What’s New in CS2

It has almost become a yearly tradition: Adobe updates and releases a new version of InDesign or Photoshop, with the latest changes taking the form of the Creative Suite 2. As the number would indicate, this is the second time Adobe has packaged its most popular software titles, including InDesign, Photoshop, Illustrator, GoLive and Acrobat. Of these applications, InDesign and Photoshop are the most widely used by yearbook advisers and students. Here are the features that are most likely to be useful to you in a yearbook capacity.

Adobe Bridge

One new feature that stretches across all applications in the Creative Suite is Adobe Bridge. If you have ever used the File Browser in previous versions of Photoshop, you have a good idea of what the Bridge can do. Bridge shows you previews of digital images, and now, previews of your InDesign documents and PDFs as well. Use Bridge to rename and label files, and add keywords and other data to help with searching and organizing files for maximum file management efficiency. Although a version of Adobe Bridge is included with all single-standing applications, you will get the most out of it if you use it with all programs in the Creative Suite.

Version cue

Because of how we use Adobe software, it is easy to forget that the design departments of newspapers, magazines, ad agencies and other corporate entities are Adobe’s main markets. Many of the features found the Creative Suite programs are focused on those professionals, but can also bring assistance to your publication. Version Cue enables you to save different versions of documents, which can then be accessed and changed by various people in your workgroup. From a yearbook perspective, think of its usefulness in creating templates that can then be added to or altered by simply saving different versions of the same document. You could use a basic blank Walsworth template as the first version, then save a version for your student life section with specialized folio information, then save another version with folio text in place. The best thing about it is, you always have the previous versions of the documents available for any other alterations that need to be made.

inDesign cs2

Several new features in InDesign can help spice up your yearbookand make your workflow more efficient.

Object Styles
By this time, you probably know about Character and Paragraph styles in InDesign, and how setting them up can help you quickly apply characteristics such as font, font size and alignment. Object Styles do the same thing, but with effects such as drop shadows and color. For example, say you have a certain design for quote boxes in your yearbook that includes a drop shadow, a specific photo size, and a specific color for the text of the quote. Create one quote box and save it as an object style. Then, create another rectangle and apply the object style to it. Size, text, the colors and the drop shadow are applied to the rectangle with just one click.

Text features
If you import text from a word-processing program such as Microsoft Word, InDesign CS2 now imports the styles that are set up in Word into the document. You can also map style names to each other so the text imports correctly with InDesign styles that are previously set up. Adobe has also added some popular word-processing features to InDesign such as auto-correct spelling and a setting that highlights possible misspellings.

Compatibility with InDesign CS
If you don’t upgrade your entire computer lab at once, it can sometimes be difficult to move documents from computer to computer and work with different versions of software. InDesign CS2 has a built-in file format, the InDesign Interchange (.inx) format, which enables you to export a CS2 document so it can be opened in InDesignCS. Note that if you are working with plug-ins, such as Walsworth’s InDesign Enhancements, the different plug-in versions may not be compatible and can result in documents that do not open in the previous version. It is possible to remove the plug-in information if needed; contact Computer Support for further instruction if you run into this issue.

Repeating transformations
Any object that you scale, skew, rotate or fit enables you to apply the same transformation to any other object using the Repeat Transformation command. For example, if you rotate an image window to a certain angle and you would like the caption to run parallel to it, just repeat the transformation on the caption for a perfect match.

Photoshop cs2

Photoshop also has added some great new features to make effects cooler and easier to apply.

Image Warp
Photoshop has enabled users to warp type for several versions. The CS2 version now enables you to warp objects as well. For example, you could create a great special effect that looks like an image is wrapping around another object, and with just a few steps.

Spot Healing Brush
Cleaning up old photos or baby pictures is a snap with the Spot Healing Brush, which enables you to make corrections to an image just by clicking, without having to select a source.

Customizable Menus
Adobe programs have allowed you to customize your workspace and keyboard shortcuts for years, but only Photoshop CS2 allows you to show, hide or apply color to menu commands and palette menu selections. This can make it easier for students to remember certain commands they need to select.

Red-Eye Correction Tool
You have been able to correct red eye in the past, but now there is a tool made specifically for this task. Choose the size of the correction you want to make and how much to darken the pupil, and the Red-Eye Correction Tool gets rid of those pesky flash effects for you.

Illustrator cs2

Even though Illustrator is not as much of a standard in the yearbook arsenal as InDesign and Photoshop, there are still some interesting features you may be able to use if you purchase the entire Creative Suite.

Live Trace
This feature converts photos, scans and other raster images to vector, line-based images that can be scaled and edited.

Live Paint
Take any object with overlapping paths and apply color quickly to the area you wish without having to draw paths or make selections.

Acrobat 7.0

We all know that Acrobat plays a huge role in creating the PDFs that you can submit to Walsworth as part of the PDF Performance Program, but did you know that it can also help in the process of reviewing and approving your work? Let’s say that your yearbook staff does not meet as a class, making it difficult to get together and communicate edits and changes to the work individual students are doing. Even if you are submitting application files to Walsworth, you could export an InDesign document as a PDF, which could then be viewed on any computer with the free Acrobat Reader application. In previous versions, you had to have the full version of Adobe Acrobat to add comments and reviews to documents, but with version 7.0, you can add and view comments in the free version of Reader to help electronically communicate grading information and requests for changes.

I hope this article has opened your eyes to some of the features available in the Creative Suite and some of the new ways they can help you be more productive with your yearbook. For information on ordering the Creative Suite, or upgrading to individual CS2 applications from your current versions, contact your Walsworth yearbook representative.