For those of you who do layout, what is your chosen program; Quark, Adobe, or Something Else?

Although I haven't ued Quark, I know one advantage it has -- which may be significant to you, depending -- is that objects can be kept in the flow of the main text. So, frex, you can place an image somewhere on a page, and if the text changes, say getting longer, the image will move with the text. Useful if you have a figure to reference. InDesign currently does not do that. If you get everything 100% set ahead of time, and are only doing one version of the document, this is probably not a big deal. But if you expect some changes or are doing a screen and a print version, it might save you a good chunk of time.

I prefer Adobe's Indesign to Quark. I find its general usability better. I also like and have used the open source program Scribus but you may need to run cygwin or something similar to use it on a windows PC.

Trevis

I use Adobe pagemaker and it's worked fine for me

Matt

unheilig studios wrote: For those of you who do layout, what is your chosen program; Quark, Adobe, or Something Else?

Hmm.

For the same reason, I prefer InDesign; particularly with CS, you can do some very nice, rapid, graceful automation.

Jasper wrote: Although I haven't ued Quark, I know one advantage it has -- which may be significant to you, depending -- is that objects can be kept in the flow of the main text. So, frex, you can place an image somewhere on a page, and if the text changes, say getting longer, the image will move with the text. Useful if you have a figure to reference. InDesign currently does not do that.

At the moment I use QuarkExpress, but seriously thinking of changing over to InDesign CS on the advice of many graphic design and layout professionals I've spoken to.

Cheers
Malcolm

Burning Wheel Classic was done in Quark. Burning Wheel Revised and the Monster Burner were done in Indesign. I think the stark difference in quality speaks for itself.

And, what took me three months in Quark -- the layout -- took me about one month in Indesign.

We need more bulk in this discussion. Unheilig: why are you asking? What are your needs? If you're considering buying one of these, it's more important to get a good bargain than which one you get. What's this about?

That said, I use QuarkXpress, but mainly because it's available. The two programs are still close enough in capability to each other that there's no reason to switch over if you're already competent in one. That could change in the future, though. Scribus, on the other hand... if you've not yet invested money and learning time in either Quark or InDesign, I strongly suggest checking it out. It's free, man!

Personally, I'm through and through disgusted with the inflexibility of all layout programs I've met. They're childishly programmed and planned out like it were the '80s - which it is for the Quark architecture, as far as I can see. Macintosh '80s, to boot. The future of layout is, or should be, in modular, open source general solutions utilizing mark-up languages and making sure that if my project needs a feature, it's f***ing available, or I can program it myself. It's contemptible to leave a designer hanging with non-portable, illogically typed data trash called "layout files" you have to build up from scratch if the project specs are changed in a fundamental way.

Sorry, had to say that. Could be because I'm currently doing layout, and remembering how fun it is. Browser bugs have nothing to Quark when it comes to employing experts whose claim to fame is getting flawed programs to work.

Hi, Tom! Good to see you back in the fray, man!

I recently changed from Quark to InDesign. The advantages ID offers are overwhelming as compared to even more recent versions of Quark. I strongly recommend InDesign as superior.

Quark still does have a handful of superior features. They are, in my experience, very minor advantages that cannot outweigh the ass-kicking, major improvements InDesign offers.

well, i'd like to layout an rpg book.

also though, a graphic novel.

i don't do layout as a matter of artistic integrity, but one of necessity. i do, however, want to produce beautiful books.

does it matter what program you use when it comes to Book Printers? Last time i had a book printed, it did.

Most printers prefer to take PDF files now, but I've sent both native Quark and InDesign files to major printers within the last year without problem.

As always, check with your potential printers first and see what they say, and follow their instructions when preparing files for them.

most printers will accept a PDF nowadays. All printers will accept Quark files. Some printers will accept Indesign native files.

Best bet is to try for the PDF output. Indesign's PDF output is rather nice and straightforward. For Quark, you can't really RIP/print a file that's been exported to pdf. You gotta shoot it through Distiller. These are, of course, vague details of bigger issues.

-L

Heya,

I'll just add that Adobe has worked out great for me. The user manual was easy to read for me and quite helpful. /shrugg I think either will work for ya :)

Peace,

-Troy

I think that you'll find that as printers upgrade, they will be switching to an Adobe PDF workflow. That also means that InDesign will be the primary.

That being said, they will always be able to take Quark files. Quark was a lot of money when printers started taking files from customers and turning it into a easy workflow. Hell, it still is a lot of money. They have a lot of money and time invested in that workflow and hate to loose that investment when they upgrade.

That being said. Time is money. The learning curve on Quark is much higher than InDesign.

I'm feeling way out of date here as I'm using Pagemaker for all my layout. How much better is InDesign? How similar are they?


If price is an issue, these are the retail prices

Pagemaker 7.0 $499
Indesign CS2 - $699
Quark Xpress 6.0 - $699

You can likely find them cheeper if you look around.

,Matt

The last time I spoke with printers they seemed open to Pagemaker as well as InDesign. Programs get aged out but Pagemaker has not been aged out yet. If you are sending the file to the printer as a PDF then it won't matter what it was made on - at least I think it wouldn't.

When it come to making a pretty book either of the programs mentioned can do it. Learn one and get good with it and be ready to make mistakes. You always spot 20 errors as soon as you get the book back from the printer!

Chris Engle
Hamster Press

MatrixGamer wrote: The last time I spoke with printers they seemed open to Pagemaker as well as InDesign. Programs get aged out but Pagemaker has not been aged out yet.

Pagemaker may not be "aged out" yet, but it's on its way. Adobe has stopped development for the program. It is my understanding that they are trying to it phase out in favor of Indesign. I believe that was the purpose of the Indesign Pagemaker edition.