Affinity Publisher - will it do what InDesign does and is it better than Apple Pages?

[Creative-Writer]

Hi All

I always used Adobe InDesign (sorry to mention it) for laying out my novels but my latest iMac does not support my old version of InDesign and I don't want to pay their subscription model so I'm looking at alternatives. I looked at Apple's Pages, but I can't find a way to 'flow' 95,000 words over about 395 pages without doing each page at a time and Pages looks somewhat 'basic' in what it is designed to do.

Given I use Affinity Photo and quite like it, especially the price, and that has been my alternative to Photoshop for the past few years I figured I'd ask about Affinity Publisher and ask how it compares to InDesign for laying out novels.

Thanks all.

[thomaso]

Hi Creative-Writer,
welcome to the Affinity Forums!

The differences between APub and ID CS6 don't necessarily touch your workflow massively when creating a layout for a novel.
Here just a few examples of differences, APub …

• has in its Find & Replace no limiter for selection, object or page (it always searches + finds in the entire document),
• has no footnotes (or references),
• no GREP text style options,
• no global layers,
• doesn't use ID's PDF libs for export but those of the operating systems,
• handles colour swatches differently (in creation, maintaining, transfer),
• placed images don't have a frame object by default,
• spreads may have 1-2 pages only (no 3rd page for spine in cover layouts)
• …

Also APub offers features which are missing in ID CS6. For instance …

• opens PDF for editing,
• opens ID layouts (.idml),
• more image import / export formats,
• more image editing options inside APub (+ Studio Link, which allows even more image editing inside APub since you have APhoto),
• ...

Why not just download APub's free trial version? Since APub can open .idml and PDF your test would give you a comparison tailored to your novel layout needs / habits.

For more opinions you also could do an internet search for e.g. "Affinity Publisher vs. InDesign", but note the publication dates: APub developed since its first release while the comparison was hardly be done with CS 6 but a newer cloud version of ID.

[Creative-Writer]

Thanks, thomaso

Question. What is GREP text style?

I downloaded free trial, but I got busy with something else and didn't get chance to try it so it expired - duh!

As long as I can 'flow' 95,000 words over 385 or so pages automatically and have page numbers automatically number, except the first five copyright/fly pages etc, and have a header and footer automatically appear on all pages and the ability to delete individual headers where there is a new chapter for example I think I'll be good.

Does this sound doable?

Thanks thomaso

[thomaso]

Yes, your list sounds like APub standard features.

Btw.: Instead of deleting headers/footers you could create a separate master page for chapter starts. Anyway I'd recommend to experience especially APub's master page behaviour before beginning a "real" project. This appears to be one of the most differing features and can confuse occasionally. Note you may have single page master pages in a facing page document (with advantages AND disadvantages) and you can apply several master pages to document pages (as alternative to base a master pages on another master page).

GREP is "just" a time saver for editing and/or formatting text, based on kind of code ("Regular Expressions"). GREP styles allow auto-styles depending on certain text content. Different to GREP in APub's Find & Replace they work backwards AND forwards (for existing & new text). –  Here is a sample video of the forums user @garrettm30, demonstrating GREP in APub's Find & Replace. There are many resources about GREP, compare this list of @v_kyr.

 

[jmwellborn]

@Creative-Writer  You might like to purchase Publisher directly from the Affinity Store and try it out.  There is a 14-day money back guarantee if it doesn’t suit your needs.  Personally I love it!  I used Pagemaker and then InDesign for years, but when Affinity Publisher arrived I immediately bought it and have never been sorry.  If you still have a machine that can use InDesign, you could export any one of your indd InDesign files as an idml file which can be opened in Publisher.  Then you can further experiment.  

[Old Bruce]

4 hours ago, Creative-Writer said:

I looked at Apple's Pages, but I can't find a way to 'flow' 95,000 words over about 395 pages without doing each page at a time

Does Copy (and Paste) not copy the text for you? 

 

4 hours ago, Creative-Writer said:

I figured I'd ask about Affinity Publisher and ask how it compares to InDesign for laying out novels.

Works well.