Luminous Landscape Forum
Raw & Post Processing, Printing => Digital Image Processing => Topic started by: BernardLanguillier on April 01, 2009, 12:12:48 am
-
Dear all,
I have been trying to use InDesign and PS to do something very simple... design a Blurb book... and need to vent some frustration.
I am simply amazed by the amounts of problems I am facing when doing such a simple thing:
- Errors when exporting pages to .pdf from InDesign or .pdf generated with errors
- PS CS4 unable to rasterize .pdf without leaving some white lines through the pictures when the images in InDesign are in .png format
- InDesign export to jpg leaving some white lines through images
- PS CS4 freezing systematically when applying a simple save to jpg/close window action
- Bridge CS4 simply deleting some files when hanging
- ...
Are people really able to produce books professionlly with this set of tools? Granted, the kind of things I am doing is probably not the most representative workflow, but I would have expected version 6 of InDesign/version 11 of PS to handle well these simple operations.
Cheers,
Bernard
-
Dear all,
I have been trying to use InDesign and PS to do something very simple... design a Blurb book... and need to vent some frustration.
I am simply amazed by the amounts of problems I am facing when doing such a simple thing:
- Errors when exporting pages to .pdf from InDesign or .pdf generated with errors
- PS CS4 unable to rasterize .pdf without leaving some white lines through the pictures when the images in InDesign are in .png format
- InDesign export to jpg leaving some white lines through images
- PS CS4 freezing systematically when applying a simple save to jpg/close window action
- Bridge CS4 simply deleting some files when hanging
- ...
Are people really able to produce books professionlly with this set of tools? Granted, the kind of things I am doing is probably not the most representative workflow, but I would have expected version 6 of InDesign/version 11 of PS to handle well these simple operations.
Cheers,
Bernard
Bernard,
I dont have any answers for you - but am eagerly watching this thread as I am about to start a book project in Indesign and CS4 / Lightroom.
So I have more than a passing interest in how you are going with yours.
Would be interested in how you went about setting up your indesign layout as well.
Hopefully someone can chime in with some answers to your problems.
-
I feel for you Bernard.
I used to be in prepress before it went digital and tried to teach myself digital prepress pagination and layout design starting with Pagemaker 6.5. It was a complicated mess but I rarely got errors. There were so many dialog boxes to configure just to print a proof producing colors that rarely matched.
I read up on the list of instructions for preparing files for output to PostScript gathering all the fonts and original linked images and placing them in one folder, so on and so on.
Then Pagemaker included Distiller so I could output to .pdf and the configuring began all over again with a myriad of dialog boxes and submenu's and panels. Had to choose a PostScript printer driver file and printer description file, blah, blah, blah. With all this learning I managed to output one page poster design that included initial caps within columns of type, insets, drop shadowed bounding borders around photos, fancy headline custom font design with drop shadows made in Photoshop. It looked beautiful and I was exhausted. I could not conceive producing a multi-page book could be any easier.
From that day on I gave up desktop publishing and when Adobe came out with InDesign I didn't bite because it was filled with the same myriad of dialog box configurations as Pagemaker that I had to say enough is enough.
I'ld advise having someone who is trained in digital desktop publishing and prepress to handle the InDesign file preparation.
Or maybe get one of those template designs and drop in the design elements. Maybe there's some kind of "simple" button hidden in InDesign's myriad of configuration dialog boxes. You do know about setting signature page layouts, right? You may need to talk to the printers for how they want the digital pagination to be handled.
-
I hear you, had the same issue last year, but I can't remember how I got around it, i'll call in later if I remember and look at the files when I got home.
It should be possible to do, and I have done, several if not may book layout using this same work flow.
Keep smiling
Henrik
-
I use InDesign all the time to print my portfolios. I have had problems in the past with file formats and I have now settled on jpg; when I need to edit an image I will go back to the master, re edit it, save a version as jpg then relink. Also in the beginning (10 yrs ago now) I would do screen captures of each step to make sure I was doing things consistently.
You might also try getting your pdf's from the print dialog instead of export to pdf. Just an idea.
Be glad you're using InDesign and not Quark. . . . HA.
-
Sounds like you need to resolve the issues with your creative suite programs before embarking on a big book project. I’m sure all the bugs and crashes you mention shouldn’t be happening.
I haven’t had any of the problems you mention with PS/Bridge CS4, but haven’t got Indesign here.
Maybe more pertinently, is Indesign is the best choice for designing photo books for Blurb at the moment ?
You do seem to read on the forums of people having problems with fonts and other pixelation issues when much text is printed via single pages that have to be converted to JPGs.
For books with mainly photo content, will it be better to use a different more photo capable software package to generate the pages, eg just Photoshop or Qimage ? I have great reservations about BookSmart’s ability to resize images well enough or get output sharpening correct, not to mention the lack of suitable templates available for photo work.
At the weekend I uploaded my first test book to Blurb and a large portion of it are tests of various packages at different settings to build single jpg output pages of multiple images at different sizes.
I’m expecting that building pages with Qimage will give the best quality photographic results. If so, it’s ‘on the fly’ resizing and sharpening will save a lot of work rather than having to optimise each different image size. OK, probably not a great choice if you’re planning on printing a lot of text, but for me that’s not important.
I won’t be able to say what the results are until I get the book back, maybe a few weeks, but it will be interesting to see what has worked best.
Maybe rather than venting your(our) frustration here, it would be better to lobby Blurb, via their forums, to accept PDF input and significantly improve BookSmart. Other POD suppliers offer better design and layout packages, why can’t Blurb?
-
Dear all,
I have been trying to use InDesign and PS to do something very simple... design a Blurb book... and need to vent some frustration.
I am simply amazed by the amounts of problems I am facing when doing such a simple thing:
- Errors when exporting pages to .pdf from InDesign or .pdf generated with errors
- PS CS4 unable to rasterize .pdf without leaving some white lines through the pictures when the images in InDesign are in .png format
- InDesign export to jpg leaving some white lines through images
- PS CS4 freezing systematically when applying a simple save to jpg/close window action
- Bridge CS4 simply deleting some files when hanging
- ...
Are people really able to produce books professionlly with this set of tools? Granted, the kind of things I am doing is probably not the most representative workflow, but I would have expected version 6 of InDesign/version 11 of PS to handle well these simple operations.
Cheers,
Bernard
Bernard
I am a professional book designer and use CS3 (not CS4) on a daily basis for all of my clients work. The problems you are encountering are not something I am familiar with, if they were I would probably have no clients left. My experience of Indesign and the entire CS3 package is that it works flawlessly, for me, on a mac Pro (OS 10.5) and 8gb of ram. How are you generating your pdfs?
If you want to PM me with more detail I will see if I can help, although the probelm could be CS4 specific.
Ian
-
Thank you all for your kind comments.
Cheers,
Bernard
-
I'm using CS4 Id and Ps, no issues at all for me with PDF output. I'm publishing a print magazine and it works fine. Sorry I can't be of more help.
-
I'm using CS4 Id and Ps, no issues at all for me with PDF output. I'm publishing a print magazine and it works fine. Sorry I can't be of more help.
Thanks Nick. I must be unlucky and I guess that my jpg workflow is not representative of what most peope do with PS and Id, which probably explains the issue.
It was reported by other people in fact.
Cheers,
Bernard
-
Hi Bernard,
The problem, we had was, that a line or lines (random) would appear in print, and only visible when viewing at 200-400%, I think it is a rendering error of some sort, but I can't nail it down. I haven't found the files that was affected, I may have deleted them.
This error occurred in the PDF, from ID.
I better keep an eye out, cos I am doing a couple of books later this year. Using Bridge PS and ID to PDF
Henrik
-
Hi Bernard,
The problem, we had was, that a line or lines (random) would appear in print, and only visible when viewing at 200-400%, I think it is a rendering error of some sort, but I can't nail it down. I haven't found the files that was affected, I may have deleted them.
This error occurred in the PDF, from ID.
I better keep an eye out, cos I am doing a couple of books later this year. Using Bridge PS and ID to PDF
I got those both in direct InDesign jpg export, and PS .pdf reaterization when the image placed in InDesign was a .png file. I am not getting those anymore with tiff, but then I am getting some totally un-readable images even in the .pdf itself. It could be me who is doing something wrong, but I cannot figure out what...
Cheers,
Bernard
-
Maybe rather than venting your(our) frustration here, it would be better to lobby Blurb, via their forums, to accept PDF input and significantly improve BookSmart. Other POD suppliers offer better design and layout packages, why can’t Blurb?
Read this post (http://forums.blurb.com/forums/4/topics/3584#posts-24390)
John
-
Read this post (http://forums.blurb.com/forums/4/topics/3584#posts-24390)
I had done already. Yes it's good they've woken up to the requirement for PDF input and hope to offer it at some future time.
However that doesn't address one root cause of the requirement for PDF input in that BookSmart doesn't meet many people's requirements for layouts. PDF input will be valuable for people already owning expensive page layout software like InDesign @ £680, but for more occasional users it might be too a big an investment to justify.
Other suppliers manage to offer far better packages for photo book layouts and Blurb ought to match this sort of package. See the myphotobook software http://www.unibind.com/unibind2008/EN/Phot...yphotobook.html (http://www.unibind.com/unibind2008/EN/Photo/home/ph-myphotobook.html) supplied free with Unibind photobook covers and with Marrutt photo books as an example for how versatile some packages can be.
-
I use creative suite 3 and have no problems with integration of InDesign and Photoshop.... the area most prone to corruption in my experience is in anything to do with pdfs... I know you get the same problems with jpg bernard but is your acrobat up to date? I think that Adobe tend to run a lot of things through pdf engines even if you don't ask it to!.. Also have you tried resetting any pdf presets to the default?
Ros
-
Whats the point with using png's? That could play part in the rasterizing problems.
-
Adobe publishing tools are notoriously bad with png files. We avoid them like the plague.
I also found in my one short project that In Design doesn't do scaling well. For best results, you need to match your printer config in In Design to the DPI of your image in Photoshop and resize to the exact dimenstions before importing to ID--this includes when you are intending to print to PDF.
I have never used export to PDF; we always use print to PDF.
Congratulations! You have reached into a whole new can of worms.
-
...or png files are really bad for publishing, since png cannot be cmyk.
Exporting a pdf from Indesign is not a problem, distiller settings are even interchangeable between Adobe Distiller and Indesign export dialog...
-
I have been trying to use InDesign and PS to do something very simple... design a Blurb book... and need to vent some frustration.
Are you doing this instead of using Blurb's Booksmart for a more custom design?
That would be my intent, and assuming that it is yours, I would like to share what I have found so far. Disclaimer: other than PS, I know nothing about or have used the following mentioned sw and templates, nor have I tried Booksmart. In fact, I have not published a book. Would appreciate feedback if my simpleton approach is flawed.
My assumption is that in Booksmart there will be a "printable area" for each page which would have area(s) for image(s) and text. For a fully customized layout of this area, I started out thinking that it should be relatively "simple" to create a flattened PS jpg file that includes all the image(s) and text for a page. I also assume that I can fill the "printable area" completely with this jpg file, which would have the exact size and resolution for printing. This would get around any spacing, font type/size issues that may come up with Booksmart, etc. And I would only be dealing with a single file format I'm familiar with: jpg. For a photo book made up of only a couple of consistent page layouts (for protrait and landscape), creating a few PS templates should not be that difficult. Done.
Then I found someone is already doing this, and has some templates already made for PS and InDesign. Although I have yet to check out these templates, the process seems to be similar to what I have in mind.
http://theartofengineering.wordpress.com/2...lurb-templates/ (http://theartofengineering.wordpress.com/2008/01/22/free-blurb-templates/)
There are also those who prefer something called Fotofusion for laying out a book.
Just like everything else in digital imaging, there are many "easy to use" tools, but if you want to "customize" just a little bit, you have to work for it.
-
"PS jpg file that includes all the image(s) and text for a page."
PNG is recommended for text - sharper results than jpeg. See this post (http://forums.blurb.com/forums/5/topics/1517#posts-19119).
Until they accept PDF (later this year (http://forums.blurb.com/forums/4/topics/3584#posts-24390)), it seems to be InDesign—> PDF—> Photoshop—> PNG—> BookSmart. Not exactly convenient, but less onerous if you are happy with actions and scripting.
John
-
It maybe an Adobe sw, but it is a different animal from PS.
From Quark we switched to InDesign for the past year or 2, and very happy. Export to pdf daily CMYK contract proofing PDFx1a files for magazine work. its the standard for Swop press work.
If you are new to it, either read up on specifcally what you need to do and do some tests, or send it out for someone who handles this regularly as a pro. There are many specifics that require a shovel to get at.
-
Hi Bernard.
I have been in graphic prepress for a long time. Used Quark and then made transition to Indesign when it first came out. Now use CS3 for all print production, from hi end colour to newspapers. had a lot of teething probs along the way and have resolved most of them ourself.
I would be glad to help, if I can, with any of your issues.
From what i have read, the white lines are , or should be, only in the PDF screen preview, and not in the postscript code. When I produced a final PDF of my thesis, the images had white lines through then when viewed through Mac Preview but not in Acrobat. We used the see this in our newspaper final PDFs but once it got to the rip it printed fine.
One way to produce PDF is to 'print' (via the print dialogue) to a .ps (postscript) file and then run it through Distiller. This method is still used or favoured by a lot of prepress departments here in the UK.
As for image files we scale images in Photoshop to 110% of final print size at required resolution e.g. 300dpi or 250dpi etc. this ensures that there is optimum down sampling if the PDF is to be compressed. Otherwise we dont compress images for final output. Yes you get big file sizes.
We use a combination of Tiff for images or psd and PDF for adverts. psd is good because you alter the psd (layer effects etc) on the original and the placed file is updated automatically. Great for adverts.
Dont use png.
The PDF setting came be troublesome if not selected correctly and this depends on output device requirements.
having said that I thing InDesign is the best DTP software I have come across and I have really thrown everything at over the last five or six years.
Fell free to email me.
Cheers
-
It maybe an Adobe sw, but it is a different animal from PS.
From Quark we switched to InDesign for the past year or 2, and very happy. Export to pdf daily CMYK contract proofing PDFx1a files for magazine work. its the standard for Swop press work.
If you are new to it, either read up on specifcally what you need to do and do some tests, or send it out for someone who handles this regularly as a pro. There are many specifics that require a shovel to get at.
Thanks for the feedback, it appears that the problem is with the rasterization from InDesign or from a .pdf file when the resoluton remains constant along the chain. A natively .pdf workflow seems to be fine.
Cheers,
Bernard
-
Do you have Acrobat Pro? I ask because it can handle the rasterization with output to PNG (better if your pages have text)
John
-
Do you have Acrobat Pro? I ask because it can handle the rasterization with output to PNG (better if your pages have text)
John,
Yes I do, thanks will give it a try.
Cheers,
Bernard
-
When you export the PDF from InDesign, choose the option to open in Acrobat. Once in Acrobat, File > Save As, and PNG is one of the choices. This produces a folder with one PNG per page, and they're numbered sequentially. Import the folder into BookSmart, make sure they're sorted by filename, and then use AutoFlow to create the pages in order.
John
-
I use In Design and before that Quark for simple pdf type projects through press work. Use tiff files and there should be no problem. either tell me your specific problems here or email me directly and I will help as much as I can
Andy dangelophoto at overlookcom dot com
-
You might be interested to note that Blurb now accept PDFs directly for book creation.
They are supplying suitable InDesign templates too.
Bizzarely the beta trial of the service only closed on the 21st June, so many testers still won't have received their test books before the full service has been launched.....
Paul
-
But, those who had done so commented that they were happy with them. In any case, this is as much a matter of workflow as it is about book quality.
-
sounds like you got a handle on things...
Instead of PNG, why not drop in TIF files to generate/export pdf?
-
Are people really able to produce books professionlly with this set of tools? Granted, the kind of things I am doing is probably not the most representative workflow, but I would have expected version 6 of InDesign/version 11 of PS to handle well these simple operations.
Cheers,
Bernard
My sharpening eBook was done in InDesign. My comprehensive reviews are done in InDesign.
My relationship with InDesign is tolerate/hate. That's up from barely tolerate / outright despise.
CS4 is a big improvement. If you did not use earlier versions, you have no idea how things like Smart Guides help. A LOT. There is stuff that is still clumsy or difficult. For example, keeping lines of text together to avoid widows/orphans. Or, adding non-breaking space. That's off under a flyout menu on the Character palette. Grrr!
I strongly recommend Deke McClelland's book for Adobe Press on InDesign CS4. It saved me a lot of frustration.
Cheers,
Mitch