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09/19/2013 08:04:01 PM · #1 |
Back in the 80s and 90s desktop publishing was very big, and as I was in Advertising at the time, we were taught PageMaker and I became proficient in it. Hell, I still have PageMaker 6.4 on my Mac Classic! So while I never marketed myself as a graphic designer - I was a copywriter - I knew enough about typesetting and basic design principles to turn out half-decent work when I had to.
Anyway, fast-forward some 30 years to the present. Photoshop is da bomb for designers and of course photographers and PhotoChoppers.
But DAMN! Does it ever royally suck when it comes to text and manipulation of same. I know it's not meant to be a desktop publishing program, but PS is so awkward and clunky with text, that I was dangerously close to digging out the 22-yr-old Mac Classic (still starts up just fine, still loaded up with PageMaker 6.4) and get the whole project done using PM 6.4 in approximately 2 hours time instead of floundering through 10-15hrs of wrestling with Photoshop and, to me, a needless number of layers. And layer masks. And channels. Blahblahblah. PM, at least back in the day, had none of this Layers'R'Us bullshit. Straightforward and simple, could have a dozen or so different text elements on the same layer, no prob.
So, can anyone explain to me why Adobe just doesn't try to beef up the weakest part of PS with the best of PageMaker?! Maybe there already is such a program integrating the best of both, I'm such an ignoramus hanging off the trailing edge of technology, I wouldn't know.
Message edited by author 2013-09-19 20:05:41. |
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09/19/2013 08:23:40 PM · #2 |
They don't include it because it takes a lot of overhead (processing-wise) to handle the nuances of good typography as you have in PageMaker**, InDesign, and Quark (among others), and they make other products which handle that (that's why they sell the "suite" together).
However, if you need to set a large block of type, you can do so in any page-layout or word-processing program (or Illustrator if you have the suite) and export it to EPS or PDF, them import that into your Photoshop file as a single piece of art. The disadvantage is that you need to go back to the other program and repeat the process if you need to do anything other than scale the block of text as a whole.
FWIW the first and only computer class I took was for PageMaker 3.0 ...
**In the trade this was usually referred-to as RageMaker ...
Message edited by author 2013-09-19 20:24:53. |
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09/19/2013 08:33:34 PM · #3 |
| LOL @ RageMaker...of course I experienced frustration at times with PageMaker, but have had several times more frustration with Photoshop! Btw I think in college we were taught on PM 4.2, I upgraded after graduation. Anyway... |
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09/19/2013 08:35:56 PM · #4 |
| When Adobe bought PageMaker from Aldus, they morphed it into Adobe InDesign nd they still make that. But it works differently and I have never gotten the hang of it. Since I don't do that kind of work anymore, I let it go. I have Corel, and it does a decent job in laying out type which I can then export to Photoshop. |
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09/19/2013 08:59:13 PM · #5 |
I think InDesign tries to incorporate the best of PM and Quark -- not sure how successfully, but it's not that much different from using either of those.
I still do book layout and other tricky layouts so I still use those programs -- right now I'm working on the second edition of a book originally done in Quark 3.0 and published in 1996. Amazingly, my backup CDs seem to have intact files.
Originally posted by Bear_Music:
When Adobe bought PageMaker from Aldus, they morphed it into Adobe InDesign and they still make that. |
The last Aldus version was 5.5. Adobe brought out versions 6.0 | 6.5 | 7.0 of PageMaker before discontinuing it in favor of InDesign (and the Creative Suite bundle). FWIW I think they still publish FrameMaker, a layout program designed especially for laying out long technical documents. |
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09/19/2013 09:04:09 PM · #6 |
Another vote of Corel Draw, who's text handling is vastly superior to InDesign IMHO.
Message edited by author 2013-09-19 21:04:37. |
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09/19/2013 09:38:15 PM · #7 |
Originally posted by BrennanOB:
Another vote of Corel Draw, who's text handling is vastly superior to InDesign IMHO. |
CorelDraw is the alternative to Illustrator, and AFAIK is intended for creating single pieces of art (ad, poster, etc.) -- it would not be a good way to lay out a book. |
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09/19/2013 10:01:54 PM · #8 |
Originally posted by GeneralE:
Originally posted by BrennanOB:
Another vote of Corel Draw, who's text handling is vastly superior to InDesign IMHO. |
CorelDraw is the alternative to Illustrator, and AFAIK is intended for creating single pieces of art (ad, poster, etc.) -- it would not be a good way to lay out a book. |
Correct. The Adobe equivalent of CorelDraw would be Illustrator. Both are exceptionally good for working with text in any imaginable way EXCEPT the threading of complex, multi-page documents./ |
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