Interactive Automation in Adobe InDesign: How to Produce Auction Catalogs and Collectors’ Catalogs Efficiently

Coins, postage stamps, memorabilia, model cars and model trains, objects of art, toys, figurines, and medals: High-quality collectables deserve to be presented well. For collectors, dealers, and auction houses, catalogs are therefore much more than mere lists. Catalogs showcase valuable items, describe their characteristics, and aid in determining their value. High-resolution photographs highlight important details, while informative descriptions of items spark interest and convey the story behind an object.

Creating collectors’ catalogs and auction catalogs is one of the most sophisticated publishing processes there is. These days, the actual data about the objects themselves are usually available as structured data. The data come from auction management software, product information management systems (PIM systems), or databases and can be imported into Adobe InDesign. Lot or inventory numbers, descriptions, prices, conditions, categories, provenance, estimated values, and image data are usually already available in digital form.

Despite this, fully automating the production of the catalog is rarely successful in practice.

The reason cannot be found in the data. It has to do with the decisions made with the data.

The experienced layout designer does much more than just view data sets. The layout designer assesses the significance of individual items and decides how these should be presented. A rare coin or extraordinary postage stamp may be displayed solo on its own page. The same applies to a rare toy, historic stamp, or noteworthy work of art. Several standard objects, on the other hand, can often be presented together on a single page. Some items require additional enlargement of important details. Others are shown at both their original size and greatly enlarged. Still other objects are so large or significant that they fill nearly an entire page of the catalog.

These decisions cannot be reliably derived from a database. They rely on experience, expertise, and an understanding of which items are particularly relevant for the reader of the catalog. Therefore, while the idea of fully automated catalog creation is tempting, it is only realistically feasible to a limited extent. A system can process data, but it has only a limited ability to assess which presentation will have the greatest impact.

The better approach: interactive automation to support the layout designer

Instead of replacing a human layout designer or graphic designer, software should support the human.

This is precisely where the strength of a specialized Adobe InDesign extension lies. The data are automatically provided, while the layout designer continues to decide how the result should look.

The panel of the InDesign extension does not contain generic functions such as “scale image” or “align object”. Instead, it provides industry-specific functions:

• Place the item
• Add obverse and reverse
• Create an enlarged version
• Create a group of objects

The layout designer no longer thinks in terms of InDesign tools, but in terms of the specific tasks to be carried out to create a collectors’ catalog or auction catalog.

The layout designer decides; the software implements.

The real added value of an InDesign extension arises through the division of labor.

The layout designer decides which objects should be highlighted, which presentation has the greatest impact, and which items deserve special attention.

The software handles the technical implementation. It places images, calculates dimensions, aligns elements, inserts text, manages image links, generates numbering, creates indexes, and verifies that the information is complete. This allows experts to retain control over creative and technical decisions, while the technical implementation is now standardized, reproducible, and significantly more efficient.

The layout designer remains the designer

A custom InDesign extension causes two things to happen at the same time.

First of all, Adobe InDesign evolves from a general-purpose layout tool into an industry-specific application. Instead of dealing with image frames, paragraph styles, object styles, and numerous technical details, the layout designer works with functions that support their actual catalog creation workflow.

Second, the layout designer is supported in doing their most important task: assessing the items and determining how to present them optimally.

• Which coin should have an entire page in the catalog devoted to it?
• Which items should be displayed together?
• Where does enlargement or magnification make sense?
• Which presentation tells the most exciting tale?
• Which way of displaying the item increases attention paid to a special item?

The layout designer continues to make these decisions.

The software handles the technical implementation. The software places images, adds text, keeps numbering consistent, creates indexes, and checks that the information is complete.

This means that the layout designer spends less time with recurring production tasks and more time with actually designing the catalog. The layout designer decides what is important and how it should be presented. The software ensures that these decisions are implanted rapidly, consistently, and free of errors.

The aim of using an InDesign extension is not to automate the layouting job in every way or to replace the layout designer by algorithms, but to automate the production work in a manner specifically useful to the layout designer of a collectors’ catalog or auction catalog. This allows more time for what a good collectors’ catalog or auction catalog is truly about: choosing the right way to display a treasured collectable item, emphasizing certain special items, and displaying a collection in a way that excites the reader and collector.