Desktop publishing matures.

• Author: Horvath, Terri
• Position: Includes related article

It's been 10 years since the term was first coined.

When Paul Brainerd, president of the software giant Aldus, first coined the term "desktop publishing" in 1984, most graphic designers, conventional typesetters and printers scoffed at the output.

They agreed that it was a crude substitute for conventional typesetting and design. DTP, simply defined as the process of using a computer to format text and graphics on a page, was relegated to low-quality publications at the outset.

Since then, however, the same people who once ridiculed DTP now realize that they, too, must become skilled in the process or be left behind in the competition.

"Quality has come a long way since the inception of the term, and it's more affordable," says Charles Horell, CEO of Cardinal/Lipps Printing Services Inc. in New Albany.

Technology in this field has improved the possibilities in staggering proportions. From its modest genesis have grown systems that forever have changed the printing and graphics industries. DTP still may be used for low-end products as it was in its beginning, but in the years since, breakthroughs have made it suitable to create high-quality publications. Indiana Business Magazine, for example, has been a DTP publication since 1986; many other Indiana publications have joined the DTP ranks as well.

These technological advances can save users time and money and give them greater control over the design work.

Some might say the user has too much freedom. "It's gotten to the point where you can't believe what you see anymore," says Randy Roberts, president of Lincoln Printing Corp. in Fort Wayne. "Anything can be altered and easily." Do you want to move the Great Pyramids of Egypt for a more pleasing composition? That's what National Geographic did for one of its covers. Change the spots on a cow? Sure. This issue of greater design control, however, usually is one of the first advantages cited by DTP users, including John Robinson, CEO of the House of White Birches in Berne, which publishes 23 periodicals dealing primarily with crafts. His staff began using DTP in 1986 and witnessed the evolution firsthand. "Our production is becoming more and more electronic."

Yet more control adds responsibility, Robinson warns. "And more and more of the work falls back on us"--work the printer once did. The additional work load causes Robinson "sometimes to wonder if we really save money; it does feel like, however, that what we are doing is more...