you’d
like it, just press “Q” again
to transform the Quick-
Mask back into a selection.
Using QuickMask Mode
gives you more control because
it not only gives you
a real-time preview, but it
allows you to use additional
tools on the selection,
such as filters to create
unusual edges.
Ben Willmore www.digitalmastery.com
Tip 11 Open Photoshop Files
Much Faster If you just need a quick
look at a Photoshop file,
or know you need the flattened
version of it, you
can save considerable time
by holding the Option
and Shift keys while opening
it. This tells Photoshop
to open a copy of
just the flattened composite
image, which is often a
tiny fraction of the file size
of the fully layered one.
The original layered image
is untouched.
Ben Willmore www.digitalmastery.com
Bug Fixes
Fix
1 Fix for Fonts
Not Activating If fonts aren’t activating in
Suitcase or Font Reserve,
try deleting the
fontTablesAnnex cache file in
the System/Library/Caches
folder and restart your
Mac. Tools such as Invisible
Finder and TinkerTool
can help locate the file, and
you will need dministrator
level access to delete it.
FYI: the first user created
on your Mac always has
Administrator privileges. MacFixIt.com
Fix 2 QuarkXPress 6
Printing Bug
A bug in QuarkXPress 6
can prevent documents
from printing if font permissions
don’t match what
XPress expects them to be.
XPress assumes fonts permissions
are set to:
Owner: System (Read &
Write)
Group: Admin (Read &
Write)
Others: Read only
Here’s how to change permissions:
Select the font you want to
change by clicking on it.
Choose ‘Get Info’
(Command-I) from the
File Menu.
Look for ‘Ownership &
Permissions’ in the Get Info
window. You may have
to click ‘Details’ to see the
permissions.
Set the Owner and Group
permissions to ‘Read &
Write’ from the popup
menu, and set Others to ‘Read
only.’
Close the Get Info window.
Fix 3 Major MAc OS X Security Flaw
Apple’s latest security update,
numbered 2004-05-
24, addresses a critical security
flaw that could allow
a website to download
a script to your Mac
and run it automatically.
Potentially, a script can be
written to do anythingfrom list the contents of
your hard drive, to deleting
everything in your
Home directory. This exploit
can be launched simply
by visiting a Web page
that has been intentionally
modified to start the
download process on your
computer. To protect
yourself, run Software
Update to install this security
patch. Tests on our
systems seem to indicate
that the patch is effective.
Apple’s Help Viewer application
is also modified
by this patch. Previously, it
could be used as part of
the exploit since it was capable
of running scripts
when requested by websites.
Help Viewer will still
launch if a remote website
sends a request, but it will
not run any scripts.
Since the patch is new and
we have not been able to
fully test it yet, consider installing
More Internet (in
our June Software Closet)
so that you can stop Help
Viewer from launching
when a Web page sends a
request. Here’s how:
Download More Internet
and run the installer.
Launch System Preferences,
then select More
Internet. Click on “help”
in the column on the left,
then drag an unrelated application
into the window.
We chose Apple’s Chess
application since it doesn’t
use any Internet protocols.
Any future request
from a website to launch
Help Viewer will cause
Chess to launch instead.
For good measure, disable
automatic opening of“safe” files. In Safari, go to Preferences> General
and uncheck “Open safe
files after downloading.”
Disk images will no
longer automatically
mount, and compressed
files will not unStuff. Other
Web browsers have a
similar preference option.
As of press time, there were
no reported incidents of
this security flaw being exploited.
(And for the record,
Intego's products would not
have stopped this problem.)
Tips and Tricks brought to you courtesy of Design Tools Monthly:
www.design-tools.com
