Let’s assume that Brad is in charge of publicity for a band. The band has a tour schedule that is constantly being updated. It’s Brad’s job to make sure that:

• The band has a great SWF site that includes the latest tour schedule.
• The band also has a great HTML site that includes the latest tour schedule for fans who don’t have Flash Player.
• The band has a mailing list, which periodically receives a printed direct mail piece showing the current tour schedule.

Once he’s decided on the band’s graphic look, Brad lays out the direct mail piece, using a Print layout in a QuarkXPress project, and imports the current tour schedule.

A standard QuarkXPress Print layout.

Once he designs the direct mail piece the way he likes it, he chooses Layout > Duplicate to duplicate the content into a Web layout in the same project. Now he can work on the HTML version of the page in the same file.

A Web layout created by duplicating the Print layout.

Now he duplicates the Web layout into an Interactive layout, again by choosing Layout > Duplicate.

To add some interactivity, he decides to make the guitar glide in from the right when an end user opens the SWF presentation. To accomplish this, he does the following:

• He adds a red line, which serves as the path the guitar will travel along. Using the Interactive palette, he makes it a Basic object and names it “GuitarPath.” Under Options, he chooses Initially Hidden (so that the end users don’t see the line).
• He selects the guitar graphic and uses the Interactive palette to make it an Animation object named “SlidingGuitar.” To indicate that it should move along the red line, he chooses Item on a Path from the Display as drop-down menu, and then chooses GuitarPath (the red line) from the Path drop-down menu. To set the speed of the slide, he enters 4 in the Speed field.

Use the Object tab to turn an item into an Animation object.

To make this animation play, Brad does two things:

Now Brad wants to add a button that will open the band manager’s HTML site in a separate window. To create the button, he draws a picture box, names it “WebSiteButton,” chooses Button from the Object Type drop-down menu, and then chooses New from the Button drop-down menu. This creates a Button layout with four pages, where Brad constructs the four states of the Button object (using only QuarkXPress tools, by the way). The different button states make it possible for Brad to provide the end user with feedback; if there’s a different image for each state, the Button’s appearance changes depending on whether it’s up or down, enabled or disabled.

The Page Layout palette lets you view the states of a button you are creating.

Now Brad must configure that Button, so he switches back to the Presentation layout and sets up the Button to open the band’s Web site by adding an Open URL action to the Button object’s Click up user event.

The Event tab lets you assign events to the various states of a Button object.

Now Brad wants to add an animated logo sequence to the presentation. To create the image sequence, he draws a picture box, names it “AnimatedLogo,” choose
s Animation from the Object Type drop-down menu, chooses Sequence in a Box from the Display as drop-down menu, and then chooses New from the Sequence drop-down menu. This creates an Image Sequence layout. Brad adds 10 pages to the Image Sequence layout, and then constructs the 11 frames of the animation by putting a frame on each page.

The Page Layout palette lets you preview the frames in an image sequence.

To make the animation play, he adds a Play Animation to the same script he used to start the “Sliding Guitar” animation.

The SWF page for the band’s tour schedule is ready, so he chooses File > Export > Exporter for Macromedia Flash, sets up his export options, and exports the presentation in SWF format.

The Exporter for Macromedia Flash dialog box lets you control export options.

When all three versions of the page — Print, Web, and Interactive — are the way he wants them, he uses the Shared Content palette to synchronize the tour schedules in all three layouts. He then prints the Print layout, exports the Web layout to HTML, and exports the Interactive layout in SWF format.

A week later, a new version of the tour schedule arrives. Brad opens the project and starts entering the new schedule in the Print layout. By splitting his view, he can immediately see that the other two layouts are being updated, too.

The QuarkXPress multiple layout view feature lets you watch as content is updated simultaneously in a Print layout and in an Interactive layout.

Now it’s simply a matter of exporting the Web and Interactive layouts, and the site is updated. And if it’s time to print a new direct mail piece, that’s ready to go, too.