Using existing AI files to create new and matching InDesign files

Forum|Forum|1 day ago
May 15, 2026
2 replies
23 views

Please share your recommendation on the most effective way to create a new InDesign file form an Illustrator file. The quality must be good, and they InDesign file will have a long life. We are at the initial design (mostly in Illustrator) with a long way to go before production. This is an environmental graphics project for the USN Seabees, the files are 20 to 30 feet final size. The files are prepared at half size. Thank you!

Bill Silbert

Community Expert

I have had a lot of success converting PDFs to fully functioning InDesign files using a third party InDesign plug-in from Markzware called PDFMarkz. I have been really impressed with how well the files have been converted. The conversion seems better to me than the same feature that has been built into recent versions of InDesign. It might be worth a try to save your Illustrator files as PDFs and then try opening them directly in InDesign after installing the plugin. For more info about this plug in go to: https://markzware.com/products/pdfmarkz/.

leo.r

Community Expert

Do you mean that you want to switch from Illustrator to InDesign to continue to create your files? Then just open your .ai file in InDesign (provided you’re using a recent InDesign version). InDesign will convert it (with various degrees of accuracy), then you can continue to work on it in InDesign.

Edward281374460vozAuthor

Participant

Thank you for the suggestion but it did not work well with these files.

The file scaled from 20” wide in Illustrator to 2” wide in InDesign. The images are very low rez but indicate that they are linked. The images are actually medium to hi rez.

leo.r

Community Expert

The images are very low rez but indicate that they are linked. The images are actually medium to hi rez

Is high quality display enabled?

Regardless, you may need to do quite a few manual adjustments after converting your .ai files; there’s no way to automatically recreate your Illustrator files in InDesign as is.

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