InDesign for QuarkXPress Users [Electronic resources] نسخه متنی

Skewing or Shearing

Skewing (also called shearing) is technically the rotation of the two axes of an object differently. The result looks sort of like a 3D perspective effect. QuarkXPress only allows horizontal skewing, and lets you skew boxes or their content separately. InDesign also only skews horizontally, but it also fakes a vertical shear (or one on some other angle) by combining skewing and rotating. (However, InDesign can't shear text inside a frame without slanting the frame, which QuarkXPress can do.)

Skew With the Transform Palette

To horizontally skew an object in the Transform palette, enter an angle in the Shear Angle field, or choose one of the preset values in the popup menu. Both the object and its contents are slanted on the horizontal axis (unless you've turned off the Transform Content option). Note that a positive shear value angles the object

clockwise (the top shifts to the right), unlike the rotation tools where a positive angle is counterclockwise.

For a vertical shear, enter the same angle in both the Shear Angle field and the Rotation field.

Using the Shear Dialog Box

You can make precise shearing tranformations by opening the Shear dialog box: Double-click the Shear tool, Option/Alt-click on the page, or choose Shear from the Transform submenu (in the Object menu). Here you have options for shearing on the vertical or horizontal axis, or on any angle you want (see Figure 18-3). If you Option/Alt-clicked, InDesign applies the transformation based on where you clicked.

Dragging with the Shear Tool

If you insist on doing all your transformations by dragging the cursor, you'll be happy to know you can do that with the Shear tool as well. However, unless you're careful when dragging with this tool, you may find its results wild and unpredictabledon't forget to keep one hand on Command/Ctrl-Z to undo. Hold down the Shift key to constrain InDesign to shear horizontally or vertically.