I am working with our church youth group and we are going to be having a huge lockin for local churches and the local community in December.
I wanted to make some nice fliers to hand out door to door and at high schools.
Does anybody know of any websites or any free software that they know of that can help?
Thanks
Mac or Windows?
What is the operating system in which you will be creating these on?
os x
I use os x. What program do I use for making fliers?
Scribus
I produce my print stuff using Scribus. It works on Linux, Mac and Windows. It requires a learning curve, but it is open source and free. It more than meets my minimal needs.
What NOT to use
I'd recommend staying away from Publisher.
As techmate said, what OS? And, what are you planning on doing with this flyer?
If this is a one time deal you might consider the free demo of InDesign (http://www.adobe.com/products/...). It's the best product out there for this kind of thing and there is a free one month full feature demo.
Matt Farina
Geeks and God Co-Host
www.innovatingtomorrow.net
www.mattfarina.com
Re: What NOT to use
Matt -
I have heard you say this about Publisher several times. I am almost up to the print design episode of the podcast. I can't wait to hear WHY you advise against Publisher.
Did that episode give the explanation of what InDesign has that Publisher is missing? For doing things like church bulletins and flyers that are B&W does it make that big of a difference?
John
john-simons.com
A Few Reasons Not To Use Publisher
Rob is really against publisher. And, his reasoning is valid. A lot of churches put out piss poor flyer's and news letters done in publisher. Part of it is the people putting together the flyer's and news letters. They just don't know how to do it well. Heck, I don't know how to do it well. Part of it is publisher.
Much of what you can do easily in Publisher just doesn't look good. So, the simple to pick up things are what people usually use. Then, the output is a newsletter that isn't laid out well and looks like publisher stock stuff.
I've been told that if you are good at layout you don't like publisher. It's typically for people with little experience looking to throw something together and they got publisher bundled with some other stuff.
If you really want a product to use check out InDesign. It's the industry standard. And, I'd suggest a book and a little time learning to do it well.
Matt Farina
Geeks and God Co-Host
www.innovatingtomorrow.net
www.mattfarina.com
If your using a Mac
If your using a Mac, I would suggest iWork-Pages. You can create some good flyers easily. Or another nice one is Swift Publisher.
I am using Windows. Also, I
I am using Windows. Also, I am working with my church youth group and we are going to start hosting rallies for our community and lock ins and I wanted to start making fliers to hand out.
So its not just a one time deal.
Thanks
For large quantities of
For large quantities of flyers you might want to consider going to your local printer or choosing a site like iPrint or try googling flyer printing services and see if there is any you like.
A Big Range of Options
The range of product you could use for this is huge.
It ranges from the bargain basement home and Kiddie oriented "Print Cool Stuff" packages, through MS Publisher, all the way to InDesign. If you know what your doing and you have aspirations to make design a pretty significant portion of your volunteer effort: InDesign is what you want.
I'm less sure about that choice in other circumstances.
You might be better off enlisting the help of someone.
And I believe for many people and purposes MS Publisher is just fine. Our staff uses it for basic handouts and a simple newsletter and produces stuff that looks better than those of about 85% of what the "competition" puts out. This stuff is kept relatively simple. It helps a lot more to know something about design, layout, balance, etc.
For the premium and big promotions stuff we enlist the help of pro's.... (Pros don't use Publisher)
We've got a few sophisticated Adobe Programs and they are VERY lightly used. In some cases they have just frustrated staff with their complexity.
That said....
CCB (and similar) are good places to shop & buy.
Mark
Nice to see
It's nice to see some practical and in use experience here.
I'm not a fan of publisher. But, if you have an idea of what you are doing you can put out some decent stuff with it. I think a lack of training and knowing what to do is the typical problem with newsletters and flyer's. Many people don't even know where to start.
Matt Farina
Geeks and God Co-Host
www.innovatingtomorrow.net
www.mattfarina.com
Long term
Look into Adobe Products. I believe that they offer discounted prices for non-profits, at least I know they did at one time. I tend to use InDesign for multi-page text based publications such as a program or Bible Study. For single page/graphic layout such as a flier I suggest Illustrator. I admit it can seem like a large learning curve with this product but the payoff is worth it. You can find some good tutorials online and consider picking up a book on it.
-sirkyle
Software
Consistent Computer Bargains has non-profit pricing on adobe products for churches. Also you might want to look at GIMP which is an open source graphics program for windows and mac. iwork for mac is great. Even though we have a graphic designer on staff our HS and JrH pastors will create graphics using the Pages program in iWork.
If you're good, you can even
If you're good, you can even use word or open office to get an awesome flyer. A lot has to do with your creativity and your knowledge of the program. So, a huge program with a steep learning curve is NOT what you want to get a flyer out by December. Make a cool flyer in whatever program you know how to use, or contract a graphic designer to do it for you.
In the meantime, looking down the road to the future, you may want to download the free version of programs from Serif. I learned how to mess aroud with pictures using serif photoplus, which is like photoshop. They also have pageplus and draw plus, which are like pagemaker and coreldraw.
This is the main site: http://www.serif.com/
This is the free software site: http://freeserifsoftware.com/
I've only used the free software and been very satisfied. I am sure the paid versions, which aren't expensive, have more benefits.
sign generator
if you need something fast (like by yesterday), you can use an online widget to make a printable flyer. Do a search for generators like this...
http://www.signgenerator.org
There are all kinds of certificate generators and such out there...
Steer clear of Publisher
I'll have to hop on the bandwagon and give Publisher a big thumbs down. I've not used it but a few times but it's truly remarkable how a program so limited in functionality is so difficult to use. Granted, I'm proficient with better tools, that may influence my decision, but it's simply not a good program to work with. Commercial printers hate it too, so I push people away from it every chance I get.
What are your alternatives? Adobe InDesign is my favorite. QuarkXPress is very, very good. PageMaker is acceptable. Even Illustrator is much better than MSPub.
The problem is InDesign retails for $699. So, what are your options?
-Search the net (eBay?) for older versions often available at a fraction of their MSRP. Be certain to get a manual; these are powerful tools and the learning curve can be steep.
-As Matt previously pointed out, download the 30-day trial from Adobe.
-Hire a designer or design student who will either make a series of handouts for your events or design it so you can easily insert a new title at a later date. Which leads to my final suggestion;
-Don't overlook traditional cutting and pasting (with scissors and rubber cement). Print your images as you normally would and use a word processor to generate your type. Then photocopy or scan the final work.
Hope this helps,
-NP
Image Generators OR Upload A Photo To Add Effects
Make graphics for church group @ http://www.customsigngenerator... , from church signs to warning traffic signs (even make logos, buttons, cartoons, photo mashups, etc). Even create your own sign generator with your own image.
MS Publisher
I spent a week experimenting with MS Publisher and while I agree it isn't suitable for serious work, it's perfectly fine for a black and white newsletter.
Publisher isn't much different than PageMaker 5.0, if anyone remembers that. My only caveat is that you'd realistically have to send the job to a printer as a hi-res PDF, which means shelling out for Adobe Acrobat. (I've not come across a printer who'll take native files.)
The bigger issue, whatever the DTP package you use, centres around design and typography. Chances are, if you're using Publisher, you're design skills won't be high and you'll be using Microsoft's horrible native fonts.
PRINT SHOP
I as well make youures, and youth ministry brochures and such. But, what I do is use 'The Print Shop' and use their quarter fold card template, and put some art from churchartonline.com on the front and do everything in their. But, somehting new we're trying is we've ordered some bulletin covers from Lifeway and we are using thoose to save ink, and just print the info off of the copier.
RLK
Scribus
I really like Scribus. There is a little bit of a learning curve if you are used to Publisher but the results are much better than Publisher. It also exports to PDF for sending to a printer quite easily.
I work in Scribus also. It
I work in Scribus also. It seems to handle the power I need. I suppose I'd switch if I were working with a pro designer, but I'm not.