One thing you *do* give up and will definitely miss if you used ID and switch to Affinity is automation. It has none, at this time. And if you do a lot of page layout with repetitive tasks, you will miss this even more.
One thing you *do* give up and will definitely miss if you used ID and switch to Affinity is automation. It has none, at this time. And if you do a lot of page layout with repetitive tasks, you will miss this even more.
That's one of the things that concerned me about Affinity Publisher. They might add that capability later on when print shops or in-house production teams need automation for the bigger jobs/projects. InDesign's automation is a massive godsend and made life so much easier. If I understand correctly, Publisher can let you add more pages manually and set things up with a master page similar to InDesign. I think Publisher has potential but will need more tweaks and automation to make it more of a competitive alternative.
The options promoted here are not for professionals (other than maybe Affinity), so I question the utility of this article. Kind of like promoting macOS native CAD software as a replacement for SolidWorks. Fine for small projects or home use, but not up to the tasks that the industry standard does. We use InDesign for user manuals and make extensive use of style guides, links and cross references (across documents). It took years for InDesign to finally get cross references to the point where it was a viable replacement to PageMaker and as far as I can tell, none of these match it. Having 80% of what you critically need is like having 0%.
If you're not earning enough money to afford $600 a year for your software you are a hobbyist. I wish people would stop complaining about how much the subscription is. Seriously, have you ever looked at what software in other industries costs? My accountant pays $5K a year for their software. The software used by architecture and engineering professionals is ridiculously expensive.
Try doing work for a major client and then handing them one of these hobby program files. Or going to the printer and having a discussion about how your PDF traps black, knocks out or overprints when your files don't output correctly or worse yet when it's discovered on press. It will cost way more than $600 to replate the job.
These programs might be fine in their own right and certainly are acceptable for the person trying to create flyers for their band. Trying to work as a subcontractor to an ad agency or design studio somewhere and using these would be like showing up on a construction job site with your Harbor Freight tools.
If you're going to show up to the job, show up with the right tools. Just my 2 cents and 30 years of design experience talking there.
If you're not earning enough money to afford $600 a year for your software you are a hobbyist. I wish people would stop complaining about how much the subscription is. Seriously, have you ever looked at what software in other industries costs? My accountant pays $5K a year for their software. The software used by architecture and engineering professionals is ridiculously expensive.
Try doing work for a major client and then handing them one of these hobby program files. Or going to the printer and having a discussion about how your PDF traps black, knocks out or overprints when your files don't output correctly or worse yet when it's discovered on press. It will cost way more than $600 to replate the job.
These programs might be fine in their own right and certainly are acceptable for the person trying to create flyers for their band. Trying to work as a subcontractor to an ad agency or design studio somewhere and using these would be like showing up on a construction job site with your Harbor Freight tools.
If you're going to show up to the job, show up with the right tools. Just my 2 cents and 30 years of design experience talking there.
Agreed on that mostly. That's why I think for graphic design work, Quark and InDesign are the main tools for the job. But Affinity Publisher has potential if they manage to add more features such as automation. When I was at the print shop several years back, InDesign made it easier to import multiple PDFs whereas Publisher probably can only do it manually. I think if I were to do a 22 page comic or a small graphic novel, then Publisher would do the job fine exporting in CMYK or other file formats required for the printer. But doing a 100 page or larger book is more time consuming and requires an app with granular control which would be ID or Quark with the automation features. But now that I'm out of the print shop environment, I don't have to deal with that again and focus mostly on illustration/design work as singular file pages. I recently redesigned my own business card using Affinity Designer on iPad Pro and it worked out, although Adobe Illustrator has has more depth.
[...] automatically formats manuscripts to avoid windows and short pages
I assume that should be “widows?” If not, can someone explain to me what “windows” are in the context of text layout?
LOL I suspect Windows was a freudian slip on this Mac site.
No. The context suggests it’s a term for an undesirable manuscript layout condition which resembles or is referred to as a window.
That’s possible, which is why I asked for a description of what it means if that was the intended term. I’ve just never heard of layout “windows” whereas “widows” are a commonly understood concept.
Unfortunately the author has neither replied nor updated the article so I still don’t really know. I’m tending toward thinking DAalseth is right.
It's silly to not mention QuarkXPress in the article, it should be at the top of the list, although I suspect that price may have been a big consideration here. Veteran publishers and designers will be familiar with the name, but a whole generation has passed where users thought ID was the only choice. But today's Quark is incredibly powerful, and their pricing structure is better than Adobe, and gives the user ownership of the product, not a subscription rental. While some new software solutions show promise, I would argue Quark s the BEST solution for content publishing out there.
It's silly to not mention QuarkXPress in the article, it should be at the top of the list, although I suspect that price may have been a big consideration here. Veteran publishers and designers will be familiar with the name, but a whole generation has passed where users thought ID was the only choice. But today's Quark is incredibly powerful, and their pricing structure is better than Adobe, and gives the user ownership of the product, not a subscription rental. While some new software solutions show promise, I would argue Quark s the BEST solution for content publishing out there.
I appreciate the Quark shoutout, but should probably ask: Are you a Quark employee?
If you're not earning enough money to afford $600 a year for your software you are a hobbyist.
No, I have eleven mouths to feed, and that's two weeks' worth of groceries, or several pairs of shoes.
Who are you, “Benny” the Martian cabbie from Total Recall?
No, just someone of limited means who has been blessed with a large family. Sometimes every penny counts. If you can't appreciate that, I feel sorry for you.
Comments
Try doing work for a major client and then handing them one of these hobby program files. Or going to the printer and having a discussion about how your PDF traps black, knocks out or overprints when your files don't output correctly or worse yet when it's discovered on press. It will cost way more than $600 to replate the job.
These programs might be fine in their own right and certainly are acceptable for the person trying to create flyers for their band. Trying to work as a subcontractor to an ad agency or design studio somewhere and using these would be like showing up on a construction job site with your Harbor Freight tools.
If you're going to show up to the job, show up with the right tools. Just my 2 cents and 30 years of design experience talking there.
No, I have eleven mouths to feed, and that's two weeks' worth of groceries, or several pairs of shoes.
Unfortunately the author has neither replied nor updated the article so I still don’t really know. I’m tending toward thinking DAalseth is right.