Quark and InDesign: The Basics of Both Programs that You Need to Know

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Quark and InDesign? Quark or InDesign? Quark vs. InDesign?

With two powerful professional desktop publishing tools, sometimes designers are left wondering, "Which one should I choose?" Quite frankly, you'll probably need to know both, but you'll end up working in one more than the other, many times depending on your clients' needs.

Quark for InDesign Users, Part 2
InDesign Resources on Amazon
Quark Resources on Amazon

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Quark vs. InDesign?

Quark and InDesign users are usually quite passionate about their respective programs.

I'll tell you right now, I'm an InDesign user at heart, but I've been working with Quark for a while, too, and I'm getting more comfortable with both programs.

There are a few basics you need to know if you are working in one program and transferring over to another.

First You Need the Programs

Adobe Indesign CS3 [OLD VERSION]

Amazon Price: (as of 11/16/2009)

Quarkxpress 7 Full Mac/win with Xpert Tools Interactive Designer

Amazon Price: $758.99 (as of 11/16/2009)

Adobe Creative Suite CS3 Design Premium [OLD VERSION]

Full version with Photoshop Extended

Amazon Price: (as of 11/16/2009)

Adobe Creative Suite 3.3 Design Premium Upgrade from CS3 [OLD VERSION]

InDesign comes with the Creative Suite, along with Photoshop, Illustrator, Dreamweaver and Acrobat Pro. NOTE: This is ONLY the UPGRADE. You must own a copy of the full version first.

Amazon Price: (as of 11/16/2009)

Quark for InDesign Users, Part 1

I thought I'd put together a little collection of my observations about the basic differences between working in Quark vs. working in InDesign. Hopefully it will help those of you who are transferring from one program to the other. I'm writing from the perspective of an InDesign user picking up Quark, since that's what I am, but hopefully if you're going the other way around-Quark to InDesign-you'll find this useful, too.

This post goes over the tools panel in Quark (InDesign equivalent here), some functions and common shortcuts and of particular importance, working with images. Working with images is one of the biggest differences in Quark vs. InDesign.

Read Quark for InDesign Users, Part 1

Quark for InDesign Users, Part 2

There are more significant differences in Quark, which are covered in Part 2. Discover how Quark and InDesign handle text styles and Master Page items. It's very different! If you're used to one way, you'll have to get used to another, unfortunately.

Read Quark for InDesign Users, Part 2

InDesign Resources on Amazon

Reference books and training resources for InDesign

Adobe InDesign CS3 Classroom in a Book

by: Adobe Creative Team

Amazon Price: $34.64 (as of 11/16/2009)

Real World Adobe InDesign CS3

by: Olav Martin Kvern, David Blatner

Amazon Price: $25.81 (as of 11/16/2009)

InDesign CS3 for Macintosh and Windows

by: Sandee Cohen

Amazon Price: $19.79 (as of 11/16/2009)

Adobe InDesign CS3: Video Training Book

by: David Blatner

Amazon Price: $36.49 (as of 11/16/2009)

Total Training Adobe InDesign CS2 Win/Mac [DVD]

Amazon Price: (as of 11/16/2009)

Quark Resources on Amazon

Reference books and training resources for Quark

QuarkXPress 7 for Windows & Macintosh

by: Elaine Weinmann, Peter Lourekas

Amazon Price: $25.54 (as of 11/16/2009)

Real World QuarkXPress 7

by: David Blatner

Amazon Price: $34.64 (as of 11/16/2009)

QuarkXPress 7 New Features

by: Jay Nelson

CD-ROM

Amazon Price: $99.95 (as of 11/16/2009)

Helpful Quark and InDesign Links

Below are some of the most helpful sites I've found on Quark and InDesign.

Quark vs. InDesign: The self-proclaimed authority on the war of the desktop publishing giants (and rightly so!)
InDesign Secrets: All those little helpful tips you didn't know you needed. The authors tend to be quite responsive to problems posted in the comments.
Planet Quark: By Quark users, for Quark users. Jay Nelson, of Design Tools Weekly fame, is the primary author/editor. He's really nice and will help you with any questions you might have!
InDesign 101: My Squidoo lens specifically for beginning InDesign users. Check it out for an in-depth program overview (bit of an oxymoron there) as well as an InDesign project walk-through.

So, Quark or InDesign?

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LaurenMarie

by LaurenMarie

Hi, I'm Lauren and I run a blog, CreativeCurio.com, all about Graphic Design. I've been in the Graphic Design industry since 2003, but there are tons... (more)

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