Topic awaiting preservation: quark (Page 1 of 1)

My boss just mentioned to me that I need to learn Quark. Since I have absolutely no experience with Quark, but have basic knowledge of Illustrator- how difficult will it be to learn Quark in a short period of time?

thanks.
CRO8

Quark is nothing like illustrator, it's used for page layout only, not drawing. Quark has a funky interface (IMHO) I would suggest finding a book, maybe peachpit press will have one of those visual quick start guides for quark, that would get you going in it.

Me Again?

When you learn the last thing there is to know about Quark, you'll look back at it all and say "what, is that it?" Quark is powerful for what it does (although it has some startling deficiencies, which will become more and more obvious the more you use them)... but Quark is also a relatively shallow program, compared to incredibly versatile behemoths like Photoshop and Illustrator.

So what I'm saying is, yes, get a book (or even just the Quark manual), and read up, if you'd like, but the program isn't as complex as all that. You can learn enough to be productive in three or four hours, and you'll learn the rest of it in maybe a week, depending on what kind of work you're doing. You'll still find little features here and there, but it's not like Photoshop, where you constantly figure out drastically new and different ways to use the program.

Jedart: Yeah, I hate Quark's interface. Why the hell can't all those character and paragraph controls be on palettes (not to mention scaling, rotation, etc...)? Do they think that people never copyfit? Do they have some strategic alliance with Extensis? "Okay, we'll make a product that is amusingly crippled, yet is also an inescapable industry standard... now you make the plugins that remedy its laughable shortcomings, and we'll split the profits!"

thanks all. Yeah- I have 2 manuals that came with the program and will start playing with it in the next few weeks. I was under teh impression that it does similar things as in Illustrator (creating shapes, text, etc.).

thanks!
CRO8

Hmm... if you want to get the most out of Quark (or any page layout program) you'll want to study up on the art/skill/craft of typography. "How to use Quark" is a relatively small topic... "How to use type" is a huge one. If you're already a print designer, and you just don't know Quark specifically, then you already know all this, but if you haven't worked with print before, there's a lot to learn about copyfitting, text color, kerning/spacing/tracking, leading grids, what fonts are suited to what applications, and a dozen other topics. More than getting a book on Quark, I'd say get a book on typography.

Furthermore, if you really care about the appearance of your finished text, you'll end up wrestling with Quark on a daily basis. Quark doesn't seem to care much about the specifics of proper design, and it'll give you some typographic indigestion at times. Quark commands an amusingly high price, and I can't really believe that it's worth it when near-perfect programs like Photoshop retail for half as much.

Hi there CR08!

Quark is nothing like Illustrator, even if you can do some stuff there that you can do in Quark. Quark is used for page layout as mentioned. It´s professional layout program and quite expensive. What is it that your boss wants you to do? Some people compare InDesign with Quark and I wont go in to that debate because it´s all about habit. You could do pretty much the same things in those programs basically. I have worked with Quark for ages and, yes the price and support sucks, but nevertheless, its a great program in my opinion. It´s fairly easy to learn the basics but it really can do a lot more too. I created a lot of logotypes before I discovered Illustrator in Quark. A great designer called Jon Wozencroft once said that it took him three years of daily use to really learn it. I dont know about that but I love it.

I think its faster than InDesign and, most important for me, more reliable since I work mainly with magazine layout. Haven´t really tried InDesign 2 yet but to leave Quark it better be good. Real good.

The guy who taught me Quark said two things: 1. Left hand on the keyboard. (if you´re not leftmoused of course) 2. Learn the shortcuts.

This will speed up your work big time.

Good luck with!

Tommy

thanks for all the thoughtful feedback. I work for in the marketing deparment of an investment company located outside New York City. My title is Production Designer, and I was hired to design marketing pieces using Illustrator. Also, I was brought on the design/develop/mainatin an intranet and, down the road- a website. Well, those two projects have halted (this organization has a bad habit of starting projects, then stopping!) Well, my boss mentioned learning Quark to design marketing pieces. Doesn't make sense to me, but if I am handed something already in quark- i am expected to be able to carry on the project to completion. not yet happened, but it is a possibility.

CRO8

oooooh. I almost forgot! Along the lines of the Quark question. . . will it pose problems if I get handed a pdf developed in quark, change some thing sin Illustr., then send to printer?

Altering a PDF from Quark in Illustrator?

It depends on the change and the job, Simple text and tint changes can be edited using Software called PitStop. Many of the print vedors I supply files for make last minute changes and such using it. Last time I tried it the major font changes were a pain but for simple price and code changes it worked fine. But the have released several versions since then.

I have not tried using illustrator very often as I mostly supply PDF not take edit them , But I have stripped grapics from PDF pages suppled from product vendors. I noticed font spacing problems when pulling PDF's into illustrator 8 on the mac . I have had better luck in Illustrator 9 (pc) but not much, I don't have illustrator 10 as of yet.

I would also depent on the software used to generate the PDF file. Like postscript there are many ways to encode pdf files.

I would print to a postscript file using Adobe's Postscript Driver and send it directly to Acrobat 5.0 . I haven't tried the plug-in solutions for Quark so can't comment on them.

jstuartj