Quark to InDesignCS3 Conversion Guide - InDesign User Group

You can apply transparency effects
to any object, including text frames,
placed graphics, and shapes you create
within InDesign. Here’s a list of
the available effects and a description
of the results they produce:
• The Blending Mode menu in the
Effects panel provides 16 options
for changing the appearance of
areas where the selected object or
group overlaps underlying objects.
The blending mode options in
InDesign are similar to those
available in Photoshop and
identical to those in Illustrator.
• The Opacity field and its accompanying
slider let you vary the degree
of transparency of the selected
object or group from 100% (completely
opaque) to 0% (completely
transparent). When you decrease
an object’s opacity, the object
becomes lighter, and the underlying
artwork becomes visible
through the object.
• Drop Shadow adds a soft- or
hard-edged shadow behind any
object. You can control the position
of a drop shadow and vary
the blending mode, opacity, size,
spread, noise, and color of the
drop shadow. The Use Global Light
option lets you use the same position
settings for all drop shadows
in a document.
specifying a 60% opacity value for the
“life” text makes it lighter and translucent.
this example also shows the options
available in the Blending mode menu.
the Drop shadow controls in the
Effects dialog box let you add a
drop shadow to any object and
control the placement and
appearance of the shadow.
Creative Effects 49