AboutSharon MacGregor Expertise I use Indesign on a daily basis for work, and at home in my more creative ventures. I can answer pretty much any type of question relating to production, design, page layout, and new features of CS3. I work on a PC (yes I know that is rare), so I am more familiar with the PC commands than mac, but I know that more often than not, the Ctril button on the PC is the same as the command button on the Mac, so they are the same!
Experience I've been working in this field since 1988. Started out when they were still doing pasteup and using a wax machine :) Have worked on both Mac and PC on several programs, but my present employer uses PCs and I bought a PC for home so I could work at home. Right now, I work on educational/technical textbooks. I have experience with magazines, newspapers, corporate identity, page layout, and general design.
Education/Credentials I have a BA in psychology with a minor in art, and am working towards an MA in Learning and technology integration (using computers to teach).
I'm using InDesign CS3 for PC, and sadly have almost reached the depths of despair trying to get the gradient tool working correctly. From other posts on this site I notice that I'm not alone in experiencing difficulties in this area. More specifically, my gradient tool only works in monochrome. I'd like to use colours, but try as I may cannot drag and drop CMYK colours into the gradient dialogue box. The "Gradient Options" dialogue box does not allow me to use the "stop color" button - it's disabled for some reason.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated - and may help me retain my employment for a little while longer.
Best wishes
john
Answer I can't specifically answer you're question - because I'ved never actually used the gradient tool to create a gradient - I've hated that tool since they put it in photoshop years ago!!! But perhaps my method can get the results your looking for. I open the gradient pallete (Window>gradient), and make my gradient by dragging swatches onto it (I find dropping them just below the color line works best), then move the boxes left/right as I need to. I just did it with a bunch of colors to try it and it worked. I don't see a "stop color" button though... but I usually do that by making the end color the color I want my gradient to blend into. Then when I've finished making my desired gradient in the gradient pallete, I select the shape I want to fill with the gradient and drag the "swatch" in the gradient pallete over the shape to fill it.
If all else fails, can you do the gradient in Illustrator and bring it in in indesign?
If I haven't helped then ask your question again and I'll send it to the general question pool! Sorry, but I never use that stupid tool....I find it more difficult than it needs to be :)
