Desktop Publishing

[Steve Owens <uso01 -at- EAGLE -dot- UNIDATA -dot- COM>]

Laila (shamji -at- sage -dot- cc -dot- purdue -dot- edu) asks:
> I am a student at Purdue University currently majoring in
> Professional Writing, however, I am kind of interested in DTP, and was
> wondering if anyone out there is specifically involved in it.  I am
> particularly interested in learning about the field because desigining
> brochures, flyers, etc. is what I like to do.  Is there more to DTP
> than what I have imagined?  Perhaps, there i s and if so, would
> somebody enlighten me?

Doug replies:
> The trend here (and my impression is, the trend elsewhere as well)
> seems to be to combine DTP with other skills, rather than have it
> "stand alone."  At one time, our technical writing group had a
> full-time graphic designer who turned the MASS-11 copy churned out by
> writers (MASS-11 is a VAX word processor; if you've never heard of it,
> you're lucky) into final "typeset" form on the Macintosh.
> [...]
> Moral:  DTP is a good thing to know, but you probably need to know
> some other things as well.

Laila, from the sound of what you "like to do", you may want to look
into majoring in graphic design.  Check to see if your university
offers that major or you can transfer to somewhere that does.

Graphic design is a field in its own right, although the job
possibilities will probably be richer in areas like advertising,
magazine publishing, etc., than in the technical writing field.  In
technical writing, graphic design is a skill that is part of the
technical writer's repertoire, but in other fields it's a career in
itself.

I only know this because I have acquaintances who majored in graphic
design - check for more details with your faculty advisor and any sort
of career consulting service your university offers.

Steven J. Owens
uso01 -at- unidata -dot- com