Import PDF into InDesign

Brand New InDesign User (latest version on OS X)
We have layout modifications to do on some marketing material that is being sent to us in PDF form. I know InDesign can import the PDFs but it seems that the type and image layers are not available. It's very tedious to go into Acrobat (we have Acrobat Standard on Windows) and save out all the images, cut and paste the text, check the fonts, re-lay out in InDesign.
Surely such a sophisticated layout program made by Adobe should be able to access the type layers in a PDF directly?
Colin

Bob,
Thanks for the quick reply. I may have spoken loosely about 'layers'. The PDF documents have text, embedded fonts and images at least. The original documents are not available (lost) and the PDFs were probably created from InDesign or some similar layout program.
Thanks for the plugin link, it looks good but another $249 on top of the ID full price we just paid...
The placed PDF looks like a graphic in ID and yet it has all this good information in it, text, fonts, images. Hard to believe it wouldn't be available.
Colin

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Importing PDF into Indesign

Is it possible to import PDf documents into the current version of Adobe Indesign ? I am currently testing the software and was wondering if it would be possible to import around 50 of my already published PDF docs to work on it and redesign it with Indesign ?
Thank you in advance.

Hi @plummerdesign and @MasterStudios - indeed, it is a crying shame our website does not work in IE and they are looking into this. Thank you. We do not have a demo for several reasons and can understand your point. We do have numerous forms of detailed video demsontrations on PDF to InDesign via PDF2DTP here and we have some awesome testiominals from graphic arts industry experts, Frank Romano, Michael Jahn, Joe Marin and more (click on the hyper links on their names to view what they say about PDF2DTP).
One of many customer quotes we have include this:
"Really pleased to have this product [PDF2DTP for InDesign]. The Beta version was really good and saved me loads of hassle with amends to pdfs."
Graham Bell - http://www.absolutegraphics.co.uk
Another quote is:
“We have a lot of PDFs from „Word“ ;-) Before PDF2DTP, we used PitStop for the corrections, now we can do it better! As a recent example, we had come in an advert in PDF for a meeting. The ad was in RGB, Fonts not included, the trim and bleed were not correct, etc. I open it with the PDF2DTP plugin and it works very nice. A little bit of touching-up work on the pictures and the colours, but not much… Thanks for the app!”
Dirk Rosenplänter
Blueprint Werbeagentur e.K.
Hopefully this helps you see how useful and yet still affordable PDF2DTP for InDesign is. It is truly a gem, especially when all you have left is the said PDF! Thank you for the feedback and we will strive to better that side of it, for sure.

How do I import a .PDF into inDesign?

How do I import a .PDF into inDesign? Does anybody know how? I need to edit a book in inDesign that is a .PDF. So if anyone know how to do that please tell me.

Bob, Peter, grmg, many thanks for your very helpful comments. Delighted mac/pc not relevant. Will scratch that from list of herrings to chase.
Re PDFs - actually, I'm working in Acrobat (not just a finalized PDF), and Acrobat does of course allow editing of a sort; I'd concluded that since Adobe is willing to tolerate that degree of editing with its product, it should therefore tolerate moving its native format (*.pdf) into another of its own native formats (*.indd). I see that's a misconception.
This morning I tried all flavors I could find of getting my Acrobatted content into ID3, including copy/paste, place, and import (from the ID side); none was satisfactory. Output from Acrobat to Word and then placing Word was fine for English but destroyed the Greek - not just wrong font, but complete gobbledygook and loss of all diacriticals. Names of fonts don't matter for my purposes; the legibility of the English, and the legibility and tonic accuracy of the Greek do matter. Author of this project is not tech-savvy and is using old Greek system as well; nothing he or i can do to fix that.
Current plan is to request author to provide me his native files, which will be Mac files. Am I understanding the Import dialog and your collecitve comments to suggest that with that file resident on my PC (and unopened), I can use the Place dialog, with "Show Options" selected, to get the Mac file into ID?
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Place pdf into InDesign CS4 js

Hi, I have those lines of script that place the pdf into InDesign, but in the process new frame gets created in which the pdf is placed, and I need it to be placed into my existing frame. How could I do it:
    var myRectangle = myDoc.pages[0].rectangles[0];
    myPage = myDoc.pages[0];
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Yes, you are right, I am stuck for a different reason, it does places the second page.
What I think is going on, and maybe there is a better approach to it than the one I am going about it: when I have single page pdf for the 1st page and single page pdf for the 2nd page, my script first tries to upload 1st pdf as multi-page just in case there is only one pdf with both files. And for some reason it uploads single page pdf twice (into the second InDesign page as well when there is no second page in the 1st pdf [If I could avoid that all together would be great]). So my script verifies if the pdf uploaded into the 2nd page is 1st page of 1st pdf then it deletes it. And then it looks if there is a file for the second page, and uploads it. So my new challenge is that when it verifies what page of the pdf is uploaded into the 2nd page of InDesign after the 1st pdf upload, it just crashes, and it worked with the previous way of placing pdfs (the green line of the script).
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function myPlacePDF(myDoc, myFile){
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    catch (e){}
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            myFrame.remove();
    catch (e){}
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function myPlacePDFback(myDoc, myFile){
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        myDoc.pages[1].rectangles.add();
        myFrame.strokeWeight = 0;
        myFrame.geometricBounds = [0, 0, myGB_Y2, myGB_X2];
    app.pdfPlacePreferences.pdfCrop = PDFCrop.cropMedia;
    myPage = myDoc.pages[1];
    var myRectangle = myDoc.pages[1].rectangles[0];
    app.pdfPlacePreferences.pageNumber = 2;
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    //myPDFPage = myPage.place(File(myFile), [0,0])[0];
    app.pdfPlacePreferences.pageNumber = 1;
Kasyan, your script might be helpful, and I would like to look into it.
Thank you very much for your help.
Yulia

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I would not crop them before placing them in InDesign, I would use them at whole. I would avoid editing those file after finishing them.

Importing PDF to InDesign

I am doing a book and i am wanting to import a document that I have both saved to doc and PDF. Is there anyway I can bring this into InDesign to extend to the pages that I have made?

This is the place where plugin programmers discuss technical issues.
Please repost in the general InDesign forum.

Converting File to CYMK/ Importing PDF to Indesign

Hi, i have a deadline approaching to create a brochure. I have been using illustrator to create my page designs using a combination of photography and vector work and was wondering if i select everything within the document and convert to cymk wether this has indeed converted everthing including the Photos. I was also wondering is it best to save my files as PDF's before importing into Indesign to reduce file size or will the quality be better if an ai. file? It is a 200 page brochure and i am the sole designer as an intern at a travel company :/ I have done some research on the matter and believe what i am doing is ok yet i have a deadline approaching and some reassurance would be greatly appreciated!

Nick,
if i select everything within the document and convert to cymk wether this has indeed converted everthing including the Photos.
In addition to what Tony said, on another day you may start in CMYK Color Mode, especially if you use colours beyond grayscale in the vector artwork; if you do, you may have some unexpected colour changes when you change the colour mode.
And Illy leaves photos (and their colours) alone, unless you coerce her to do something both of you may regret.

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This is a fictitious example to illustrate my problem...
I have .PSD file measuring 10cm square. It's completely blank except for a layer containing a 5cm square box in the middle. When I import to InDesign it places as a 10cm square picture frame (with the 5cm image in the middle surrounded by blank space), rather than a 5cm square picture frame "snapped" to the edges of the .PSD content.
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Apologies; that's been described incredibly badly. I hope someone understands what I mean!
Thanks in advance

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I've tried deleting the preferences for both InDesign and PhotoShop in the vain hope it would be as simple as that. That didn't work.
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Problem with imported images into Indesign

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I have contacted the scanner company and of course they put the issue with the exporting to the PDF.
Can anybody help??

This is bug #2960217 filed by me in September, relating to Indexed over Gray colorspace, also with a Fujitsu Scansnap S1500M.
I have scanned a book as a one bit (B & W) 600 dpi document. I have imported the document into Indesign as i need to integrate some decsreened pics in. I then export the finished document as a press ready PDF and the image virtually disappears off the page and what is left is very distorted. the type is twice as high and about five times wider than the original image.
The scanner that i have used is a Fujitsu Scansnap S1500M.
In short, don't use it in Grayscale (Or BW, I guess) modes. Use it in Color, or make sure to process the iamge in another app (like Photoshop) and save
it with a normal colorspace.

Import PDF into InDesign

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