What are my options?

Claruz

Claruz

Dogcow
Hello, I'm a bit of a newbie when it comes to DTP. I've used PageMaker before. It wasn't much fun, but I learnt it and could do what I wanted in it, albeit it clumsily. I used it to make a small membership newspaper for an organization. It went quite well.

Now I am interested in making a magazine, and I need some advice on what direction to take software-wise. I'm guessing the main players in this field are InDesign and QuarkXpress. They are both VERY expensive(!!). Appart from those two are there any others to consider? Any suggestions from people that know more than me?

Thanks
 
Your best bet would be Indesign. I don't think there's anything else that can compete with ID or Quark, and ID is much better and cheaper than Quark. Yes, it's still expensive, but what you get is well worth it.

You might try looking for used copies of software, like older versions of Indesign, Pagemaker, etc.

Something else to consider if you want to make a magazine is, well, how much you want it to be like mainstream magazines. If you want it to be the next Macworld, you'll need more than just a DTP program... but if you just want something to show off stuff in your life, or a catalog, or a single issue, Indesign would be a good way to go.
 
arden said:
If you want it to be the next Macworld, you'll need more than just a DTP program... but if you just want something to show off stuff in your life, or a catalog, or a single issue, Indesign would be a good way to go.
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I was thinking a bit bigger than earlier. I need the ability to create professional looking design, the same high quality like Macworld for example. It will be a monthly magazine aswell. So i guess according to you I will need more than a DTP program. What type of stuff do you mean I need? Illustrator and such or? I'd love some more details. Thanks for the help so far!
 
Look in the credits section of Macworld and you'll see what you need person-wise.

Technically speaking, you'll need a DTP program, a good repertoire with a printing press, lots of hardware like printers (to check proofs) and multiple computers/backup systems, design programs like Photoshop and Illustrator, and quite a bit more. Including, probably, a better computer than what you've got.

Write a letter to the editors of MacAddict and Macworld asking what they have. They have actual offices to produce their material, you may need something similar, depending on what you want to do.

What are you making this magazine for, anyway? Is it for a company, or just a hobby thing? You might need to get someone to put some money into this if you've been assigned to do a magazine.

If there's any way I can help, drop me a line outside this site. You can check out my website for examples of what I can do, and if there's any way I can contribute I gladly will.
 
Here's some thoughts in regards to what to buy.

Photoshop
It's a must for any graphical treatments in the magazine/print/web world. It gives you the ability to open and edit any mainstream graphic formatted file.

Also, I've seen people do entire spreads in Photoshop. I wouldn't recommend it, but whatever suites your fancy.

InDesign
InDesign is the better page layout program, in my opinion. My only drawback is that it's a tad slower then Quark. Especially when dealing with large amounts of text. And I guess one could say that there are too many individual windows to contend with. But overall I think you'll like it, as the UI is very similar to Illustrator and Photoshop.

Illustrator
This is the third in the order of importance. Illustrator is great for vector (line) art. It handles curves and illustrations very well. You can use it to make that perfect circle, etc. I think InDesign has gotten to the point where you can very easily accomplish some (not all) of the work that previously had to be done in Illustrator.

I have to say I've kind of fallen from Quark since they dragged their feet on releasing their OSX version. It was very purposeful and it was meant to hurt Apple (in my opinion) so I've been an InDesign advocate ever since.
 
Quark 6 is a joke, so don' even bother looking at it, you'll be glad you don't. ID1.5 is still more advanced, and they've had 2 featured packed releases since then with ID.

Pickup a legal, full copy of Photoshop (old version) on EBay for 10$, then use that for the Adobe Creative Suite Premium upgrade. This will get you full versions of InDesign, Photoshop, Illustrator, GoLive, and Acrobat 6 Pro for about $750.

InDesign and Photoshop are must haves, Illustrator while not required would be a welcomed addition.

Your computer doesn' really matter, as most design shops are still using a wide variety of machines. I know of quite a few in the Cincy Metro are using B&W G3s and Beige G3s still. It can be done on the older ones just as nice as a new machine, albeit a bit slower.

Your real concern after figuring out the software side is your printer. How much volume are you going to shoot out? Color, B&W, mixed, etc. What type of finishing (binding) are you using? ETC, ETC, ETC.
 
You may want to stick to using OS 9, as many design firms still swear by OS 9 and won't touch OS X with a 10-foot banner ad, much less Windows.

And find a printing firm that will take Indesign 1.X files, since they can probably print, bind, and finish a magazine in bulk much better than you can.

Did you answer this question yet: What kind of magazine are you putting out? And for what purpose?
 
I don't know if I agree to stay away from osx. I think a lot of designers (print) have had the ability to avoid taking the transition to OSX much longer then the rest of us.

It's only going to hurt them when they finally do convert their machines to the OS. Of course every office is different, and some may really need to hold off until they can allocate some adjustment time... but come on! Are you going to use OS9 forever?!?!
 
The only reasons a majority of design firms haven't switched was:

No quark (which now we know isn't the case, not to mention quark is years behind ID anyways)

Technology plans, in other words, they won't just upgrade computers or OS cause something new came out, it's just not a good business practice. Most buy a computer, and keep it for a set time (3 years maybe). Now alot of places will be coming up on the time to upgrade, and will switch.
 
Well that's the problem, is that most companies tend to create separate budgets for hardware and software. As they tend to be on separate cycles.

For example the company I work for, all of the print designers are on os9 and are stuck their. They have been on a software cycle which -- as a department -- doesn't disrupt the work flow. So every version of Quark, we have to have, since our clients tend to have various versions.

When a new version of Quark comes out, we time it to our project. So the upgrade occurs at the start of a new project, rather then the middle. As people break off from the project they start to get the upgrade and the production manager will sometimes have it on his/her machine before then (but in addition to current version).

The problem that Quark created is that most companies who were upgrading machines, saw osx as an option, but not a requirement. They had to have os9, and why learn osx if you don't have to (from a business perspective). So new machines old software, just like the normal rotation. The rest of the world moved to OSX and the print industry was left in their wake.

Meanwhile the printing companies had to wait as well. In my area there are still printers that don't take Adobe InDesign files. A major printing company has stated they never will.

The downsides of OSX have played heavy in this industry as well.. OS9 is zippy and the print design is a processor intensive task. OSX, especially in it's earlier stages was not as fast as OS9. It just wasn't -- not by anyone's clock. So, in the case of where I was working, when the designers were presented with OSX, it wasn't ready for them, they were ready for it.

Now this has caused even more delays in the process. We won't be upgrading our print department for another two years! And the machines that they currently have, don't all support a functioning OSX environment.

Now OSX -- as all of us know -- does have it's advantages, but because the print designers came in late to the party, they really need to be filled in on OSX.

Lastly, I'd like to say, that what is going to further complicate the situation is that Quark's version of OSX is kind of bad... every pro OSX person I meet seems to lean towards InDesign. So from the companies perspective it's a lot to ask your staff... learn a new OS, program AND still be productive. That's not realistic.
 
Did you answer this question yet: What kind of magazine are you putting out? And for what purpose?
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I didn't answer it very thoroughly. Mainly because this is all in the planing stages and may never even happen. The idea is a free monthly magazine focusing on console gaming. Me and another guy would be doing the layout. The printing will be left to a professional printer. The content isn't sure yet, but we are hoping to team up with some guys that do an online version of what we are trying to do.

OSX is no question, I wouldn't use anything else. From what I have heard in this thread ID seams to be our best bet. The magazine would obviously be funded by advertisement so there are many things that have to be considered before this can even be started.

Thanks for all your input, it's been very helpful in deciding the building blocks of this project to (may)be.
 
What about content? Do you have people to write stuff for you, or are you doing that yourselves? Or are you licensing stories from other sources?

I'd suggest charging at least a small subscription fee. Putting out a monthly magazine in full color will cost quite a bit, and advertising isn't the only way you should try to recapitulate that cost (as it probably won't get you enough).

You should also work on your grammar skills if you plan to write or edit; "Me and another guy" won't fly very far in the world of professional journalism. ;)
 
arden said:
What about content? Do you have people to write stuff for you, or are you doing that yourselves? Or are you licensing stories from other sources?

I'd suggest charging at least a small subscription fee. Putting out a monthly magazine in full color will cost quite a bit, and advertising isn't the only way you should try to recapitulate that cost (as it probably won't get you enough).

You should also work on your grammar skills if you plan to write or edit; "Me and another guy" won't fly very far in the world of professional journalism. ;)
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As I said, we are hoping to team up with some other guys for the content. About my grammar skills, I didn't know you wanted high level super incredible ultra fantastically written stuff, I thought this was a forum. I have excellent grammar skills, just don't like to flaunt them around in a public forum, I prefer being a bit more relaxed. Anyway, I won't be writing much in the paper.

About the subscription fee, if we can't offer it for free it's a no go. There already is a free paper with similar content available.
 
I don't want to kill your dream, but have you thought through the kind of time and money that producing a magazine, even quarterly or monthly, will cost you? I mean besides ponying up the money for a G5, Photoshop and ID... What about pre-press and printer services? Just the paper can bankrupt you if you're working with a sheetfed press, and you won't have the volume for offset for quite some time. In the last few years, many magazines have closed their doors permanently, and few new magazines have been hitting the shelves. As a pre-press professional, I would strongly advise you to think about making an online 'zine. Think about your audience: gamers.
Gamers like physical magazines only if they have ads for stuff they want and content that reads like a comic book. I'm not insulting gamers; I love games and I read about them in places like Inside Mac Games...and I could get the physical mags for free 'cause my pre-press company is part of a much larger printing company that's one of the top 3 volume printers in the country. Anyway, think about it...
 
mseydel said:
I don't want to kill your dream, but have you thought through the kind of time and money that producing a magazine, even quarterly or monthly, will cost you? I mean besides ponying up the money for a G5, Photoshop and ID... What about pre-press and printer services? Just the paper can bankrupt you if you're working with a sheetfed press, and you won't have the volume for offset for quite some time. In the last few years, many magazines have closed their doors permanently, and few new magazines have been hitting the shelves. As a pre-press professional, I would strongly advise you to think about making an online 'zine. Think about your audience: gamers.
Gamers like physical magazines only if they have ads for stuff they want and content that reads like a comic book. I'm not insulting gamers; I love games and I read about them in places like Inside Mac Games...and I could get the physical mags for free 'cause my pre-press company is part of a much larger printing company that's one of the top 3 volume printers in the country. Anyway, think about it...
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Great input. We are still in the thinking through stage, and all the input from here helps. We aren't planing on printing it by ourselves. As it stands right now the two question marks are: how much will the printing cost, and how much can we expect to make from ads. If the latter can be seen to surpass the other quite soon then this is worth a shot. As for as ezine, there are plenty of those, there is an extra appeal for actually having a physical paper. Both for readers and advertisers alike.

Since you are in the business maybe you could give me a very rough estimate of what printing would cost. Full colour glossy magasine with about 20-30 pages. Granted I am in Sweden so costs probably will vary a lot, but any insight is interesting.

Thanks
 
hmm...I'm a retoucher and color guy, not sales, so I couldn't begin to give you an accurate quote, especially for printing in Europe. Just for page processing alone, you'd probably somewhere around 120-150 US dollars/page. That's assuming that you're going to be doing all of your own scans and color- you'd almost have to, as scans and color can be prohibitavely expensive. In the US, magazine scans run a pretty wide range, from about 60 to 120 dollars/scan. That's only if you've negotiated regular work; a one-time drum scan runs closer to $200. Since you're dealing with games, it should be alot of screenshots, so you may not need to worry much about scans. The nice part is that since they're digital, you can bypass the scan cost. They've got their own problems, though- the resolution/image size has to be adjusted, and they're usually oversaturated RGB images that don't transitioin all that well to a CMYK magazine page. I've worked on gaming/technology magazines, and screenshots are no fun...partly because people are used to looking at them through the transmissive surface of their monitor; you can never match that sort of color intensity with ink on paper. Glossy paper will help the depth and contrast of the images, but to gloss interior pages is insanely expensive. Check out your competition- few mags even use much of a gloss on the cover anymore...

As for paper/printing cost, I can ask someone at my office in print sales for a rough estimate on Monday, but they're not too familiar with the European market, either.
 
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