Indesign colour bars

by Design Workshop Sydney

Adding colour bars to an Indesign document can add an extra dimension of interest to the design. We demonstrate how easy this is done in our Adobe Indesign training courses.
First of all choose the Rectangle shape tool and click and drag across the bottom of the page, for example. Note the Fill and Stroke colours at the bottom of the tool box. To adjust the colour make sure the Fill icon is overlapping the Stroke icon. There are three ways of choosing colour in Indesign: via the Swatches panel or the Color panel, or by double-clicking on the Fill icon at the bottom of left-hand side Toolbar.
If the colour is too dark, you may adjust the Tint value at the top of Swatches panel. We also want no stroke generally, therefore make sure the Stroke icon is overlapping the Fill icon and choose None – the red line icon, or hit the / key. You can also adjust the size and position of the colour bar with the Selection tool ( black arrow).
You may also type in the RGB (Red, Green, Blue) values for a company’s corporate identity colours, for example 184, 8, 80. These values may be found in a company’s branding style guide. Click the Add RGB Swatch button and the swatch will be saved in the Swatches panel as well as in the new Libraries panel. This last panel will appear whenever you open any Adobe CC (Creative Cloud) program – this saves a lot of time recreating your swatches for each program.
And yet another option is create the colour in the Swatch panel options, New Colour Swatch button.
More tips and techniques can be found at Adobe.com. There are many tutorials and forums for designers to discuss topics and the latest Indesign features. See also many examples of our own clients’ work on our Facebook page.
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