Comments on: InDesign vs Illustrator

By: Brian Johnson

Brian Johnson — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 02:17:55 +0000

I just started learning illustrator today, and haven’t learned indesign at all… It sounds almost like you wouldn’t need indesign if you weren’t planning on doing any kind of print media or ebook/ezine sort of thing. Since I’m not, I probably won’t have a need for it for a while, but so far I am very impressed with illustrator. Thanks for the advice, it still stands true after 6 years!

By: Don Baker

Don Baker — Tue, 21 Jun 2011 13:30:04 +0000

Illustrator does have layers. Lock your “master page” (all design elements that do not change) as the first layer, add other layers for any changes, export eps files to the printing device by turning layers on and off. This is not Indesign, but will handle up to 10 pages without much trouble at all. I don’t do that much with raster art. If you had a lot of that Illustrator might be slow as suggested above.

By: Gary

Gary — Wed, 06 Apr 2011 15:48:17 +0000

This is great information and a well written explanation of the difference between the two programs.

I did see a couple of typos but no big deal.

Thank you

By: Gupse

Gupse — Sat, 02 Apr 2011 10:14:58 +0000

Thank you soo very much! Cleared the bleary horizons for me.
Love from Jordan.

By: chetan

chetan — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 10:27:30 +0000

i like this artical because am afraid to learn indesign now i will learn i easly

By: madan kumar

madan kumar — Sat, 22 Jan 2011 06:07:41 +0000

what is the use of indesing and illustrator

By: madan kumar

madan kumar — Sat, 22 Jan 2011 06:06:33 +0000

i know photoshop cs5 and flash basic i went many interview they are asking indesign and illustrator but i dont know so i want to know that pls help me

By: zorba

zorba — Wed, 03 Nov 2010 11:11:24 +0000

hi, elli…………
nice topic and very helpfull of all designer,
think… different between in_and_illu

but coraldraw is batter then Illustrator…that i think work fast in coral.

By: JD Koloc

JD Koloc — Wed, 20 Oct 2010 19:14:37 +0000

Interesting article… Loved the toothbrush analogy. I work in the flexo world and have received more and more InDesign files as of late. Since we have to convert everything to spot color /vector, I am wondering what the best way to go about converting these InDesign behemoths into Illustrator so I can at least use them as a template. It would be a great time saver to be able to pluck vector images from them as well… Am I asking for the impossible?

By: Aditya Apte

Aditya Apte — Thu, 12 Aug 2010 09:01:00 +0000

Hey, the article here was interesting. But while going through the comments, I felt that many of the guys here are wandering in the dark. What I mean is before just comparing the applications one has to understand the basics of Graphics workflow. One can then further know why are there separate (& specialised) applications for each thing. I am just puting some light on that

Graphics workflow basically involves 3 things. • Raster Work (Photos & Continuous tone images) • Vector work (Logos & Line Drawings) • Layouting (Final Assembly of all the elements and formatting it with text content) Usually the layouting stage comes last. The graphic designing is spoken in terms of ‘Print media’ & ‘Online or Electronic Media’. Depending on the output media, the the final layouting stage will defer. The other stages are applicable everywhere. A typical work flow would be 1) Create all necessary elements (Logos & Icons, Photos, Backgrounds & Textures, Charts) in the relevant applications. (Be sure to use the appropriate colour models CMYK for print, RGB for web, also check the resolution of raster images for print or web). 2) Export them to the required formats (EPS, JPEG, TIFF). 3) Create final layout by assembling all the elements along with the text content. 4) Create Output ready files.

There are separate softwares for each of these stages. Vector work (Adobe Illustrator, Corel Draw, Denba Canvas, Macromedia Freehand), Raster work (Adobe Photoshop, Corel Photopaint, Macromedia Fireworks), Layouting for print (Adobe Pagemaker, QuarkExpress, Adobe Indesign), Layouting for web (Macromedia Dreamweaver, Microsoft Frontpage). Well Corel Draw is a Mixture of Vector Editing & Layouting (Print & Web) application.

Since the layouting stage is the final stage, layouting applications also support its relevant media features. eg. QuarkExpress or Indesign is used mainly for print layouting, it can output in postscript language and has print related features like Trapping, Overprinting, Colour Separations etc. while Dreamweaver and Frontpage being web layouting applications output in HTML & support web related features such as Frames, Button Functions, Scripting etc.

By: Colleen

Colleen — Tue, 10 Aug 2010 18:24:59 +0000

I am learning on line and started with InDesign but wondered if maybe it should be Illustrator or Photoshop. I wondered how they fit together. You have cleared the fog for me.

THANK YOU !

By: Joe

Joe — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 00:49:52 +0000

Haha. cool. I read the article. Cool thanks!
What was funny was to see the website critisism in the comments.
Perhaps i came late, but i will tell you my first impression of this site design: “whoa. I like it. Look at all the space. Neat. And look at the cool colors on the page. Cool. And strange how the right sidebar content is dropped below the comments, but way cool i think. Look at the logo, that thing is sweet- colors-human-circles and stuff. Like it. Wonder if i can steel it. No. Perhaps adapt it. No. Perhaps whatever i design is already designed somewhere. No. hehe. Ok, cool i’ll read the article now because this is exactly what i searched for.”

But then, since i am completely a newby to the software mentioned, i wonder if there are any cool shortcuts where i can production line symbols and drawings in illustrator, and easily insert them into indesign. Based on your writeup it seems that i will need both programs to work hand in hand.

If you have any comment on this, send me an email. Thanks heaps

By: sid

sid — Thu, 13 May 2010 09:34:31 +0000

You explained very well… i got the point very clearly..
Thanks

By: Jon

Jon — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 04:23:25 +0000

Great article! I was looking for a write up to best explain the difference to our interns. This will be our bookmark.

By: Jeremy Schultz

Jeremy Schultz — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 18:59:39 +0000

Randy, back when this was written (2005) artboard didn’t exist in Illustrator. They do now of course, which I thought was a killer feature of AI CS4.

Bill: I don’t think InDesign by itself can parse chart data and build graphics. Illustrator can though. You said you dropped AI graphs into InDesign but they showed up as bitmaps, did you drag-and-drop or did you place them? I can place these charts in InDesign without a problem.