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Adobe InDesign is revolutionary software which has made designing page layouts and templates easier than Quark Express and PageMaker.
Like its predecessors, InDesign offers an interface that allows you to easily template and develop an application from scratch. InDesign is utilized to format entire print publications by linking the content from its source. This is the most exciting feature since it is difficult to adjust the content because you have to adjust the design of the document itself. With InDesign, you can modify the content of a document without adjusting the design. Primarily, InDesign is extremely helpful in creating printed materials such as magazines, newsletters, poster, books, manuals, billboards etc. However, it can export electronic files for almost any design platform.
It is a fact that page layout involves a lot of repetitive work. Designers and compositors cut, copy, paste, apply style, tag images repetitively to create a compelling design – perhaps, thousands of times a day. With InDesign CS4 Adobe has focused on reducing the steps for repetitive tasks. And it has succeeded in making designer’s life a whole lot easier.
Designing a print document like magazine layout is a tedious task. Designers had Quark Express and PageMaker to do that. But it took a lot of time. Adobe InDesign has cut the time by minimizing the tedious work of repeating the steps again and again.
Several improvements streamline the layout process, including finer control options for text and paragraph styles and more tools for object manipulation. Text editing is no more difficult. It is like word processor; with tools like drag-and-drop text editing, as-you-type spell checking and support for foot-notes. You can add footnotes to an imported text file or the text created using InDesign.
There are options that will give you greater control over what comes in when you import text files, with enhanced options to map or rename styles.
A new Object Layer menu lets you view all of the layers in a Photoshop file on the page. This feature is touted for in-house composition, so a designer can simply place an unflattened Photoshop file in one InDesign document and then view different versions by toggling layers on or off, rather than making several PDFs for review.
The Object Styles control panel lets you save a wide range of style settings, including fill, stroke, and corner effects; transparency; and text and paragraph styles, allowing you to apply one or a dozen styles to objects with a single click.
However there are some issues that InDesign doesn’t address. For example, you cannot open QuarkXPress 5 or 6 files; if you have been using Quark 5 or 6 and have substantial archives, expect to keep both layout programs on your machines. Also, to save down to InDesign CS, you must still export documents in Interchange format, which requires CS users to get a plug-in to read CS2 and above files.
In contrast, Adobe InDesign has certainly made the life of designers and compositor whole lot easier. Now they don’t have to learn complex steps and tools to build a great-looking layout. They will be able to experiment with layouts and content placement. InDesign sure is the best tool for graphic designers today.
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