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What Software/Platform for Print Publishing?

Posted by Cliff on from the state-of-the-written-art dept.

Howzer asks: "What's the deal with publishing these days? I remember clearly the old Quark vs Pagemaker wars, the winner being Quark, on a Mac, end of argument. But that was the late 90s. These days the three products I seem to be hearing about are Quark, Publisher, and InDesign. I'd love to get some opinions on platform/software and the current state of play, as it seems I may have to have an opinion on this soon. I thank you, the designers who'll soon be working for us thank you, and the people who'll be reading our 120 page glossy monthly magazine thank you." What publishing software gives you the best performance and features for the money?

1 of 23 comments (clear)

  1. My Experience by major.morgan · · Score: 2, Insightful

    This has been an ongoing debate for years...

    My humble input is as follows:

    1) The Mac or PC issue - all of the applications in professional use are feature identical between the platforms.

    2) The performance angle - sure a Mac can beat a PC on the Unsharp Mask filter (but for $1000-2000 more), and it really isn't a significan portion of anyone's day. Save yourself a buck (or $2000) and buy a PC.

    3) Which Application - Quark was the superior program for many years, but they killed themselves by not coming out with a new version for what 4+ years? PageMaker is most shop's standard, with many transitioning over to InDesign. Ultimately I suppose you can use any app, as long as you can create a CLEAN PDF.

    Summarized: Adobe Apps on a PC (Sorry, It's the real world).

    I imagine this will draw some flak from the various independent designer's out there, but the reality is if you are working for yourself - you can use whatever you want. If you want to collect a paycheck, know a PC, don't be a Mac zealot, and create layouts that actually output to film.

    I have worked in the industry for years (for a specialty book printer) and this is how we go about business. We will take any platform, any file-format - but we use PC's in-house running PageMaker, InDesign & Acrobat.