Quark
An imported picture in Quark can be sized in the Measurements palette, with the X% and Y% fields. There's no way to link those fields, you have to address both to size an image. Another way to scale an image and its picture box is by holding Command and dragging the corner of the box to scale both. Oddly though, adding the Shift key doesn't constrain proportions in the image, but forces it on the box, so the image gets distorted.
Finally, you can scale the picture to the size of the box by right clicking on the box and choosing the command Scale Picture to Box. Adversely, you can fit the box to the picture by choosing Fit Box to Picture. You can crop an image by changing the size of the box and move the image within the box with the Content tool. To center an image in a picture box, you can use Command (Control) + Shift + M.
InDesign
A placed image can be manipulated separately from it's picture frame in InDesign with the Direct selection tool. You can scale the image with the Direct selection tool. Clicking and holding on the placed image for a few seconds will reveal its total size beyond the boundaries of the picture frame. You can control the percentage of the size of the picture in the Control panel and link the horizontal and vertical aspects.
InDesign has several Fitting options. You can Fit Content to Frame, Fit Frame to Content, Center Content, Fit Content Proportionally, and Fill Frame Proportionally.
Significance
Quark feels clunky when it comes to placing and sizing images, whereas InDesign offers so many ways to deal with placed images. There's more room to change your mind with InDesign, more opportunities to experiment and alter them. Again, I think Quark's mindset is that the designer should already know the size of the imported image beforehand.
Thursday, July 31, 2008
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
InDesign v Quark: Linking
Quark
Quark has two tools for linking: the Link tool and the Unlink tool. You can automatically flow text into a new Project that has automatic text boxes created in it. To manually link, you need to select the Link tool and then click on an text box that has an overset symbol on it, then click on an empty text box to flow that text into it.
To break a text link, select the Unlink tool and click on a text box that is linked. An arrow will appear that indicates the link between the text boxes. Click the tip of the arrow to break the link.
InDesign
InDesign offers three ways to link text: manual, automatic, and semi-automatic. There is no link or unlink tools in InDesign for linking text frames. Every text frame has an In and Out port. When text is overset, the Out port will have a red plus sign in it. Click on the red plus sign and now you will have a loaded cursor. To manually link, click on an empty text frame. To semi-automatically link, hold down Option (Alt) and click on multiple text frames to continue the thread throughout a document. To automatically link, hold down the shift key. Click on a column and new text frames will be created to accomodate the entire story.
Another thing about InDesign is that you don't need to create a text frame to begin flowing text through a document. Once you Place a story and the cursor is loaded, you can then click on a column to flow that text.
Significance
Again, Quark is expecting you to plan ahead and have all of your text boxes in place before you flow text. The advantage in InDesign is that you don't need to have text frames in place to link or use special tools to do it.
Quark has two tools for linking: the Link tool and the Unlink tool. You can automatically flow text into a new Project that has automatic text boxes created in it. To manually link, you need to select the Link tool and then click on an text box that has an overset symbol on it, then click on an empty text box to flow that text into it.
To break a text link, select the Unlink tool and click on a text box that is linked. An arrow will appear that indicates the link between the text boxes. Click the tip of the arrow to break the link.
InDesign
InDesign offers three ways to link text: manual, automatic, and semi-automatic. There is no link or unlink tools in InDesign for linking text frames. Every text frame has an In and Out port. When text is overset, the Out port will have a red plus sign in it. Click on the red plus sign and now you will have a loaded cursor. To manually link, click on an empty text frame. To semi-automatically link, hold down Option (Alt) and click on multiple text frames to continue the thread throughout a document. To automatically link, hold down the shift key. Click on a column and new text frames will be created to accomodate the entire story.
Another thing about InDesign is that you don't need to create a text frame to begin flowing text through a document. Once you Place a story and the cursor is loaded, you can then click on a column to flow that text.
Significance
Again, Quark is expecting you to plan ahead and have all of your text boxes in place before you flow text. The advantage in InDesign is that you don't need to have text frames in place to link or use special tools to do it.
InDesign v Quark: Guides
Quark
Quark has a utility called Guide Manager under the Utilities menu. You can add a number of horizontal and vertical guides with this tool. You can also remove guides that have been added in the same utility. What's odd about this tool is that you cannot use it on a master page, which would make the most sense. You can add the guides to All Pages or All Spreads, but as soon as you add additional pages, those guides are not on the new pages.
InDesign
Under the Layout menu, go to Create Guides. You can specify the number of Row and Column guides and fit them either to the page or to the margins. This tool can be used on master pages - where it probably should be used.
Significance
If grids are really important to you, then creating a logical set of guides to help you during the design process is very helpful. However, if your design does not neatly fit into a specific grid or only requires a few grid lines, then neither of these tools are anything to gain from.
Quark has a utility called Guide Manager under the Utilities menu. You can add a number of horizontal and vertical guides with this tool. You can also remove guides that have been added in the same utility. What's odd about this tool is that you cannot use it on a master page, which would make the most sense. You can add the guides to All Pages or All Spreads, but as soon as you add additional pages, those guides are not on the new pages.
InDesign
Under the Layout menu, go to Create Guides. You can specify the number of Row and Column guides and fit them either to the page or to the margins. This tool can be used on master pages - where it probably should be used.
Significance
If grids are really important to you, then creating a logical set of guides to help you during the design process is very helpful. However, if your design does not neatly fit into a specific grid or only requires a few grid lines, then neither of these tools are anything to gain from.
InDesign v Quark: Eyedropper
Quark
Quark doesn't have a color picker or eyedropper tool to select colors. Even when you are creating new colors, there's no way to select colors from imported images.
InDesign
InDesign has an eyedropper tool in the Toolbox. With the eyedropper tool, you can select colors from a placed image. Click once to hold a color. Option click to select again. then you can go to the Swatches panel and choose New Color Swatch from the options menu.
The eyedropper tool does more than just color in InDesign - it can select formatting attributes. With the eyedropper tool selected, click on some formatted text and those attributes will be held. Click and drag over some unformatted text with the eyedropper tool and now that text will be formatted.
Significance
Yes, I suppose you should know the colors that you will be using in a given project ahead of time, but there are those times when you need to reference a color within your layout program without having to go back to Photoshop to find out it's CMYK or RGB values. Apple has a utility called Digital Color Meter that you could use while in Quark to pick out values, but you'd still have to write them down and make new colors. Not as easy as InDesign.
Update
This is a real ass-backwards workaround, but you can get color sample/eyedropper functionality in Quark:
http://www.quark.com/service/desktop/support/techinfo/knowledgebase.html
Quark doesn't have a color picker or eyedropper tool to select colors. Even when you are creating new colors, there's no way to select colors from imported images.
InDesign
InDesign has an eyedropper tool in the Toolbox. With the eyedropper tool, you can select colors from a placed image. Click once to hold a color. Option click to select again. then you can go to the Swatches panel and choose New Color Swatch from the options menu.
The eyedropper tool does more than just color in InDesign - it can select formatting attributes. With the eyedropper tool selected, click on some formatted text and those attributes will be held. Click and drag over some unformatted text with the eyedropper tool and now that text will be formatted.
Significance
Yes, I suppose you should know the colors that you will be using in a given project ahead of time, but there are those times when you need to reference a color within your layout program without having to go back to Photoshop to find out it's CMYK or RGB values. Apple has a utility called Digital Color Meter that you could use while in Quark to pick out values, but you'd still have to write them down and make new colors. Not as easy as InDesign.
Update
This is a real ass-backwards workaround, but you can get color sample/eyedropper functionality in Quark:
http://www.quark.com/service/desktop/support/techinfo/knowledgebase.html
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