All Pages Are Not Created Equal

All Pages Are Not Created BY DAN BRILL GATHER ROUND, ALL YOU ASPIRING GRAPHIC DESIGNERS AND WOULD-BE graphic artists. Let’s talk about making pages. Equal I don’t mean making pages look pretty. I don’t mean developing and executing a graphic communication strategy. Those are skills you should possess already — or will have with the proper training. Creating pages in today’s digital world means more than simply being able to design pages well. It means building files that work for their intended destinations, whether for print or for the Web. As one who has seen far too many files come into this publication which were either badly constructed or downright unprintable, it seems to me that there isn’t nearly enough emphasis in schools and graphic design environments on learning how to deliver pages that can be output first time, every time. Not too long ago I was at a trade show here in Toronto. I happened to stop by a booth for the Association of Registered Graphic Designers of Ontario (ARGDO), IMAGE BY DINAH TOLTON where I picked up a pamphlet called A Primer on Buying Graphic Design Services. ARGDO is an organization which was created in 1996 to “serve the best in- terests of both the graphic design industry and the public.” According to its brochure, ARGDO’s Registered Graphic Designer (RGD) designation assures clients that they are working with “an experienced and qualified professional who graphic exchange» june/july 1999» 17 All Pages Are Not is governed by the Rules of Professional Conduct of [ARG- and organizing of visual information to aid communication Created DO]”. A designer’s right to use the letters “RGD” may be and orientation.” Despite the mention of “technology” in Equal granted only by ARGDO, a privilege protected by provin- ARGDO’s description, I found it curious that not a word in cial law by virtue of an Act of the Ontario Legislature. its literature or on its website (www.argdon.org) is devoted to the This is how ARGDO describes its discipline: “Graphic subject of proficiency in digital skills. Design is an interdisciplinary, problem-solving activity ARGDO’s pamphlet for buyers of graphic design services which combines visual sensitivity with skill and knowledge suggests they discuss projects with prospective designers in in areas of communication, technology and business. terms of time frame, fee structures and budget considera- Graphic design practitioners specialize in the structuring tions. Yet if I was a knowledgeable client searching for a John Warnock: Q&A with the around 60/40 between Windows ence. In terms of acquisitions, we product, given the billion dollar size and Mac. The worst quarter we do look for technology acquisitions, of the company now? had, in terms of Mac mix was where someone has built a great John: The core tools and the ma- 65/35—I think it was the third quar- product like GoLive, and we feel chinery in the cross-platform stuff ter of last year. Now, since the that with our marketing distribution in the basic core graphics code, iMac was announced, and since and our ability to bring the product the basic text handling code— the G3s were announced, that mix into harmony with the user inter- that’s in a thing called core tech- has stabilized around 60/40. faces of the other products, we nologies. To bring out a new prod- John Warnock, co-founder (with Dan: You’ve bought GoLive, and can gain advantage by doing that. uct is essentially doing something Chuck Geschke) of Adobe Sys- you’ve been acquiring other com- So, we do both acquisitions and in- that depends on the core technolo- tems and the inventor of Post- panies. Internal development ap- ternal development. gy. That’s a very well-developed Script, may be regarded as one of pears to have not been as signifi- Dan: Depending on...? piece of code that’s been de- the true icons of the desktop cant as what you have gone out John: Depending on the levels of bugged for years and is very sta- publishing revolution. One of and bought, aside from InDesign, expertise. InDesign clearly we did ble. InDesign for instance, gets all the few CEOs of a technology which is the obvious exception. internally, because we had all the of its image import filters from Pho- company who welcomes techni- What is the future plan for product talent in-house to do page layout, toShop. It gets all of its graphic im- cal discussions,Warnock is an development? Essentially, are you so we did InDesign over the past port imaging from the vector graph- engaging, articulate spokesman looking to buy or build? five years as a ground-up develop- ics side from Illustrator. That’s core for both Adobe and technology John: We do both, and it’s part of ment. Sometimes we can buy code. It gets its basic text handling issues in general. Graphic Ex- our plan to do both. Our run rate plug-ins for Photoshop to add val- from CoolType, which we call our change publisher Dan Brill had for R & D expenditures has always ue, or we can do them in-house—it text engine. So the architecture for the opportunity to sit down been around 20% [as a percent- depends on which is most eco- InDesign was built so that it could with Warnock for a one-on-one age of revenue]—forever—from nomical. build in the various capabilities discussion the day after Adobe the first days that Adobe brought Dan: Given that it took five years to from other products to make the stock hit a new high, which fol- out its PostScript devices to re- bring InDesign to market, and giv- products work together in a seam- lowed the announcement of cently. It will sometimes ratchet up en that Adobe appears to be taking less way. Adobe’s quarterly earnings. The a percent or down a percent, but over the entire printing and publish- Dan: What’s Microsoft doing that conversation covered a broad we try to keep R & D expenditures ing market, can we count on you has you concerned? range of topics. at about 20% and that’s what we being able to turn around quickly John: We worry about Microsoft in said yesterday at the press confer- enough when the market needs a that, if they get a very strong prod- Dan: First, let’s talk about the Mac- intosh market. What kind of propor- tion and focus will there be on [Adobe’s] product development for the Mac? John: We’ve consistently said that the Mac business is coming back, that it’s been strong. We expect that the mix will probably stabilize 18« june/july 1999« graphic exchange graphic designer, I would be asking questions like “What capable of not only designing well but also producing print- format will we use to exchange files?” or better still, “What ready jobs with proficiency. referrals can you give me from a printer or prepress house?” What this means is that computer skills form the back- What’s the point here? Simple. Digital production work- bone of a designer’s role. Knowledge of file construction flows have changed the role of the graphic designer dramat- and preparation is fundamental to being a good graphic de- ically. Where once a designer could hand off to a graphic signer. Familiarity with the various tools and techniques that artist who would take care of mechanical production for the standard graphics applications offer is both a prerequisite printer, now these two jobs have been merged. The design- for success and a competitive advantage. er is now also the graphic artist. And the designer must be Conversely, a lack of competence with digital tools limits Father of PostScript uct at the low-end, they have a ten- gone on? How closely has Adobe you, but it’s not going to be that favorite places to live. We love the dency to start at the mass market grown in developing from the origi- long before you’re going to be people, we think it’s a great city. It and then ratchet up to squeeze out nal vision that you had? thinking about smelling the roses. has all of the good parts of New the professional products. They John: The vision was there, but John: I think when we got the hos- York and not the bad parts. have tried to squeeze on us on a lot what was never there was our ex- tile takeover attack from Quark last Dan: What is your personal per- of different fronts. Initially in 1989, pectation of the success that we’ve summer, the stock was down at spective on the Canadian market they tried to attack the PostScript had. We thought that PostScript $24. Chuck and I looked at each and its importance in the whole market with TrueImage—remember was absolutely a very cool technol- other and said, “It is not going to world market? that? TrueImage was their version ogy. We thought that it had the po- end like this, that is simply not go- John: Well, in some sense I don’t of PostScript and they shipped one tential to revolutionize the printing ing to happen. We are not going to even think about it in those terms. I commercial product, which was a and publishing business, but we let that happen, we won’t allow it.” know that essentially, Toronto is the failure. So they were not terribly never dreamed that it actually So, I think that in the past six publishing capital of Canada and it successful, even though they tried would revolutionize printing and months, we have become much is the creative capital of Canada in to give away the code, to take over publishing, because it’s a huge, more engaged in the business, terms of all the film and television the PostScript market.

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