Stacking Objects | Adobe InDesign CS3 Bible

Each time you begin work on a new page, you start with a clean slate (unless the page is based on a master page, in which case the master objects act as the page's background; see Chapter 7 for more on master pages). Every time you add an object to a page ‚ either by using any of InDesign's object-creation tools or via the Place command (File ‚ Place, or z +D or Ctrl+D) ‚ the new object occupies a unique place in the page's object hierarchy, or stacking order.

The first object you place on a page is automatically positioned at the bottom of the stacking order; the next object is positioned one level higher than the first object (that is, on top of and in front of the backmost object); the next object is stacked one level higher; and so on for every object you add to the page. (It's not uncommon for a page to have several dozen or even several hundred objects.)

Tip ‚

When building pages, always try to keep the number of objects to a minimum. For example, instead of putting a headline in one text frame and a subhead in a separate text frame directly below the one that contains the headline, use a single text frame. The leaner your pages, the leaner your documents. Lean documents save and print more quickly and are less problematic to modify than bloated documents.

Although each object occupies its own level, if the objects on a page don't overlap, then the stacking order is not an issue. But some of the most interesting graphic effects you can achieve with InDesign involve arranging several overlapping objects, so it's important to be aware of the three-dimensional nature of a page's stacking order.

Because objects are added in back-to-front order, it makes sense to build your pages from back to front. For example, if you want to use a lightly tinted version of a scanned image as the background for a page, you would first place the image on the page, then add other objects on top of or in front of the picture frame.

In an ideal world, the first object you placed on a page would remain forever the backmost, the last object would be the frontmost, and every object in between ‚ created in perfect order from back to front ‚ would relate correctly with every other object. In this perfect world, you would never have to worry about moving objects backward or forward.

But the world is not perfect, and you may change your mind about what you want to achieve in your layout after you've already placed objects in it. To change an object's position in a page's stacking order, use the Arrange command (Object ‚ Arrange), which offers four choices:

Bring to Front (F5 or Ctrl+Shift+])
Bring Forward ( z +] or Ctrl+])
Send to Back (Shift+F5 or Ctrl+Shift+[)
Send Backward ( z +[ or Ctrl+[)

For example, you might want to see how a piece of text looks in front of an illustration. But if you created the text frame before you created or placed the illustration, you'll have to move the text frame forward (or the illustration backward) in the stacking order.

Cross-Reference ‚

In addition to letting you change the stacking order of objects on a page, InDesign also lets you create document-wide layers. Each layer contains a separate collection of stacked objects. For more information about using layers , see Chapter 6.

To change the stacking order of objects:

Use any of the object-creation tools to create four overlapping shapes , as shown in Figure 12-1.

Figure 12-1: The first shape you create is the backmost, the second is one level above, and so on. In this example, the three smaller boxes partially overlap each other and they are all in front of the largest box.

The numbers in parentheses indicate the order in which you should create the shapes.
If it's not already displayed, open the Color pane by choosing Window ‚ Color or pressing F6.

You'll use this pane to change the shade of each object so you can easily tell them apart.
Click on the Selection tool, click on the last object you created, then use the color tools in the Toolbox or the Color pane to fill the object with a color.

Cross-Reference ‚
See Chapter 11 for more information about applying strokes and fills to objects.
Use the Color pane to fill each of the remaining boxes with a successively lighter tint of the color, as shown in Figure 12-2.

Figure 12-2: Applying tints to the shapes lets you see the stacking order of the four rectangles. Every InDesign object occupies one level in the stacking order.

In the example, the remaining shapes are tinted at 25%, 50%, and 75%, respectively.
Click on the frontmost shape (the last one you created), then choose Object ‚ Arrange ‚ Send Backward or press z +[ or Ctrl+[.

Notice that the Bring to Front and Bring Forward commands are not available. That's because you can't move the frontmost object any farther forward in the stacking order.
Click on the backmost shape (the first one you created), then choose Object ‚ Arrange ‚ Bring Forward or press z +] or Ctrl+].

When you bring the object forward, one of the objects becomes obscured.
Choose Object ‚ Arrange ‚ Bring to Front or press F5 or Ctrl+Shift+].

The smaller shapes are now obscured by the largest one.

Choose Object ‚ Arrange ‚ Send to Back or press Shift+F5 or Ctrl+Shift+[.

The hidden objects are once again visible.

Tip ‚

To select an object that's hidden behind one or more other objects, hold down the z or Ctrl key, then click anywhere within the area of the hidden object. The first click selects the topmost object; each successive click selects the next lowest object in the stacking order. When the bottom object is selected, the next click selects the top object. If you don't know where a hidden object is, you can simply click on the object or objects in front of it, then send the object(s) to the back.

New Feature ‚

InDesign CS adds to the Object menu the Select submenu, which provides new controls for object selection. The first four options let you select another object relative to the currently selected object: First Object Above (Option+Shift+ z +] or Ctrl+Alt+Shift+]) selects the topmost object, Next Object Above (Option+ z +] or Ctrl+Alt+]) selects the object immediately on top of the current object, Next Object Below (Option+ z +[ or Ctrl+Alt+[) selects the object immediately under the current object, and Last Object Below (Option+Shift+ z +[ or Ctrl+Alt+Shift+[) selects the bottommost object. If no objects are selected, InDesign will base its selection on the creation order. (Chapter 11 covers the Select submenu in more detail.) You can also access these four selection options by Control+clicking or right-clicking an object and choosing the Select menu from the contextual menu.