ID HW 1

Shapes/Frames Tool- How to Create Shapes & Frames | InDesign Tutorial (youtube.com)

This tutorial made the shape tool look very easy to use, as you select from rectangles, polygons, circles, etc. When inserting outside photos, you can use different shape frames to place your photograph into and scale it to the size you’d like. In the video, the author adds a headshot that was originally in a square shape and turned it into a circular shape perfect for an avatar for a portfolio or LinkedIn profile.
Additionally, with this feature you can round out your edges to create an even clearer shape for your artwork. This would be perfect for creating text boxes for an animation/comic book style piece. The creator of this video was short, concise, and made a somewhat difficult looking topic seem like a breeze. Definitely a great teacher!

The gap tool seems like a seamless way to adjust sizes of the space between your objects on a file. Whether that is with designs, texts, or whatever else you may have in your piece, the tool lets you resize the objects that have commonly aligned edges simultaneously, while keeping the gaps between them fixed. The video, however, was very repetitive and didn’t show different characteristics of how this tool can be used on what types of designs per say. In the video, he does state that this tool is perfect for creating brochures which I would have to agree with.

The gradient tool seems a little more complex than the other two tools mentioned above, but it is an essential tool for InDesign. The narrator of the video goes into grand detail on different features you can use in the gradient tool; adjusting the color, where the color blends, and rotating the colors in your swatch. I would use this tool to enhance my text for a more eye-catching appearance on my social media graphics. This video was a huge help for a tool that I can see myself using on a daily basis during my career

Abby's Digital Media