2 Replies Latest reply: Dec 5, 2008 4:45 PM by (Aaron_Andrade) RSS

    Best way to do document covers -- Illustrator or Indesign?

    RodneyA Community Member
      I work on an academic journal that's relatively simple -- no bleeds on the inside, mostly black and white text and illustrations, with a perfect-binding (paper-back-book style spine). I also now design the covers, which are identical for each issue except for the issue number and date on the front and the spine, and a picture in a box on the front cover. There's a background color over the entire cover that bleeds off all edges. I've been doing the cover layout in Illustrator, since I need to do the front, back, and spine in one piece, and since the width of the spine changes based on the page count, and I wouldn't know how to do this easily in Indesign. But I also need to produce single-page PDFs of the front and back covers without the spine, and making these in Illustrator is awkward -- I can do it using the Print Tiling Tool and printing PDFs, but the Print Tiling tool doesn't snap to the page borders, so it's not as accurate as I'd like. I'd also like to see if I can set up the issue number and date as cross references so they'll automatically update each month, which is something I'd have to do in Indesign.

      What's the best way to design the front and back cover in Indesign and import to Illustrator to unite them and add the spine? I'm a little worried about seeing borders between the background color of the covers (made in Indesign) and the spine (made in Illustrator). Any advice appreciated...

      Rodney