Working with Gradients | Adobe InDesign CS3 Bible

A technique that has increased in popularity is the gradient, which blends two or more colors in a sequence, going from, say, green to blue to yellow to orange. InDesign has a powerful gradient creation feature that lets you define and apply gradients to pretty much any object you create in InDesign: text, lines, frames , shapes , and their outlines (strokes).

Note ‚

Gradients go by several names among artists . Others include blends and graduated fills.

Creating gradients

In the Swatches pane, where you define colors and tints you can also define gradients: Just use the New Gradient Swatch option in the palette menu. You'll get the dialog box shown in Figure 8-7. The first two options are straightforward:

Enter a name for the gradient in the Swatch Name field. Picking a name is a bit more difficult than for a color , but use something like "Blue to Red" or "Bright Multihue" or "Logo Gradient" that has a meaning specific to the colors used or to its role in your document.
In the Type pop-up menu, choose Linear or Radial. A linear blend goes in one direction, while a radial blend radiates out in a circle from a central point. (Later in this section, Figure 8-10 shows some example gradients.)

Figure 8-7: The New Gradient Swatch dialog box.

Now it gets a little tricky. Follow these steps:

Select a stop point ‚ one of the squares at the bottom of the dialog box, on either side of the gradient ramp that shows the gradient as you define it.

The stop points are essentially the "from" and "to" colors, with the "from" being the stop point at left and the "to" being the stop point at right. With a stop point selected, you can now define its color.
Choose what color model you want to define the color in ‚ select from CMYK, RGB, LAB, and Swatches in the Stop color pop-up menu.

The area directly beneath the pop-up menu will change accordingly , displaying sliders for CMYK, RGB, and LAB, as well as a list of all colors from the Swatches pane for Swatches.

Now create or select the color you want for that stop point.

New Feature ‚

In InDesign CS, you can now select the [Paper] swatch ‚ essentially, transparency or no color ‚ as a stop point in a gradient. Now you can also drag swatches from the Swatches pane to the gradient ramp.

Repeat Steps 1 and 2 for the other stop point.

Note that the color model for the two stop points don't have to be the same ‚ you can blend from a Pantone spot color to a CMYK color, for example.

You now have a simple gradient. But you don't have to stop there. Here are your options:

You can change the rate at which the colors transition by sliding the diamond icon at the top of the gradient ramp.
You can create additional stop points by clicking right below the gradient ramp. By having several stop points, you can have multiple color transitions in a gradient. (Think of them like tab stops in text ‚ you can define as many as you need.) You delete unwanted stop points by dragging them to the bottom of the dialog box.

Notice that there's a diamond icon between each pair of stop points ‚ that means each can have its own transition rate. Figure 8-8 shows a complex gradient being defined.

Figure 8-8: A complex, multihued gradient being defined.

Tip ‚

When you create a new gradient, InDesign will use the settings from the last one you created. If you want to create a gradient similar to an existing one, click on that existing gradient before selecting New Gradient Swatch from the palette menu. InDesign will copy the selected gradient's settings to the new one, which you can then edit. One reason to use this is to create, say, a radial version of an existing linear gradient.

The Swatches pane will show the actual gradient next to its name. You'll also see the pattern in the Fill box or Stroke box in the Tools palette if that gradient is currently selected as a fill or stroke, as well as in the Gradient box in that palette, whether or not it's currently applied as a fill or stroke.

Note ‚

If a gradient mixes spot colors and process colors, InDesign will convert the spot colors to process colors.

Tip ‚

If you want to share your settings with others, you can give them the color definitions for each stop point, as well as the exact location of each stop point and transition control ‚ notice the Location field at the bottom of the dialog box. As you click each control and stop point, it shows the current setting. You can also adjust the settings for the select control or stop point by changing the value in the field, rather than sliding the control or point.

Creating unnamed gradients

Just as it does with colors, InDesign lets you create unnamed gradients ‚ gradients that have no swatches. My caution on using this feature for colors applies less for gradients, since all colors in a gradient are converted to process colors and/or use defined spot-color swatches ‚ so there are no unnamed colors in their output. Here's how it works:

Select the object you want to apply the gradient to.

Make sure the stroke or fill, as appropriate, is active in the Toolbox.
Go to the Gradient pane (Window ‚ Gradient), shown in Figure 8-9.
Select a stop point.
Now go to the Color pane.

It's usually in the same palette as the Gradient pane, but use Window ‚ Color or F6 to display it if not.
Create a color using the CMYK, RGB, or LAB models.

Use the palette menu to choose the model.
Repeat Steps 2 through 5 for the other stop point.
Create any additional stop points by clicking below the gradient ramp, and adjust the transition controls as desired.

Figure 8-9: The Gradient pane, for creating unnamed gradients and for adjusting linear gradients ‚ angles.

Editing gradients

Editing a gradient is as simple as double-clicking its name in the Swatches menu or selecting it and choosing Edit Gradient Swatch. You'll get the Gradient Options dialog box, which is nearly identical to the New Gradient Swatch dialog box in Figures 8-7 and 8-8.

What's different in the Gradient Options dialog box is the Preview check box, which lets you see a gradient change in a selected object (if it's visible on-screen, of course) as you make changes in the Gradient Options dialog box.

The Gradient pane used to create unnamed gradients also has a use for gradient swatches. After you've applied a linear gradient ‚ whether via a gradient swatch or as an unnamed gradient ‚ you can change the angle of the gradient, as done with the bottom middle gradient in Figure 8-10 (compare it to the otherwise identical object at the bottom right). Just enter a value in the Angle field to rotate the gradient's direction.

Figure 8-10: Examples of gradients.

You can't rotate a radial gradient, because it's circular and, thus, any rotation will have no effect. That's why InDesign grays out the Angle field for radial gradients. But you still can adjust the location of a radial gradient ‚ as well as that of a linear gradient ‚ using the Gradient tool in the Tools palette (shown at left). After applying a gradient to an object, select the Gradient tool and draw a line in the object, as shown in Figure 8-11:

For a linear gradient, the start point will correspond to where you want the first stop point of the gradient to be, while the end point will correspond to the last point. This lets you stretch or compress the gradient, as well as offset the gradient within the object. Also, the angle at which you draw the line becomes the angle for the gradient.
For a radial gradient, the line becomes the start and end point for the gradient, in effect offsetting it, as done in the upper-left gradient in Figure 8-10 (compare it to the standard gradient setting for the same object at upper-right).

Figure 8-11: The Gradient tool lets you set the offset, adjust the gradient length, and (for gradient blends) adjust the gradient angle.