Can you 'offset path' in Indesign

[par1sons]

Quick one

Can you off set path in Indesign, if so how??

Cheers

Andy

[Eugene Tyson]

No it's not illustrator.

What are you trying to do? There may be another way to achieve what you want.

[par1sons]

When i normally build adverts with borders in Illustrator, i 'offset path' my borders for accurarcy and its far easier to zero X and Y. Sloppy artist using Illustrator for ad building use the strokes to create borders which are NEVER the correct size and NEVER zero to X and Y.

I real want to change to Indesign but i can see limitation for the type of work i create.

[Eugene Tyson · Accepted solution]

Well it's not offsetting as such in illustrator

But in the top bar (the control bar)

When you select your frame set the Proxy on the left (the square shape with 8 squares around and 1 inside it) set the black square in the middle.

In the Width/Height information (make sure the link button is on (to the right of it) and type in 3mm and hold down alt and press enter

That will duplicate the frame you have - effectively offsetting it.

You can then group them - does that do what you need?

[par1sons]

Thats wicked, thats a great tip. Its near as dam it 'offset pathing within Indesgin, your a top man Eugene.

Just showed the team that neat trick and it got a big wowwww, question is do i claim that wicked trick as my own, lol

[Eugene Tyson]

You add and substract, divide and multiply in the Transformation (in nearly every part where you can add dimensions)

That trick is an old one - not even I can claim it - it belongs to the InDesign wizards of yesteryear, nobody is 100% sure who discovered it, but rumours are always awry.

You can do the same thing in Illustrator - holding down Alt will make copy - it's pretty neat trick.

[Peter Spier]

I usually set the stroke to align to inside on border. That lets me accuratly size and position them. Is that what you have in mind?

[Eugene Tyson]

Nice tip.

[par1sons]

Yeah thats how i have been doing my borders. I set my defaults so my stroke always strokes to the outside. Its very handy and quick. The offset path is a great tool when constructing detailed shapes etc, i will leave that to illustrator

[anssik_]

How do you set default in InDesign to always stroke to the outside?

[rob day]

This thread is 9 years old. You don’t need two frames to offset a stroke, it can be done via a custom Stroke Style applied to the single frame:

[anssik_]

Doh! Thanks Rob!

EDIT: Actually, when using this method for offset stroke you need to manually calculate the actual point size for the stroke, as with Stroke Styles you're only allowed to give percentages so you need to calculate for example a 10 % width stroke with a 100 pt stroke weight would equal 10 pt stroke from 90 pt away of the path. It's not ease to set the exact wanted distance and width.  

[g4zilla]

@rob day: Thanks for this tip! Just made my job so much easier!

[casinclaire]

Thanks so much for posting this! I was scouring the forums, etc., looking for an easy, if manual, way to do this, but your update to the thread is exactly what I needed.  Much appreciated!

[Laubender]

Hi anssikumpula,

as with all settings for items you like to change the default behavior:

Do it for new frames you draw with your active document when nothing is selected.

Do it for new documents when no document is open.

Regards,
Uwe Laubender

( ACP )

[anssik_]

Of course, silly me! Thanks Uwe!

[denni2579]

Thank you for the correct way to get 'offset paths' ..  I wish things were a bit more consistent and we have the same options throughout all the software.