If you hover over a section of a path without a point, you’ll switch to the Add Anchor Point tool, indicated by the small plus sign next to the cursor.

If it’s over an existing point, the cursor will switch to the Delete Anchor Point tool, which is indicated by the small minus sign next to the Pen cursor icon. Look closely and you’ll see the Pen cursor icon change when hovering over an existing anchor point or path. Switch to the Pen tool using the Tools panel or the keyboard shortcut P. If you want to add or remove anchor points, you’ll need to use the Pen tool. Switch to the Direct Selection tool using the Tools panel or by using the keyboard shortcut A.Ĭlick and drag an anchor point to move it around, or you can click an anchor point to select it and then use the handles to adjust the curves on either side of the point, just the same as any other vector shape in an Adobe program (see below). You can use the Direct Selection to adjust existing anchor points and curves in your newly-outlined text. Instead, you have to use InDesign’s vector manipulation tools such as the Direct Selection tool and the Pen toolset. Once you have outlined your text, you can no longer edit the text contents by using the Type tool and typing in new letters with your keyboard. You can also use the keyboard shortcut Command + Shift + O (use Ctrl + Shift + O if you’re using InDesign on a PC).Īs you can see in the example above, the text is now closely outlined by a vector path with anchor points and curves that match the original shape of the letterforms. Step 2: Open the Type menu and click Create Outlines. Make sure the text frame is still selected. Step 1: Create a new text frame using the Type tool, and enter some text. It only takes two steps to create outline text in InDesign. The actual process of outlining text in InDesign is extremely simple. Some of the text’s visual quality is lost during the outline conversion, especially at small font sizes.Outlined text can be used as a clipping mask for images.Outlined text cannot be edited using the Type tool but must be edited using vector path tools.Text can be converted into vector path outlines in InDesign using the Create Outlines command.

Indesign vector