Pages: PDFs for professional printers

I hope this may help Pages users who struggle with making PDFs for professional printshops.
Pages provide several options to produce PDFs. However, not all are suitable for professional print shops. For instance, 'Export to PDF' option under File menu will give you PDFs that look okay on screen, but will not break into four colours (CMYK) needed for professional printing.
One efficient way of preparing Pages files is by using the ColourSync utility.
1. In your Pages document go File - Print. Print dialogue window opens.
2. Click on the third pop-down menu bar. Go down to ColorSync.
3. In ColorSync dialogue second pop-down menu bar is called 'Quartz Filter'. Click on it and go down to 'Add filters...' ColorSync launches and a Preview pdf of your document opens after a few seconds. In the top left corner of the Preview there is an icon with red, green and blue filters. Click on it.
4. 'Filters' dialogue window opens. Click on the triangle next to the third option 'Create Generic PDFX-3 Document'. At the bottom of the window click on + to create a new filter which will be your configurations choice for producing PDFs for printers. 'Untitled' option appears at the bottom of the list.
5. Double click on it to change the name of the option. Click on the little triangle to the right of the 'Untitled' and a choice of option opens. Go down to 'Add PDF retouch component' and when options open choose PDF/X-3.
6. Click on the little triangle to the left of your 'Untitled' and you will see that a new 'Create PDF/X-3' submenu has been added.
7. Click on the little triangle to the left and a choice of PDF settings appears. Now here, on the fourth line you have 'Destination Profile' drop-down menu. If you choose 'Generic CMYK' you can start producing PDFs already colour separated for professional printers. Next, go further down to 'Flatten Transparency'. By default it is checked and resolution is set at 72 dpi. That is good enough for the internet and for e-mailing pdfs. But for professional printing you need a much higher definition.
8. Next step: click on your preview pdf, at the bottom left there is a choice of filters - a drop-down menu bar. Click on it and you will see your 'Untitled' at the bottom of the menu.
9. Close Filters dialogue window, close preview, and go back to your Pages document. Click Print under File menu and in Print dialogue window go to ColorSync again. Click on the Quartz Filter menu bar and you will see that the 'Untitled' filter with your PDF settings sits there.
10. Now, follow the Print - Save as PostScript - Create PDF route, but in a slightly modified way:
- Open Print dialogue;
- Choose ColorSync and set Quartz Filter to yours - e.g. 'Untitled'.
- Under PDF menu choose 'Save as PostScript'
- Launch Acrobat (or drag the PS file onto the Acrobat icon) and 'Create PDF from file' under Document menu or Open the PS file under File menu.
Changing PDF settings allows you to prepare ready CMYK converted files for printers. It may look cumbersome, but, mind, you only have to adjust your PDF settings once to find what best suits you, and then it's just sliding down to ColorSync and clicking on your settings.
FrankBe has described the use of ColoSync for preparing PDFs on this forum. I am adding here a recommendation to use the PostScript stage to convert Pages files to PDF. A fuller version of this method is on http://i-work-in-pages.blogspot.com.
Sashura
iMac, iBook Mac OS X (10.4)

Thank you very much for this detailed tutorial, Sashura -- it is greatly appreciated!

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PDF weirdness / sending Pages PDFs to the printers

Hey!
I have problems exporting my Pages documents to PDF. For small fonts they look totally pixly when viewing. I'm not sure, but seems like it's only fonts under 9pts in size. Looks awful. Not sure what's happening. Also, when using the 'best' alternative when exporting the file size is a staggering 23.9mb. The 'better' setting yields a filesize of 380k or something. But I have no idea what exactly Pages does!? I'm used to be working in InDesign and this drives me nuts.
Also, has anyone sent a PDF made from a Pages document to the printers? I mean like offset printer.
I'm using Pages 3.02...
thanks

D,
I am using three (offset) printers with very few problems. One was when I used Pages Opacity function to fade a B&W graphic for use behind text. It printed too dark and made the text hard to read. The printer advised me to change the black color to gray color (rather than use the Opacity slider) which I did in Photoshop Elements. Another problem was using Pages new Frames. I chose the one with the ragged edges and the "masked" portion came out gray. Back in v2.x I had a few problems with drop shadows but that seems to be okay now.
These are all gray scale jobs. One color job I took to Minute Man Press and the result was excellent.
Another was done on a digital copier because it was such a short run. Again, no problems.
The printers all do the impositions; I don't have to do them for them.
The secret here is to work with your printer, ask his advice and if he can't handle your PDFs, try another printer. It can be done. (I make my PDFs from the Print menu and use the Save as PDF... option.)
Walt

Creating a PDF for the printers shop

Hi Guys.
I'm currently trying to design an annual report for our company and this is the first time, I'm trying to make it on my own.
The biggest problem is, that our printers shop uses an older version of Adobe InDesign. So they are not able to open my file. They gave me the advice to make a PDF out of InDesign. Therefore I have two questions.
1.) In InDesign you've got the option of printing a brochure. In this case, InDesign is sending all pages to the printer in the correct order. So if you have more than just two pages, you'll get the pages in the way they should fit, if you want to bind them. How do I reach the same effect by exporting the pages?
2.) If I export my pages to PDF, what settings do I have to take to get the same result as the printers shop, if they would get the InDesgin-File to print directly out of InDesign? You know, I want to get the same quality on the paper.
Hope you can help me and ... please, if you find any mistakes in grammar or orthography, please forgive me.

Hi,
thanks for your answers so far.
The printer did not ask me for an imposed PDF. He just told me, that he can't open my ID-File because he would have an older version of ID. But he told me, that I could send him a PDF. I now asked him via eMail wether he can print out of a PDF in the same quality an of course in right order of the pages or not. I think, he can put the pages in the correct order. The only question is what settings I have to chose for exporting our report. I also noticed the other settings but I can't actually see the differences, even if they are explained in my own language.
Ok. I guess I have to wait for the answer of our printer.

Crop makrs for professional printers

Hi,
I recently landed a job with someone who needs a designer. I always played around with photoshop and got quite good at it, but I never had to print what I made. I was told that I needed to make bleeds and crop makrs and deliver the design as a PDF to the printer.
I am a bit lost. The posters I designed are 8.5 by 11. I added on .25 inches to the lenght and width to allow for the bleed, then desinged the poster. I am lost however with what to do for the crop marks. Are they simply the Guide Lines? Those don't show up when I view the file as a PDF, and the image shows up as 8.75 by 11.25, and if that gets printed the image will shrink slightly to fit the page.
I know it's sort of an open-ended question, I apologize. But how do I go about makin crop marks and delivering those to the printers in PDF form.
I'm afraid that what I deliver will end up being printed with an unwanted white boarder, and there are over a thausand copies set to print. I really don't want to mess this up!
Thank you in advance for any advice.

Mr.Met
I think i have a simple way forexaple he is using photoshop lets say a Biz Card which stardard size 9x5 what i do in PS i will make the size 9.2x5.2, When the card is ready Place in Indesign draw a box of no stroke of 9x5 ofcourse the points will be the Bleed Centre that box with Align Pallete into the card then go to the windows in Cs4/Automation and In Cs 5 Utilities Script panel your can use VBS/Javascript Look up for Cropmarks Double Click when the drawn Box is Selected your Ready to Go.
Imran

How to Setup Default Page Size for Multiple Printers

I've got two printers, a laser printer for printing "normal" 8 1/2 x 11 pages and a Zebra label printer for printing 4x6 shipping labels. I have my laser printer set as the default printer with a default paper size of US letter. Whenever I go to print shipping labels on my Zebra printer, I switch the printer in the Print dialog box and it always defaults to a paper size of "Full Bleed 8 1/2 x 11". Is there any way to change this setting so that it defaults to "4x6"?
Another interesting thing is that if I temporarily set the Zebra printer up to be the default printer, none of the paper sizes that are "appropriate" for this printer appear in the default paper size popup menu. It looks like the choices are only those that would make sense for my laser printer. But when I go to print with my label printer, I can choose all sorts of "appropriate" sizes from the dialog box, including the "4x6" size that I use.
Any ideas?

Stop the queue (or take the printer offline manually), queue a print job, and check the settings on the submitted job using the CUPS interface; see if you can get the print job "captured" in the queue, and then see if the job is asking for the page size. Based on what you're describing, I'd guess that whatever application or tool you're printing from is specifically requesting the page size, and not defaulting it.

Resolution of Pages PDF for offset printing

I'm making a brochure for my wife's company. I've already made it in Photoshop (on my PC). I've duplicated it in Pages (tri-fold template). The pdf made in PS is about 25MB. The pdf made by pages is about 1.3MB. The printer wants files that are 350ppi. And now that I think of it, they also want them in the CMYK color space. Pretty sure Pages won't do that. Anyway, anyone made a document that was printed by a service (offset press)?
Dave
in Maine

I'd agree with what Peter says but for a possible few points.
1. As you have calibrated monitors, you presumably have a spectrophotometer and a monitor calibration / monitor characterisation package. The package should autoinstall the ICC profile for the state of the display and set the ColorSync Utility and the Display control panel correctly. However, take care that you don't override these settings manually. The typical mistake is to use the display profile as the profile for colour correction. The reason this is a mistake is that your display typically has a smaller colour space than your offset printing condition, except if you are printing on lowend gray newsprint or lowend gray magazine paper as in US SWOP. For any half-decent printing gamut, use a larger colour correction space such as ECI-RGB or AdobeRGB or if you are digital then PhotoGamutRGB by the pro photographers in Germany. If you can't define a colour in the colour correction space you can't define the colour in the output space - you have to have the colour to be able to print the colour.
2. In using the PDF/X-3 workflow, check with your printer for the bleed box and trim box. If you don't have to have transparency, try staying away from it in your design. The idea is that PDF is output to a determinate imaging area for the page itself, which you define in Page Setup, but printing processes have different needs of additional space and this additional space is customisable. If you do have transparency, set the transparency flattening appropriately in the PDF/X-3 dialogue. Finally, talk to your printer about the printing condition and determine if there is a house printing condition for which an ICC printing profile is available or if the shop supports ISO 12647 in which case you can get prebuilt ICC profiles at www.eci.org and the measurement data itself to build your own gamut mapping and black generation at www.color.org which is the home of the International Color Consortium.
Probably a bit rambling, sorry about that.
hh

File format for professional printing

(In case it's relevant I'm using CS2, but I think it probably doesn't matter.)
I have some logos that I'm publishing for people to use for a variety of purposes. I want to keep the number of file formats to as few as reasonably possible in order not to confuse everyone. My question is, what vector-based format should I use for professional printers?
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For the sake of simplicity (rather than getting too involved in the actual logo design), imagine a white circle with a standard drop shadow outside it fading smoothly away the further you get from the circle's edge. This is supposed to sit on any coloured background, with the parts of the shadow gradient that aren't grey (if that makes sense) being transparent. The trouble is that, apparently, in Quark (and maybe other programs for all I know), this shaded area comes out with a white background. I've mocked up an approximate comparison - attached - of how it ought to look and how it actually comes out.
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Thanks,
Giles.

Aarmed wrote:
CMYK is always preferred, as there's no such thing as a printer that uses RGB inks. Switching color spaces can end badly.
Agreed for printing CMYK is preferred but, i gather that there are some digital printers that prefer RGB files... hence my caveat.
however rips with color precise elements that can hit things like PMS colors require vector art with embedded swatches.
Whatever the method, if you have a tiff file, you're safe. But, it's not flexible except for downscaling.
A pdf is generally preferred, as even if the sender forgets to convert the fonts, you can always open the file in Photoshop and have the file be read accurately.
Forget to convert fonts? In a tiff? What are you talking about?

Inserting Multipage PDF for view only-

Help!
I want to insert a three page PDF for view only. I do not want this to open in a new window, I do not want this to download, I just want visitors to view the entire three pages vertically, or scrollable.
When I insert the PDF I only get the first page. I haven't had any luck with the google docs iframe HTML stuff (but I am admittedly very bad at that and could be missing something).
I am not experienced, so please be clear and patient.
Thanks!

Another simple way would be to split the 3 page pdf into 3 one page pdf files. Then drag each pdf file onto the iWeb page, resize and postition as required. They get converted into image files. Not elegant but will do what you want. You can even add a frame of some kind around them if desired like this one page PDF example: Add PDF
OT

How can I convert digitally signed PDF's so I can combine them into a single multi-page PDF?

We are an architectural firm and we receive drawings from consultants as PDF's that are digitally signed. In order to combine all of our drawings into a single PDF, we currently send the PDF's to a printer, have them printed, and scan them as new PDF's. This process reduces the clarity of the PDF and re-printing the scanned PDF's reduces the clarity even further. Is there a way to "flatten" or otherwise convert the digitally signed PDF's so we can combine them into a single multi-page PDF? Making a portfolio is not an option. We need an actual multi-page PDF for a variety of reasons. This problem is actually preventing our office from using digital signatures so any help would be greatly appreciated.

You can't. There was a discussion on this Forum a few months ago on this subject. Look it up for more info.

Seperating 2-page spreads for printing?

I recently have had trouble with printing my booklets.
I am using 11x17 documents and wish to seperate 2 page spreads for printing?
When i currently print it prints the cover page, page 1, seperate but combines the other spreads, with 2 pages per actual printed page.
I seperate the files one by one for printing currently but i want t0 know if i have to do that, because it wastes valuable time.
Is it a problem with the way i am exporting the file?
Please give me your advice as I am open to other ideas to reaching my main goal.

When you see two pages side-by-side in an InDesign file which is set up with facing pages, that's just how it looks on the screen. If none of the items on your pages span across both pages of a spread, you can output a multi-page PDF, and each page will be independent. In fact, you could have something that crosses the spine on a spread and still output to single pages, but that's not really the point. The double-page part they are talking about is the ability for you to output (for example) pages 2 and 3, which are side-by-side, as a single page that is twice as wide as a normal single page. They also don't want 32 different one-page PDFs for a 32-page book. Neither of these will be a problem if you export your PDF normally. If you see facing pages in the actual PDF, that may be (probably is) just a viewing option. All of the pages will be singles.
The point I want to make is that you don't have to override the facing pages to make a multi-page PDF.

Using Windows Search for multiple, multi-page PDFs

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Something that may help -
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In the Extract Pages dialog you can select "Extract Pages As Separate Files".
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Additional options are also possible.
In a thread at AUC, Thom Parker identifies these.
http://www.acrobatusers.com/forums/aucbb/viewtopic.php?id=4703
Be well...

Getting Page Count for a Multi-Page PDF file using Illustrator script?

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Any Ideas?

This script i did for photoshop:
OK so lets do it working on WIN and MAC without any shell script.
This solution is not the best but its working.
I used Try catch to solve it.
Only issue is that you should at least somehow know how many pages you expect in pdf.. this mean if you are working with books or flyers...
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I am working with pdfs with max 20pages.. so i start open the 20 then 19 then 18 and when i am success i know the amount of pages.
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var maxPagesCount = 20;
var actPagesCount = maxPagesCount;
var opts1 = new PDFOpenOptions();
opts1.usePageNumber = true;
opts1.antiAlias = true;
opts1.bitsPerChannel = BitsPerChannelType.EIGHT;
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opts1.suppressWarnings = true;
opts1.cropPage = CropToType.MEDIABOX;
myFunction = function () {
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When saving a document as a PDF for printing, I lose pages, clip art, and my orginal format. Help!

I have created some forms for our congregation to fill in with answers on adobe forms central. When I go to turn it into a PDF for printing for a hard copy, (not all our members have internet) when i save it to a PDF, it doesn't save all the pages and formats it differently then show on the screen i programmed it onto. How do I fix this issue?

Hi;
In the "Feature Tutorials/Help" linked from the top of the main page of the Forums: Feature Tutorials / Help
There is a Tutorial on "Creating and distributing fillable PDF Forms": Tutorial: Creating and distributing fillable PDF forms
The main thing to look at is the "View" setting and for PDF set it to "Page View", the page breaks you define in Page View will be used in the PDF, there are also "implicit" page breaks added automatically based on the page size.
For the issue with clip art see this FAQ: Image does not show up in PDF
Thanks,
Josh

AI CS4 Need to switch from letter (individual page PDf) to tabloid for duplex on digital press.

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You'll need 3 artboards. 1 for each individual page then a third which is tabloid sized and overlaps the other two artboards.
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A hyperlink click to a pdf document in a website does not open a pdf document instead presents a blank page "searching for bookmarks"

a hyperlink click to a pdf document in a website does not open a pdf document instead presents a blank page "searching for bookmarks"

Check the settings as shown in the [[opening PDF files within Firefox]] article.

Pages: PDFs for professional printers

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