Learning Goals



  1. Login to your computer and open Adobe Indesign
  2. Create a new document with the following settings:
  3. Click OK or enter on your keyboard
  4. Now you will need a couple of toolbars for your workspace
  5. Go to Window > Styles > Paragraph Styles
  6. Keep going to the window dropdown to find the following items and make sure you have them all visible on your screen:
  7. Now, combine all these toolbars into the toolbar on the right side of your screen for easy access
  8. Familiarize yourself with the toolbars at the top, left and right sides of your screen
  9. Make sure that your screen mode is normal by clicking on the drop-down
  10. Note: if you're ever unsure what a tool does, simply hover over it and Indesign will simply tell you


A Master Page is a templete that can quickly apply content to multiple pages in your document

  1. Go to the Pages panel in your toolbar
  2. Double click on the A-Master. You are now in the A-Master which is currently applied to all of the pages in your document.
  3. Delete one of the pages in the A-Master by right clicking on one of the two pages shown and selecting Delete Master Page
  4. Add a header above the outline in your A-Master page. Go back to your pages panel and select page 1 (you may need to double click). Now you can scroll through the pages of your document and see that the header you added in the master has been applied to all of the pages. If you right click on one or multiple of the pages, you can change which master is applied, but don't worry about that for now.
  5. Go back to your A-Master and go to the Text tool
  6. Create a text box in the bottom of your master that fills the width of the page. (This is where you will create your automatic page numbering)
  7. Center the text in the textbox by going to Paragraph > Align center
  8. Insert the numbering by selecting Type > Insert Special Character > Markers > Current Page Number. There should now be an 'A' in the bottom of your A-Master.
  9. Go back to one of your pages. You will now see that there are different numbers on each page. This is your automatic page numbering!

For more info about Masters click here
For more info about Page Numbering click here



  1. Go to page 1. Create one text box (using the text tool) in the left column of your page that has H: 58p and W: 21p9.451 (Make sure this box snaps to the sides and bottom of the column)
  2. Duplicate this textbox into the right column of your page by holding alt while dragging the original textbox to the right side of the page. Repeat this for the columns of your other 2 pages
  3. Insert some dummy text from here into your first textbox on page 1
  4. Overflow the text from your first textbox into all the others by selecting the first textbox with the Lorem ipsum text and clicking on the little red + in the bottom right-hand corner. Now click on the second textbox in the right column of your first page. Continue this process until your text has been overflowed into all 6 columns of your doc.
  5. Add a Title at the beginning of page 1. Style it as you like, with bold, different fonts, and bigger size
  6. Go into the Paragraph Styles panel and select Create new style. (This has saved all the settings for your title as a preset that can be used again and again)
  7. Double click on the new paragraph style and rename it to "Title"
  8. Copy and paste the following text into the end of your dummy text:


    Bédécarrats, A., Chen, S., Pearce, K., Cai, D., & Glanzman, D. L. (2018). RNA from Trained Aplysia Can Induce an Epigenetic Engram for Long-Term Sensitization in Untrained Aplysia. eNeuro, 5(3), ENEURO-0038.
    Bird, A. (2002). DNA methylation patterns and epigenetic memory. Genes & development, 16(1), 6-21.
    Zovkic IB, Guzman-Karlsson MC, Sweatt JD (2013) Epigenetic regulation of memory formation and maintenance. Learn Mem 20:61-74.

  9. In the Paragraph panel, adjust the Left Indent to 1p5 and First Line Left Indent to -1p5 You have now created indented text for citations!


  1. Now that you have inserted and formatted your text, now it is time to insert pictures. In Eukaryon, we will be primarily inserting inline images. What this means is that they will be in line with the text and when anything in the text changes, the image will shift with it.
  2. From the word document below (Sample with Images) Select the image inside of the caption box, right click, and click Save as Picture. Save to your desktop, or whichever folder you would like.
  3. Click in the text where you would like to insert the image (right now it doesn't matter where, but when working with actual articles, you may place the images either all together at the end of the document or considerately inside)
  4. Go to File > Place and select the image that you want to insert.
  5. Resize the image to fit in the column that you have just placed it in. You may notice that resizing only adjusts the cropping of the image, not the actual sizing.
  6. Double click on the image. You will notice that there is are orange and blue outlines. If you adjust the orange (while holding down the shift key for proportions), the image size will shrink. If you adjust the blue outline, the frame that is cropping the image will change.
  7. Adjust the blue frame around your image so that it fits within the column with your text. Now right click on the image, and select Fitting > Fit Content Proportionally
  8. Go to your Links panel (If you can't find it, go toWindow > Links)
  9. With the image selected, right click on it in the Links panel and click Embed Link (this will embed the image in your document so it will save with the document
A couple notes about Images in InDesign:


  1. To save your new masterpiece, go to File > Save As > Format: Indesign CS4 or later (IDML) > Save
  2. See below for a finished example of what your document may look like.
  3. That's it! You are now ready to convert word documents into InDesign for printing in Eukaryon! Congratulations!! 🎉



Completed Example


Download the following documents and try your hand at transferring a Eukaryon article from MS Word into Adobe Indesign

Indesign Template Sample Doc Sample with Images