Alternative to InDesign for a Basic Print Book
July 28, 2022 4:35 PM Subscribe
I am interested in making my own D&D campaign journal that I can have printed and bound. What would be a suitable program for me to do this in? I have access to InDesign and Pages but I will gladly use something proprietary if goes with a good printing service and more than a beginner's level of design capabilities. Any recommendations?
InDesign would be the standard software that a pro would use for this kind of thing. You don't say why you'd want to use something else, but if you're looking for something less expensive, check out Affinity Publisher.
You'll most likely be providing your printer with a PDF, so file format shouldn't be too much of a concern, but if they need to be able to tweak your files, they'll have InDesign.
posted by adamrice at 4:52 PM on July 28, 2022 [1 favorite]
You'll most likely be providing your printer with a PDF, so file format shouldn't be too much of a concern, but if they need to be able to tweak your files, they'll have InDesign.
posted by adamrice at 4:52 PM on July 28, 2022 [1 favorite]
Err, yes, I meant Affinity Publisher, not Designer. Their product naming continues to confuse me...
posted by primethyme at 5:05 PM on July 28, 2022
posted by primethyme at 5:05 PM on July 28, 2022
When you say "campaign journal," what do you have in mind? Is it a journal in the sense of lined pages where people hand-write entries, or journal as in a published diary where all the text is entered on the computer before it's printed?
If you're looking to created lined pages, you'll have a few more options such as Adobe Photoshop, Affinity Designer, and Sketch (if you push Sketch outside its comfort zone). That's in addition to InDesign, Publisher, and Pages.
For a published diary, I'd go for InDesign or Affinity Publisher. If you didn't already have access to InDesign, I'd tell you about how Pages can be perfectly cromulent for making something that looks like the PHB. But for this work Pages is way more of a hassle than InDesign, so just go with the best tool for the job. You'd also want to spend some quality time with tutorials — learning how to set yourself up for success. You'd want an understanding of parent pages (formerly known as master pages), character and paragraph styles, and linked text frames. (Possibly others — my skills here are rusty.)
posted by Banknote of the year at 5:20 PM on July 28, 2022
If you're looking to created lined pages, you'll have a few more options such as Adobe Photoshop, Affinity Designer, and Sketch (if you push Sketch outside its comfort zone). That's in addition to InDesign, Publisher, and Pages.
For a published diary, I'd go for InDesign or Affinity Publisher. If you didn't already have access to InDesign, I'd tell you about how Pages can be perfectly cromulent for making something that looks like the PHB. But for this work Pages is way more of a hassle than InDesign, so just go with the best tool for the job. You'd also want to spend some quality time with tutorials — learning how to set yourself up for success. You'd want an understanding of parent pages (formerly known as master pages), character and paragraph styles, and linked text frames. (Possibly others — my skills here are rusty.)
posted by Banknote of the year at 5:20 PM on July 28, 2022
Response by poster: 'Twould be a personal thing for me to print and then write in. I am familiar with parent pages and such, as I used InDesign daily many years ago for print design, but I ALWAYS ran into problems when I was trying to print something in book form. :( As such it would be nice to not have to use it again.
Another Google search led me to Canva. Its creator tool looks sort of nice. Good alternative?
posted by The Adventure Begins at 6:07 PM on July 28, 2022
Another Google search led me to Canva. Its creator tool looks sort of nice. Good alternative?
posted by The Adventure Begins at 6:07 PM on July 28, 2022
I've used Canva and it's OK for doing layout, although a bit fiddly. Can't speak to the printing, as I've only used it for making quick flowcharts.
The last time I did something similar I used Blurb. The free software was easy to use, and you could download and test to see if it fits your needs. The books you print with them were pretty nice, I still have some.
posted by gemmy at 6:33 PM on July 28, 2022
The last time I did something similar I used Blurb. The free software was easy to use, and you could download and test to see if it fits your needs. The books you print with them were pretty nice, I still have some.
posted by gemmy at 6:33 PM on July 28, 2022
My guess is that the problems you were having with InDesign when trying to print something in book form had far more to do with your printer (or its driver) than InDesign. If you're sending a file off to get printed, you'll just be sending a PDF, so InDesign's booklet capabilities are irrelevant. If you have it and already know it, I say use it. It's better than any other option stated above. Pages is fine, and Infinity's stuff is excellent. But why buy a Ford Taurus when you already own a Mercedes?
posted by jonathanhughes at 6:37 PM on July 28, 2022 [3 favorites]
posted by jonathanhughes at 6:37 PM on July 28, 2022 [3 favorites]
I recently tried using free, open source Scribus. It seemed pretty good, but maybe with a steep learning curve.
posted by johngoren at 1:33 AM on July 29, 2022 [2 favorites]
posted by johngoren at 1:33 AM on July 29, 2022 [2 favorites]
TeX and LaTex offer options[1][2] to render lines in a document, and can render as many of those pages (e.g. split by \pagebreak) to a PDF for printing.
1: https://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/141527/how-to-create-a-lined-page-with-line-numbers (archive.org copy)
2: https://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/188164/how-to-use-latex-to-print-a-document-to-look-like-a-lined-notebook (archive.org copy)
posted by k3ninho at 6:48 AM on July 29, 2022 [1 favorite]
1: https://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/141527/how-to-create-a-lined-page-with-line-numbers (archive.org copy)
2: https://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/188164/how-to-use-latex-to-print-a-document-to-look-like-a-lined-notebook (archive.org copy)
posted by k3ninho at 6:48 AM on July 29, 2022 [1 favorite]
I know that any time you ask a software question, someone comes in with a Linuxy answer that seems to either be "If you learn the Layout Calculus, you can run Page Formulas through GNU sdfjaklsfdjsodifjasdiof and job done!" or "There's a weird half-finished GUI clone of InDesign that I like."
That said, I have done a lot of layout in Scribus and found it fine as a page layout program. I currently use LaTeX for almost everything, using the styles created for Edward Tufte. Part of the reason I do this is that I can just feed raw text into the thing and out will come beautiful half-finished works. But I am also willing to sit down and read arcane error messages and update my time-saving macros to fit, and I'm also happy to add offsets to specific elements just to move them slightly around the page, and re-build my PDF to see if it worked.
The advantage of going the LaTeX route is that once you work out a few idiosyncrasies, you can create a sort of factory that churns out neatly laid-out pages from updated inputs. With a GUI system you kind of find yourself back to square one every time you open a new document, while "just make this one look like the others" is a simpler task when you're just wrapping your text in some boilerplate markup and running it through the same process as the others.
posted by rum-soaked space hobo at 4:55 PM on July 30, 2022
That said, I have done a lot of layout in Scribus and found it fine as a page layout program. I currently use LaTeX for almost everything, using the styles created for Edward Tufte. Part of the reason I do this is that I can just feed raw text into the thing and out will come beautiful half-finished works. But I am also willing to sit down and read arcane error messages and update my time-saving macros to fit, and I'm also happy to add offsets to specific elements just to move them slightly around the page, and re-build my PDF to see if it worked.
The advantage of going the LaTeX route is that once you work out a few idiosyncrasies, you can create a sort of factory that churns out neatly laid-out pages from updated inputs. With a GUI system you kind of find yourself back to square one every time you open a new document, while "just make this one look like the others" is a simpler task when you're just wrapping your text in some boilerplate markup and running it through the same process as the others.
posted by rum-soaked space hobo at 4:55 PM on July 30, 2022
If you are taking the trouble to research apps and ask on this forum, then you care very much about the quality of the book. Something like Canva will annoy you with multiple tiny compromises in your design. You know what you have to do. Get back on the horse and tackle InDesign. Maybe it's gotten easier since you last used it. (joking) But how will you live with yourself if you make a compromised book because you took the easy way?
posted by conrad53 at 10:54 PM on July 30, 2022
posted by conrad53 at 10:54 PM on July 30, 2022
I've had success with online tool Visme for a moderately sized eBook that I wanted to have a professional look without getting back into fighting with InVision for every single margin.
They have a robust templating and design theme system, so once you get the journal page format that you like it's easy to add new pages and paste in your content.
posted by QuixoticGambit at 8:57 AM on August 1, 2022
They have a robust templating and design theme system, so once you get the journal page format that you like it's easy to add new pages and paste in your content.
posted by QuixoticGambit at 8:57 AM on August 1, 2022
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posted by primethyme at 4:52 PM on July 28, 2022