PDF (adobe.com)

Customize the pasteboard and guides

You can control the colors used to display guides for page margins and columns, as well as the guides for the bleed and slug areas on the pasteboard. To make it easier to distinguish between the Normal and Preview modes, you can change the color of the preview background.

InDesign also lets you control how close an object needs to be to snap to a guide, whether guides should be displayed in front of or behind objects, as well as the size of the pasteboard.

  1. Choose Edit > Preferences > Guides & Pasteboard (Windows) or InDesign > Preferences > Guides & Pasteboard (Mac OS).
  2. Under Color, choose the desired colors from each of the following menus, or choose Custom to specify a custom color using the color picker.
    Margins
    Sets the color of the page margins.

    Columns
    Sets the color of the column guides for the page.

    Bleed
    Sets the color of the bleed area (which is set in the Document Setup dialog box).

    Slug
    Sets the color of the slug area (which is set in the Document Setup dialog box).

    Preview Background
    Sets the color of the pasteboard when in the Preview mode.

  3. To set how close an object must be to snap to a guide or grid, specify a value in pixels for Snap To Zone.
  4. To display guides behind objects, select Guides In Back.
  5. To specify how far the pasteboard extends out from the page or spread (or the bleed or slug area, if specified), enter a value for Minimum Vertical Offset.
  6. Click OK to close the Preferences dialog box.
You can change the on‑screen color of your paper. With no text or objects selected, double-click the Paper color in the Swatches panel (choose Window > Swatches). The Paper color appears on‑screen only and does not affect output; it is intended only to simulate designing for nonwhite paper.