Prepress
Comprehensive Free Booklet and Video Provide Practical Guidance to Using QuarkXPress 8 with Adobe Creative Suite
Thursday 04. December 2008 - Downloadable 36 page booklet demonstrates how Creative Suite users can work seamlessly with QuarkXPress 8 for the best possible integrated design experience
Quark Inc. announced today the availability of a free booklet, online content, and video to enable creative professionals to unlock the full potential of their design tools. The book, downloadable, details how QuarkXPress 8 users can work seamlessly with Photoshop, Illustrator, Dreamweaver, Flash and PDFs either separately or within Adobe Creative Suite. It also provides an introduction to QuarkXPress 8 for InDesign users, outlining both the similarities and differences that users should know.
The booklet, which was previously available for QuarkXPress 7, has been updated to reflect the changes in both QuarkXPress 8 and Adobe Creative Suite 4. QuarkXPress 8 builds on the previous integration with leading design applications, with new support for native Illustrator (.ai) files and built-in Flash design capabilities. Through standards such as SWF, XHTML and CSS, QuarkXPress 8 users can design across media both within the integrated design environment of QuarkXPress 8 and alongside dedicated Adobe Creative Suite applications, like Adobe Flash and Adobe Dreamweaver. The booklet outlines in more detail how QuarkXPress works with Creative Suite and the best practices that users should follow when using these design applications together.
Getting the Full Potential from Leading Design Tools
QuarkXPress and Photoshop are two of the most widely used design applications, and QuarkXPress is considered by some to have the best integration with Photoshops PSD file format. The booklet recommends when designers should use the PSD file format for images and gives tips on how to get the best results.
The booklet also covers Illustratoranother extensively used application as well as the refined pen tools in QuarkXPress 8 for the creation of logos and vector illustrations. Traditionally, the route for bringing Illustrator files into QuarkXPress has been to export an EPS from Illustrator; now it is possible to import native Illustrator files into QuarkXPress 8. This gives much more flexibility as well as the advantage of having an Illustrator file that can be easily shared across the organisation. In addition, the new pen tools in QuarkXPress 8 mean that users may decide to create more of their vector artwork directly in QuarkXPress 8.
Another topic covered in the booklet is an introduction to the built-in Flash design capabilities of QuarkXPress 8, which make it easier than ever to output Flash (.swf) files directly from a page-layout application. Users can easily create interactive materials by leveraging the design precision and ease-of-use of QuarkXPress with the power and flexibility of the Flash format. This means that users can create for print, Web and Flash in a single integrated environment, with synchronised design and content without having to learn to code.
“QuarkXPress now has better integration with Adobe Creative Suite than ever before, and this free booklet highlights how users can leverage all of these applications to improve their design experience,” said Marc Horne, Quark Senior Product Marketing Manager. “The booklet also highlights some of the differences between QuarkXPress 8 and Adobe InDesign to help users evaluate the most appropriate page-layout tool for specific tasks, and it outlines how both QuarkXPress and InDesign integrate with key design applications within Creative Suite.”
The free book is available to download along with a short video that shows some of the highlights.