WoodWing’s Smart Layout plug-in for Adobe InDesign is an indispensable tool for any newspaper or magazine designer. It will do the following for you:

• Create complex text frames with ease
• Work efficiently with multiple columns
• Save a lot of your valuable time
• Create consistency throughout your documents
• Can be used with Smart Styles and Smart Catalog for even greater efficiency

Let's take a look at two examples.
In both examples, we are working on an article and an advertisement. In the first scenario, the advertisement has already been placed on the page in an earlier stage, and the article needs to be added afterwards. The second scenario is the other way around, as the article is already on the page, while the ad yet has to be placed.

Scenario 1 - Create an article that ‘flows’ around the ad

Smart Layout works with the Article concept. This is a new object type in InDesign. Articles can contain a collection of images, text and other objects that together behave as one object. When moving or resizing Smart Layout Articles, they behave intelligently - for example, columns can be changed automatically on the fly.

Imagine that an advertisement is already on your page, and you need to create a text frame in InDesign that ‘flows’ around the ad. This would involve a number of consecutive steps, like creating separate text frames for each column, linking them, and grouping them together. Resizing the columns in your text frame would involve even more steps.

Not with Smart Layout! You can create just one new Smart Layout Article frame, and it will automatically flow around the existing objects on your page, in this case the ad. You’ll be able to control all aspects of the Article, like number of columns, their width, gutter, etc. Life can be so easy at times...

Click on the movie below to see how an Article is created with Smart Layout.

Create a Smart Layout Article

The resulting Article frame has been filled with text.

Scenario 2 - Place an ad after the article has been placed

You just finished a page for a magazine, you are all happy with the way it looks, but then the chief editor asks you to place a last-minute 2-column advertisement. This would normally involve a lot of work, as InDesign doesn’t allow you to change the height of columns within a text frame individually.

Again, Smart Layout will make your life so much easier! In this example Smart Layout’s ability to change each column’s height individually helps you out. Smart Layout provides a number of extra frame handles that allow you to easily do this. The text will automatically reflow. Now you can place the advertisement across two columns. It took only a couple of seconds.

Of course, you would be left with text overset, and depending on the situation this could be solved either by editing the text, or changing the size of the Article frame. The latter, again, is accomplished in a matter of seconds with Smart Layout as it will automatically adjust the number of columns, the column width or the gutter for you, depending on your preferences.

Normally, inserting the ad would involve a lot of steps to perform.

The Smart Layout Article provides a number of extra handles for resizing columns.

In the resulting article, only text overset needs to be fixed.

What would you like to do next?

• Dowload a fully functional 30-day trial version of Smart Layout
• Obtain a Brochure
• Read the Manual
• Find a WoodWing Reseller nearby
• Purchase Smart Layout online