Placing articles on a layout in Studio

Working on a print publication is team work and involves many steps before the final product is completed.

One of these steps is placing a created article on a layout. Depending on your workflow, this step can be performed by various people within the team and at various stages during the production process.

In Studio, the tools for placing an article on a layout are available in the fullscreen mode of a layout. Opening a layout in fullscreen mode can be done anywhere in Studio, including the Publication Overview application.

This article explains how to use these tools.

Before you start

Please note the following:

• An article can only be placed in a frame on the layout if that frame is part of an InDesign Article. Studio will inform you when the layout that you open does not contain such frames.

Note: Making a frame part of an InDesign Article is done in InDesign.

It is assumed here that the layout that is opened contains InDesign Articles.

• Articles cannot be placed on a Layout Module.

Placing an article

Step 1. Open the layout in fullscreen mode by doing one of the following:

• Select a layout and press the Spacebar.
• Right-click a layout and choose Preview.
• In the Publication Overview Application, double-click on a page in the Duplicate Pages panel, or right-click a page and choose Preview from the context menu.*

* When double-clicking a page in the Publication Overview itself, the design and functionality from Studio 11.72 and lower is shown.

Step 2. Open the Place Articles panel by clicking the Place Articles icon in the toolbar on the right side of the page.

The 'Place articles' panel appears on the right side of the screen and the layout changes to a mode that makes it possible to place articles in a frame.

Figure: The Place Articles panel.

For detailed information about using the panel, see Using the Place articles panel later in this article.

Step 3. (Optional) Use the Filter to narrow down the list of articles.

Step 4. Drag the article from the panel and drop it onto the frame on the layout.

The following takes place:

• When a Print article is used, it is immediately placed on the layout. When a Digital article is used, a print variant of that article first needs to be created. This requires a Conversion Rule in which the components of the Digital article are mapped to those of the Print article. A dialog box appears asking you to choose a Conversion Rule from a list. Make a choice and click OK.

• The placed Print article is created and placed on the layout, the layout is saved and the layout preview is updated.

• The placed Print article gets the same Brand and Category assigned as the layout.

Step 5. (Optional) Double-click the article to open it in the Print editor to further edit it such as copyfitting or to place images on the layout.

Using the Place Articles panel

The panel is divided into 2 sections:

1. A Filter at the top of the panel for narrowing down the results in the list of articles.
2. A list at the bottom of the panel containing all articles that can be placed.

In addition, articles are divided over two tabs:

1. The Related articles tab shows all articles that are related to the layout. An article is considered to be related when it is part of the same Dossier that the layout is in.
2. The Other articles tab shows all articles in the system that you have access to. It also contains options for creating more complex filtering.

Working with placed articles

When placing an article, it is important to know if it has already been placed; either on the same layout or on different layouts. When an article is placed multiple times and subsequently edited, every instance of the placed article is updated which may not be desirable.

To indicate that an article is placed more than once, a pin icon is shown.

The following icon types are used:

• A orange icon when the article is placed on the layout that is currently viewed.
• A white icon when the article is placed on a different layout than the one that is currently viewed, and / or when the layout that is currently viewed is part of a different Brand.

Note: The icon is also shown for Digital articles to indicate that a print variant of that article is already placed.

When hovering the mouse pointer over a pin icon, a tooltip appears showing on which layouts the article is placed.

Filtering

Take note of the following when filtering the list of articles:

• Use the buttons to quickly filter on the type of article or their placed state: All, Digital, Print, or All, Placed, Unplaced.

• A list in the Search box can be opened to use an existing Custom Search or to create a new Custom Search. Click the icons next to the name to share or edit the Custom Search.

• When the Other articles tab is open, additional options are available to further narrow down the search results by filtering on Brand, Category, Status, and Issue.

Tip: To show or hide these options, click the More filters or Fewer filters label.

Troubleshooting

The message "This layout does not have any frames to place articles in" appears

This means that the layout does not contain any frame that is part of an InDesign Article. Articles can only be placed on a frame if that frame is part of such an InDesign Article.

The message 'Cannot read properties of undefined (reading 'Params')' appears when placing an article on a layout

To resolve this, make sure that the Studio Server plug-in 'Automated Print Workflow' is enabled in Studio Server.

Revisions

• 3 February 2026: Updated section 'Troubleshooting' with information about the message 'Cannot read properties of undefined (reading 'Params')'.