What program do you use the most? I’ve been asked this question a lot over the past few years, and I am always somewhat wary on how to answer it. I know a lot of pretty good designers, especially web designers, who do all of their work in Photoshop. At my current job I use a combination of Photoshop and Illustrator for every project. If I had InDesign I would use all three. All three, you might be asking? But why would you need to use all three? Well the answer is simple, each program is designed to do a different thing.
Photoshop is meant for photo manipulation. This means, you should probably open this one first to work on all of your photos and make them look as good as you can before going any further in the project.
Illustrator/Freehand/Corel Draw should be used for any graphics you need. From shapes and symbols to any elaborate vector drawings you may need for the final design. Try not to bring photos into this program as they can slow the program down to a snails pace and will probably not look as good as they do in Photoshop or Indesign. Illustrator also limits you to one page so it’s pretty much useless if you are doing booklets or multi-page designs. Freehand allows multi-pages, but as it is a dying program, it is better to use Indesign for later editing.
Indesign/Quark Express are the page layout programs most commonly used. Most of the places that have been around for a long time will probably still be using Quark, while newer companies and places that have recently updated are more likely to have Indesign. This is where you take all of the stuff you made in the other programs and put it together to make your delicious design. Personally I have never done more with Quark than a basic tutorial and prefer to spend my time learning Indesign as it seems to be where the industry is moving, but I have seen plenty of ads for designers that require that you know how to use this program, so I wouldn’t say that it is dead yet.
What program have I not mentioned? Word! Word processors are not design tools. I don’t care if they have those nifty little templates and can accept photos, if you are ever planning on sending the work to a true designer, or even a printer, do not expect them to be able or willing to touch a .doc (word file). They will almost always rip out their hair, cry a little, than have to recreate the entire design if you send it to them this way, which can be impossible or nearly so. So DON’T USE ANY WORD PROGRAM FOR YOUR DESIGN!!! Seriously! Or I will hunt you down and break your computer.
