Layout and DTP

[Eugene Zee]

I have to agree with Jack here.  We can talk all day about WP vs Layout and such but in actuality you should use whatever works best for you.  If you let the price of a piece of software get in the way of your writing and creativity you are defeating the purpose.

So I guess the answer is no, its not worth it if you don't already have a high end program and you will be paying off the bill with 20 months worth of sales.

Regards,

[Clinton R. Nixon]

Guys, do you have a word processing program already loaded onto your computer? Just text? That's OK. It will do. Just write it. You aren't going anywhere until you just write it (and play it, and revise it and play some more, but that's another topic). Use what you have, and make something with it or else you'll just wind-up with a dusty guitar in your closet.

Jack,

I appreciate your sentiment, but I'm seriously looking for good technical advice here - I'm basically asking the people who started just like you said, with a pawn-shop guitar, and are now really playing. What's their guitar of choice now?

That said, your sentiment is completed appropriate for someone starting out.

[Michael Hopcroft]

I don;t know if I'm the one to talk since, lacking both software and expertise, I hired an outside typesetter. He used InDesign 2.0 and saved everything to PDF.

He found he liked the direct control he had and that Pagemaker had reached about the end stage of its development cycle.

Adobe does seem to have the DTP market pretty muhc wrapped around its finger, If you want to be compatible with your printer, get your PDFs to port over exactly, or generally be compatible with whatever you're doinbg, you need some Adobe program or another. Unfortunately, Adobe software is expensive as heck.

This is why publishing companies should be started by colleege students -- they get academic discounts and good package deals.

[hive]

This is why publishing companies should be started by colleege students -- they get academic discounts and good package deals.

Not only that, but i'm sure that there are alot of layout/production peeps on the board that freelance options are available. So if you can't spend the g's to get the Adobe Suites there are those of us in the grassroots sections that will help a fellow indie.



-
h

[Adam]

He found he liked the direct control he had and that Pagemaker had reached about the end stage of its development cycle.

Not technically true; PageMaker development has not been discontinued.

Adobe does seem to have the DTP market pretty muhc wrapped around its finger

Except for the still numerous people and publishing houses that still use Quark and just give Quark files directly to the printer.

Unfortunately, Adobe software is expensive as heck.

Almost all "professional" software is; when you're earning $20-30 an hour doing it [unfortunately, few in the gaming industry are . . . ] $600 is not a huge investment.

[Tim Denee]

This is why publishing companies should be started by colleege students -- they get academic discounts and good package deals.

You're telling me. At my my local Large Franchise Book Store they have a Macromedia bundle (dreamweaver + fireworks + flash + that other one) for $800 NZ for tertiary students... compared to the $2000 NZ for normal folks. Of course, for the average tertiary student it's nigh impossible to get $800 together in the first place. So I suppose they don't lose any money on it.

[Eugene Zee]

Clinton,

Sorry, I realize now what you are asking.  Of course Quark, Photoshop, Illustrator are the standby of the industry and that is what we use.  As far as PDFs the new incoming standard is a format called PDF X1a and we are in the process of converting to that standard now.

Hope that was better.

Regards,

[Clinton R. Nixon]

Eugene,

No problem. What I'm doing here is trying to update my essay about how to publish games on the cheap. While Ron whittles away at game design, bringing knowledge to us all, I'm focusing on the technical side of things - how someone without a lot of capitol can start professionally publishing their RPG.

[woodelf]

I use much of the same as others:

Being a long-time Mac freak, I MUCH prefer QuarkXPress 4.0 or greater.

precedent-antecedent disagreement, seems to me. a "long-time Mac freak" should be using PageMaker, since that was the first DTP package, the first Mac DTP package, and for quite some time the only DTP package.  just can't resist picking a nit when it involves jabbing XPress.  ;-)

However, I actually did the Godlike layouts in PageMaker 6.5. Pagemaker has some nice features (like auto page numbering and book creation), but I'm just far more proficient in Quark.

'course, i'm in teh opposite boat--there are a couple things that're easier to do in XPress, but i'm much more proficient in PageMaker and InDesign.

----
anyway, to answer the question, i do most of my work in InDesign.  if you can't afford a good DTP package, i hear that even MS Publisher is better than MS Word for doing layout (which, frankly, wouldn't take much of an accomplishment).  or, you could use AppleWorks (nee ClarisWorks)--it's actually a remarkably full-featured app for DTP stuff.  the only real issue i've had with it is that it doesn't seem to manage memory well when dealing with a 100p, 20-section document with numerous graphics on every page, and gets very sluggish despite having copious quantities of available memory.

if you want to see something that makes significant use of ClarisWorks' (v4) capabilities, take a look at the PDF version of Four Colors al Fresco that is online.

currently, i'm using mostly InDesign, though Illustrator for flyers/posters.  and i do my web stuff with Illustrator and BBEdit Lite.  i'm actually in the process of evaluating DTP packages to figure out which one to shell out the bucks for.  what frustrates me is that there's no one best.  while QuarkXPress wants to be good at everything, it has definite strengths (color processing, gradients, web publishing) and weaknesses (indexing, other long-document features).  and Adobe is pushing their products into parallel, rather than hierarchical, tracks.  rather than FrameMaker, say, having all the features of PageMaker and InDesign, and then some (ordered based on price), each has features the others doesn't.  so PageMaker is best-suited to traditional book-length works, FrameMaker is best for highly-technical works and multi-medium works (keeping, say, XML and print versions in sync), and InDesign is best for magazine-like works.  problem is, RPGs really need the book-length features of PM and the graphic capabilities of InDesign, and those of us in the indie field could really use the standardization/automation features of FrameMaker.  as i said, i've been using InDesign for my last few projects, and i hope to get my hands on FrameMaker (i already am familiar enough with PM and XPress to weigh them).  so far, InDesign is a dream--all the features/power of XPress, with an interface even smoother than PageMaker (mostly).  but i really wish it had *any* tools for helping with ToC or index generation (PM's a dream for this), not to mention footnotes/endnotes, or even a word count feature--i have *no* idea how big my latest work is.

[Adam]

so far, InDesign is a dream--all the features/power of XPress, with an interface even smoother than PageMaker (mostly). but i really wish it had *any* tools for helping with ToC or index generation

InDesign v2 does have these features; I haven't messed with index generation yet, but the ToC tool is certainly as powerful as the one in PageMaker, and I'd wager a fair amount more flexible.

[Tim Gray]

I'm using Serif's Page Plus DTP software, for decent features I can actually afford. Good look getting a printer to read that format, though. On the other hand, you can buy a second copy to give to your printer and still have spent less than on most other software. I'm told a new version will shortly appear with PDF output built in. Not having to shell out extra for Acrobat Writer would make it a very attractive package for our purposes, I'd think.

[Matt Wilson]

This question's not meant to accuse anybody, but: is it cost-effective to buy something like PageMaker for layout? When you're a one-man show - I write, edit, and layout my own games, leaving only art for someone else to do - the cost of PageMaker (over $500, last time I checked) eats up all your profits.

I see most of you are using PageMaker + Photoshop, which I know comes in over a grand together. I ended up going with PagePlus + Paint Shop Pro (www.jasc.com) and ended up spending just over $150 - which is about the same as my profits so far.

I think you made a good choice. If you come to a point where you think you want to upgrade, it'll probably be the layout tool, and you're better off saving up for a really good one. The app makes a difference, but when you're experienced enough, you'll be happier with something like InDesign or Quark over PageMaker.

[Matt Wilson]

This question's not meant to accuse anybody, but: is it cost-effective to buy something like PageMaker for layout? When you're a one-man show - I write, edit, and layout my own games, leaving only art for someone else to do - the cost of PageMaker (over $500, last time I checked) eats up all your profits.

I see most of you are using PageMaker + Photoshop, which I know comes in over a grand together. I ended up going with PagePlus + Paint Shop Pro (www.jasc.com) and ended up spending just over $150 - which is about the same as my profits so far.

I think you made a good choice. If you come to a point where you think you want to upgrade, it'll probably be the layout tool, and you're better off saving up for a really good one. The app makes a difference, but when you're experienced enough, you'll be happier with something like InDesign or Quark over PageMaker.

[Clay]

For the really whacked out types that don't pay for software (including  your OS), these options don't quite work.  What does work is LaTeX for the page layout and Gimp for the graphics.

The Gimp is easy enough to use, and it's even available for Windows.  LaTeX is another story. It's more like programming than graphic design (a lot more). Font selection becomes vanishingly small (good luck using much beyond the 14 basic postscript fonts), but your typography will be rock solid and cross-references, TOC and List of Tables type things will be trivially easy. PDF output is possible, and the output looks quite nice.

The first edition of Dominion Rules was done with LaTeX, if you'd like an idea of what it's capable of. http://www.dominionrules.org

Price: free - I haven't paid for software in a long time, and that includes my operating system.