What's the best program to use when making a zine?

[Emma Stronach]

Hello :) I've just joined today, came about this website while looking for information on how to assemble a zine once all the parts have been drawn.

I wanted to know if there is some kind of computer program where I can create a book, layout and all, then print it. I've searched all the document types, but I couldn't find anything double sided.

It's A5. Thanks so much, really appreciate help on this one.

[Emma Stronach]

That program sounds good, might have to try and get my hands on a copy of it.

As for printing, I'm lucky on this one, I have a pretty good multi-function printer and access to a colour photo copiers (thanks dad's office ;)

Jeannine said:

I used PrintMaster by Broderbund. I just got version 17 which allows me to create my 'zines as PDF documents without hassle. They have a 'newsletter' format that I start with and when I print, double-sided printing is an option.

As far as hard copies go, I do my own printing at Office Depot for mass distribution.

[Emma Stronach]

Bah haha thanks Kate, I wish I could do it all by hand, but I am trying to get it to look as professional as possible so I can sell it as a colouring/sketch book.

Kate A-T said:

The best program I've found are scissors, paper & glue, assisted by my hands. Works like a charm every time!

[Trent Rampage]

photoshop-it!
photoshop is best. you can set margins etc and set print format etc

also - i used to do zines in crazy cut and paste and it was real fun but then i've started to want to incoporate some of my graphic designs and found that it is easier to do it with photoshop.

[Zach Mandeville!]

Indesign works really well, and you can often download it for a thirty day trial. So when everything is ready, d/l the program, make your zine within thirty days, and you are good to go. I live in a college town, and the computer lab computers all have indesign installed on them, so I go to college whenever i need to do layout.

[Emma Stronach]

Hmmm... maybe that's what I can do with extra bandwidth this month :P

Photoshop user friendly? sounds pretty awesome for my purposes.

Trent Rampage said:

photoshop-it!
photoshop is best. you can set margins etc and set print format etc

also - i used to do zines in crazy cut and paste and it was real fun but then i've started to want to incoporate some of my graphic designs and found that it is easier to do it with photoshop.

[Emma Stronach]

That's a rather ingenious way of getting around things. What happens if you want to make more than one zine though?


Zach Mandeville! said:

Indesign works really well, and you can often download it for a thirty day trial. So when everything is ready, d/l the program, make your zine within thirty days, and you are good to go. I live in a college town, and the computer lab computers all have indesign installed on them, so I go to college whenever i need to do layout.

[Andrew Culture]

After doing a bunch of issues in MS Publisher my printer explained that it was shite, so now I used Indesign, which is awesome if you're already an IT boff and can understand what the hell it's on about half the time!

[Rianh Wynne Silvertree]

you cant get better than the model 220 hands, the only upgrades they ever managed were teh shiny coloured nails, but they make no difference to functionality.

Emma Jane Falconer said:

Kate A-T said:

The best program I've found are scissors, paper & glue, assisted by my hands. Works like a charm every time!

Are those the model 220 hands with the PinchyThumb (tm), or the older model?

[Rianh Wynne Silvertree]

i only manage to make things 'double sided' by asking my printer to print it that way. its not a program, its just a printing option, as far as i am aware.

[Rianh Wynne Silvertree]

use publisher, print it in landscape and get your printer to do it double sided. you will have to use your brain to make the pages be where you want them to be, although publisher might have those options to choose from.

[KEROUAC'S DOG MAGAZINE]

I'd love nothing more than to use a real cut and paste jobby, but unfortunately it takes so much time, and then I end up pouring glue on my hands and then peeling it all off, which is definately distracting. I use InDesign, it's a leap on from Quark Express, and a few days of messing around with it, you soon get the hang of it. I think it's just nice to have a print-ready pdf that's great for emailing as an attachment, and/or sending to a printers if you need to. It's nice to have the flexibility. You can still get a pretty authentic handmade-look if you talk to the printers.

With regard to photoshop, just be careful, as it's not a vector-based programme, which means the quality of the images (where text is concerned at least) is not high quality enough for printing.

KD.

[Jeff Somers]

I use Open Office to write (www.openoffice.org) and Scribus for layout (www.scribus.net). Both free, both work on Mac/Linux/Windows. both rock. Scribus can take a few days to get used to. Better than spending $$$ on huge bloated programs when you can get huge bloated programs for free. I also use GiMP for image manip (www.gimp.org).

I was making my zine (60 pages digest sized) exclusively in Open Office for a while. It was a bit clunky as OO (or Word or ANY word processing program) isn't really made for laying out a zine, but it worked just fine with some patient tweaking.

J