Hello,
Let me just state that I am a complete newbie to InDesign. I literally installed it for the first time ever the other night. I have a Creative Cloud subscription for the video editing utilities, but upon being tasked with creating a wedding invitation I realized I should give it a go. Can't be THAT hard, right?
I actually managed to squeeze something out that wasn't half bad (by my standards), but I have two remaining issues that I couldn't figure out so far. In addition, I really know nothing of the jargon. So please forgive me for my childlike descriptions of things that you guys probably have proper words for.
1. Main page layout
The invitation (the actual paper) isn't a size that exists as a preset. It is 22cm x 16.4cm in landscape mode, and there is a vertical fold in the center, so that it can be folded into a little "magazine". Well, if you do that, and count the first page as page 1, then all of the stuff I'm making goes on page 3 - the right hand, "inside" page. When I created the document in InDesign, I got the dimensions in there, I told it to create a two column layout, and tried to emulate the size of the fold (only a couple of millimeters). On the screen it looks good, but when I print to my Canon MG8250, the whole body of text (it's all centered, like horrible web design of old) is obviously placed too far to the left. The left side of one centered line of text is 1.9cm from the left side of the page (the fold in the middle of the paper), while the right side of the same text is 3.5cm from the right side of the page. Another shorter line is 2.7cm from the left side and 4.4cm from the right side (all measurements somewhat approximate). All text boxes are made to be the same width as the "title safe" part of the page (i.e. the pink/purple guidelines that InDesign made for me), and the text is centered within them. Now, my basic math skills tells me "How about you move the right margin about 0.8cm to the right - that'll make it look right!" - however, is that the right way to go about this? Anyone care to weigh in to help me see the light?
2. Centering of italic fonts
Two pieces of the text uses an italic font - the names of the bride and groom, and the names of the people the invitation is for. I liked the look of the "Kunstler Script" font, so I went with it. However, in comparison to the rest of the text (which uses the default Minion Pro for now), the italic text does not look centered at all. Of course, I see the problem knowing where the "center" actually is, because the baseline is much further to the left than the top of the letters. All I know as a layman is that InDesign and I have very different ideas about what centering actually means. Compared to the other text lines, the Kunstler Script lines appear to be much further to the right. I did another measurement. From the leftmost pixel of a name line to the leftmost pixel of the next line below, we have 0.7cm difference (the name line being wider). However, the rightmost pixel of the name line compared to the rightmost pixel of the line below is 1.5cm further to the right. Is it possible to center this in a fashion that makes it actually appear centered to a human?
Any help would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks!