Designing print projects on-screen comes with a false sense of precision. It is easy to assume that whatever is designed on-screen will accurately reproduce – without flaws – into a real-world finished product. This is reinforced by the ability to place objects on precise coordinates and align and distribute with similar precision.
Unfortunately, the practical application of the design from computer to real world product comes with a series of tolerances that are not taken into account in the design software.
Such examples are
Variables in the substrate. Paper stocks can stretch, distort and swell based on humidity, storage conditions, temperature and ink density, just to name some variables.
Creep (aka shingling, pushout or thrust). This is covered in an earlier article, but it is the phenomenon of artwork in a book moving towards the foredges of pages due to the gathering of folded sections.
Registration between inks and Embellishments.
Precision of the paper folding.
What your computer says vs what the output device prepares.
Some tolerances are hardly noticeable and imperceptible without magnification, while other tolerances are large in comparison. This article will examine several print phenomenon and the tolerances associated with each phenomenon.
Tolerances in ink registration
This is an example where tolerances are quite tight, and best shown when printing several colours in one pass, such as full colour process offset printing, digital toner or inkjet printing. Take for example the following headline.
At normal magnification, the inks appear to be in perfect registration. However, when zoomed in, it is possible to see that the registration of the inks is slightly off, demonstrating tolerances in microns.
However, it doesn’t take much to make the tolerances worse, such as:
Using a printing method where misregistration is a larger concern, such as flexography or screen printing;
Printing additional colours on a second pass, meaning the sheets have to dry first and add the variable of paper distortion to trying to register the additional inks to the previously printed inks.
Embellishment registration
From here, tolerances begin to get worse. Take for example a full colour plus one spot colour print that has an additional spot UV clear varnish applied over the lettering.
Note that while the inks are in register, the spot UV is off by half a millimetre to the top right. This is because two separate processes were used – a five colour press to print the inks onto the paper; then the spot UV was applied using a screen printed stencil that was made using an imagesetter that was different to the platesetter that produced the images for the plates.
Another example is how a design translates from screen to embellishment. Take this complicated foil, and notice how the fine detail in the foil is lost.
Fold registration
This is where tolerances can be out by several millimetres. A simple exercise that demonstrates this issue is to take a sheet of paper and fold it in half four times, then look at how the pages line up at the heads and feet of the folded pages. The same issue occurs when taking an imposed sheet and folding it into a signature to combine with other gathered signatures for burst binding.
Take the following example that has a running header in InDesign where the sidebars bleed off of the foredge. Note the difference between the highest point vs the lowest point.
What can be done?
Know that printing and binding are not precise and subject to tolerances like any other manufacturing. What is important to know is where the extreme tolerances lie and how to design with them in mind.
Speak to your printer or finisher and ask to see samples of previous work.
There is also page to page registration that needs to be discussed, but this will be covered in a future Colecandoo article.
A feature which is strangely absent from Adobe Illustrator (yet present in Adobe InDesign) is mixed inks. This gives the user the ability to make a new swatch based on percentiles of other swatches that can include spot colors, along with process colors.
InDesign’s mixed ink feature also allows groups of mixed ink colors to be made, based on how much of each ink should be in each swatch, and the increments they should differ by.
For pure spot color work, this can create colors that would otherwise require using blend modes such as multiply or darken to create similar colors. However, from a prepress standpoint, mixed inks have several advantages over applying blend modes to objects to achieve the same effect.
Embellishments
For digital devices that can apply inline varnishes, mixed inks make sense. In the following example, the headline requires a varnish
Usual way of doing this would be to create a second layer with an identical headline, but set to a Varnish spot color on another layer, with either a transparency effect such as darken or multiply applied; or overprint turned on from the attributes menu.
That’s fine if the position of the artwork is final, but if the design is in a state of flux, that requires moving the varnish to be in the same position as the type.
A solution is to use InDesign’s mixed ink to create a new mixed ink swatch. In this case, I’ll call it Varnished Headline, and give it 100% of the black and 100% of the varnish spot
This solution also applies to other common embellishments such as embosses, foils, raised varnishes, etc.
White Masks
When preparing label artwork for clear or metallic substrates, white masks have to be prepared so that the color art can appear correctly above the substrate. Take for example this logo to be printed over a silver background.
Again, by using mixed inks, it is possible to make a white mask that doesn’t require another layer, blend mode, and can move with the artwork. In this example, three colors would be created: the white mask; Red and a white mask; and Black and a white mask – the last two being mixed inks.
The art can then be recolored so that the red now uses the red mixed ink; the black now uses the black mixed ink; and the paper now uses the white mask ink.
Notice that the gold cup does not contain a white mask – that is because the gold color – when printed on a silver stock – will appear more like a gold foil.
Double-Hit Prints
On one or two spot colour jobs that have large areas of solid ink coverage, occasionally the same colour will be applied twice on the press as to hide any mechanical ghosting from the printing process.
In the above example, one plate would be for the solid color, and a second – though stippled plate – would be for the undercolor to hide the mechanical ghosting. This color can be set up using InDesign’s mixed inks.
But this is missing from Illustrator!
Despite the mixed ink feature being available in Adobe InDesign, it is notably absent from Adobe Illustrator. This is frustrating as artwork that usually requires the three solutions above is often prepared as Adobe Illustrator artwork, requiring old-school solution of layers and blend modes.
If you feel that this missing feature deserves to be in Adobe Illustrator, make sure to let the Illustrator Uservoice know!
UPDATE 2021-03-19: A further statement from Cricut’s CEO Ashish Arora was released on March 18, 2021, stating:
So, we’ve made the decision to reverse our previously shared plans. Right now, every member can upload an unlimited number of images and patterns to Design Space for free, and we have no intention to change this policy. This is true whether you’re a current Cricut member or are thinking about joining the Cricut family before or after December 31, 2021.
Ashish Arora (Cricut CEO)
This follows an announcement made in the previous week that uploads to Cricut’s Design Space that exceeded 20 per month would require a Cricut Access subscription. What followed on social media was an angry backlash of its user base, leading to the article that was previously posted below. I will leave the article for posterity, but in the interests of transparency, the article has since been reflected to post the March 18 statement.
There has been a development since the last article concerning Cricut’s decision to limit free uploads to its Design Space to 20 per month before requiring a Cricut Access subscription. In short, the CEO has released a statement that backs away from this decision… for now. Read the Cricut CEO’s statement on their site.
While this can be perceived as a win for Cricut users for the moment, it is worth noting the language of the second-to-last paragraph of the statement, that reads as follows:
We will continue to explore affordable ways for our future users who register machines after December 31, 2021 to allow an unlimited number of personal image and pattern uploads.
Ashish Arora (Cricut CEO)
Note the word “affordable”, and not “free”. Also, why set a date of the end of the year?
Where to from here?
Until this event, the Cricut maker community was arguably at peace and was happily using their Cricut plotting cutters. Since this event, the trust in the company has now been shaken… and the language used by the CEO in their statement does not rule out that they won’t try something like this to new users beyond next year.
The Cricut’s main competitor in this space – Silhouette – has been quick to capitalise on Cricut’s PR disaster releasing their own statement, of which one paragraph sums up their position:
There is no limit to the number of designs you are able to open and use with our software program. Silhouette has no obligation to sign up for any paid service in order to use the Silhouette cutting system or software, including your own files and designs (such as JPG, PNG, BMP, and TTF font files).
Silhouette spokesperson
The event has also spurred the community to looking into alternatives to the Cricut Design Space to interface with the plotter itself. Attempts to do this nearly a decade ago were met with legal action that was ultimately settled. But that will not necessarily stop everyone in the community from attempting to “Jailbreak” their Cricut so that the plotters can be run on other CNC software, whether a competitor or open-source.
Unfortunately, the whole event has tarnished the Cricut brand that makes arguably good hardware and consumables. Members of the Cricut community were vocal on social media, with the Reddit’s Cricut subreddit briefly pinning a note describing what action could be done – everything from cancelling Cricut Access, joining a class action lawsuit, brigading social media platforms such as Cricut’s Instagram and Facebook pages, buying competitor consumables such as vinyls and tools, etc.
I would personally like to interface the Cricut with any other software than the Cricut Design Space as described in the previous article. Releasing an API to the community so that plug-ins could be made for software such as Adobe Illustrator, Corel Draw, Affinity Designer and Inkscape would go a long way to not only restoring faith in the Cricut brand, but make people use their Cricuts more as making designs for it would be in software that users would be familiar with already. If the Cricut Design Space is a good enough application, it should be able to stand on its own two feet without forcing its users to use it because there isn’t another application… and right now it is nowhere near that level.
Ultimately, it’s a win for existing Cricut users that has exposed the thoughts of what the company is prepared to do; and it is also a wake-up call to other software developers that software relies on happy users, and that it doesn’t take much to turn happy users into the Reddit army.
For the last year or so, I’ve been using a Cricut Maker as a cutting plotter to prepare bespoke labels, and in recent months, have been using it to mock up box and carton prototypes.
What is a Cricut?
For those unfamiliar with Cricut, it is a brand that makes several models of cutting plotters aimed not at my industry of printing, but of the maker space community. Along with the cutting plotters, the company also retails consumables associated with the plotters such as various vinyls and substrates; tools such as additional blades or adapters for other functionality such as scoring or perfing; and additional hardware such as a mug press and heat press of sorts.
Originally, I was going to write a piece about the Cricut on what I’ve been doing with it and what uses others may have for it, but a recent development has spurred me to write a different take on the article.
How does it work?
However, unlike a printer that can be printed to from any software, the Cricut Maker is interfaced directly from companion software called the Cricut Design Space.
When the Design Space is opened, it shows the recent projects, tutorials, and then dozens of projects that are available via a one-off payment or via Cricut Access – a subscription service that provides access to thousands of premade projects and fonts.
But if I make a new project, I’m taken to the Cricut Design Space where I can make a project from scratch…
…Well I could if there were any useful tools. The templates button puts a picture in the background that can be traced over but can’t be manipulated; the projects and images buttons take you to assets that can be purchased or accessed via Cricut Access; so the only drawing tools available to me in the software itself are Text and Shapes. These are limited too, with many fonts having to be purchased for use (or again available via Cricut Access) unless they are already on my system.
The shapes tool is also rather limited, not even allowing for a freeform line.
In order to make anything that I’ve prepared in other software such as Adobe Illustrator, I can import it using the Upload button. It can’t accept my PDF or AI file but can take SVG or DXF files.
From here, I can then effectively determine if the import took the graphic in correctly, and if so, I can save the project and proceed to sending it to the Maker to cut the shape as required.
Here is the rub
In an update on March 12, Cricut announced that uploads to the Cricut Design Space will be limited to 20 per calendar month unless you subscribe to Cricut Access for USD$10/month (it’s hidden right down the bottom of the page, but this link will take you there).
What that effectively means is that each graphic file that is uploaded using the Upload button counts as an upload. As implied earlier, the Design Space’s drawing tools are rather lacking and it is unimaginable that anyone making their own unique design would do so using the shape and text tools alone, but would instead create their design in Adobe Illustrator or alternatives such as Affinity Designer, Corel Draw, or Inkscape; and then use the Upload button as an effective import tool.
No workarounds (yet)
Unfortunately, it isn’t possible to simply cut and paste the design from Adobe Illustrator into the Design Space as that would save a lot of issues. Similarly, it isn’t possible to print directly to the Maker as a cutting plotter – the only way to interface it is to use the Design Space.
My thoughts
I purchased my Cricut with an aim to sell my own branded merchandise that I would design myself, as well as gifts for friends and relatives. My recent use of my Cricut for prototyping cartons and boxes is an added benefit.
That said, I didn’t expect to have to pay a subscription service for what I consider to be a cutting plotter that I had – in good faith – purchased outright. For me to create any workable design, there’s no way on earth I could design an entire project using the Design Space’s own tools and therefore must rely on the Upload button to do nothing more than import a design I’ve already to created to a cutting plotter I’ve already bought. It’s the equivalent of buying a car and then the manufacturer saying “you can turn right 20 times a month but if you want to turn right more than that you have to subscribe to our turn-right service”.
I can’t begin to describe how frustrated this makes me feel. It is up there with bad ideas such as the Juicero (a subscription juice service best described by Youtuber Critikal – language warning), or the Fine Bros attempt to trademark the word “React”.
Cricut’s own shot in the foot is also a perfect opportunity for rivals in the space such as the Silhouette Cameo will take advantage of this situation and use it as a unique selling proposition (i.e. we won’t make you pay to use this software).
If the idea of the subscription for uploading art is to fund the servers where the art is stored, perhaps give users the opportunity to save files locally, provide better import options or better overall tools that are available on services such as Chili Publisher or Canva.
Designers in my space are already paying subscriptions such as Adobe Creative Cloud, Office 365, Dropbox and the like… and this is a tool aimed at a home-based maker community that do this as a hobby.
I hope that Cricut realises it has made a terrible mistake and reconsiders its decision; and in the meantime there is a petition on Change.org to let Cricut know the opinions out there.
During an overseas holiday, I was asked by a fellow traveller what I did for a living. Because the term “prepress operator” is esoteric, my response was to say that I make food labelling and other printing. However, I was caught quite off-guard by the traveller’s response, which was “why do you have to make labels so darn hard to read?”.
That moment has stuck with me for some time now, and in this article I’d like to answer that traveller’s question comprehensively in an Australian setting.
In short: Limited real-estate vs too much information
That’s it in a nutshell – labels tend to be small in size, usually because the product that they contain is small in volume. Despite the small size, there’s also a lot of information to include within that size.
Details that have to be displayed by law
As a disclaimer, I am not a lawyer and this is not constituting legal advice on all specifications for a label.
The ingredients and additives by ingoing weight, and in some circumstances the percentage of ingredients. For example, if the label is identified as strawberry jam in the branding, then the percentage of strawberries actually used in the product has to be given.
Allergen information
Directions for use or storage
What the food is (e.g. is it strawberry jam, cookies, kombucha, etc)
The contact address of the manufacturer
The measurement of the weight or volume of the product
Country of Origin label
Some information can be presented on the label but may be presented elsewhere on the container, such as:
Batch or run of the product being produced
Best before or Use-By dates
In addition, the position of where the measurement of the weight or volume of the product can appear on the label is rather rigid and structured.
Country of Origin
From 1 July 2018, food products sold in Australia must display a Country of Origin label. This label has a specific appearance that must be adhered to, along with guidelines of how the label must be phrased.
An example of the Country of Origin label
This is enforceable at law by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) – the Federal Government’s consumer watchdog which can – and does – give hefty fines to corporations and individuals for breaches of the Australian Consumer Law (ACL).
There is an online generator to create such labels, so having to maintain an array of assets for this task isn’t required – simply generate a label as and when they are needed.
Details that may also be required
Barcodes
Note that in the above code, that a barcode isn’t required by law. However, if the product is to be stocked on a large scale through distributors in a logistics chain, then it will usually need a barcode. In Australia this will usually be an EAN-13 barcode but in North America a UPC barcode is more likely.
Barcodes also have limited scaling, and GS1 (a provider of barcodes and related logistic products and services) indicates that a barcode should be placed at no less than 80% of its recommended size.
Specifications from GS1 relating to EAN-13 barcodes at 100% size
In GS1’s more detailed instructions on their website, they also recommend specific locations and orientations for the barcode, so can’t just go anywhere at any size.
These recommendations sound strict, but are done with the best of intentions so that a barcode will scan first time, every time, regardless of where the product was purchased. Remember, it’s a retailer’s aim to get that product from their shelf to your pantry or refrigerator with the least amount of fuss.
The size of the barcode can also be influenced by the retail chain that is selling the product and may recommend not proportionally scaling the barcode at all but leaving it at 100% size. It is best to check with the retail chain’s specifications first.
Container Deposit Scheme
As at the time of writing, all states and territories in Australia (except for Victoria and Tasmania) have some form of container deposit scheme, usually for soft drink containers. These schemes encourage consumers to return the containers to a collection facility in exchange for a refund for each item returned.
Three items commonly seen on flavoured milk cartons (from top clockwise): The Country of Origin label; The Australasian Recycling Label; and The Container Deposit Scheme.
Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) to certify the product or its packaging is from a sustainable source;
Cultural preparation certifications such as Halal or Kosher.
These types of logos won’t use a generic logo, but will usually contain a unique identifier such as a number that can be tied to the particular supplier.
These logos usually have strict stylesheets that have to be adhered to such as size, color, position in relation to other elements etc, and these guidelines have to be taken into consideration when juxtaposing the artwork for the label. The third party (or its auditing agency) usually requests to see the artwork prior to approval for print to ensure that the logo is used appropriately and within its guidelines.
Australasian Recycling Label
This is a private initiative to reduce landfill by informing consumers how the packaging can be disposed of once the product is used. The logos aren’t in the public domain and permission must be sought for use of this artwork.
And of course, our own branding
With all of the other details now on the label as required, it’s time to add the branding and design to the label… if it will fit!
This is just for food!
The details listed in this article are only describing what goes on a food label in Australia and aren’t exhaustive – this article doesn’t even mention regulations that concern pharmaceuticals or industrial products that may contain harmful chemicals.
Don’t even try being creative for cigarettes
While cigarette cartons aren’t labels, it is worth mentioning this as it is currently unique to Australia. Since 1 December 2012, any tobacco product (including labels on loose tobacco such as roll your own cigarettes) in Australia must follow the plain packaging guide, which – on a regular pack of 25 cigarettes – features such marketing gems as:
The brand and variant must be in Lucida Sans font in PANTONE Cool Gray 2C;
The pack surface must be in PANTONE 448C (a greenish-brown color);
A warning statement and graphic that covers at least 75% of the front surface without spaces separating the statement or graphic; and 90% of the back surface.
The limited amount of branding that can be applied to cigarette packaging due to Australia’s Plain Packaging Guide.
And this is just for Australia!
This article has focused on Australian food labels as they are the ones I am most familiar with and see on a daily basis at work. However, after spending time living in Canada, I recall seeing products that were sold nationwide (with exceptions of course) having to be in both English and French – good luck with getting all that information to fit now!
Can’t the label be bigger?
That can certainly provide more real-estate for the information to be displayed, but the size is often determined by:
Price of label production. Larger labels usually cost more than smaller labels that have otherwise identical print specifications such as stock, inks and embellishments.
Size of the package itself. An A4 page simply won’t fit on a cylinder that holds 100ml of a product;
How the labels are applied. For example, if machine applied, there may be specifications that a larger label can’t fulfill that a smaller label can fulfill.
Marketing. It may be more desirable for a consumer to see more of the product in the glass jar as opposed to a label that would obscure the contents.
Your thoughts
I hope this article has explained why labels can be hard to read – put simply it is to cram all of the required information into a tiny space. I’ve tried to cover as much as I could without trying to encompass all labelling, but no doubt there are items that I’ve missed or aren’t applicable in your part of the world. Leave a comment below on anything I’ve missed or if there is anything specific to labels in your country.
A pain-point I see regularly concerns inconsistencies in color names, particularly spot colors that are used for embellishments. Take for example a color that is used for representing a forme-shape. For consistency sake, the office has implemented a CC library with standard swatches for regularly used embellishments such as Dieline, Perforation and Spot UV. The concept is that anyone who requires an embellishment can simply open the CC library and choose one from the embellishment colors that have been established.
Despite creating this CC library, embellishment colors and names can still be inconsistent for reasons such as:
The artwork was legacy artwork prior to introducing the CC library;
Operator error; or
Art was supplied by a third party, such as a client or supplier.
Naming consistency is important with workflows that have been established with these embellishment colors. Take the color “Dieline” for example. This should be clearly visible on the native files, but not on the printed output. In this instance when printing to digital devices, the RIP will identify the color “Dieline” and assign it a white color value that will treat it as if it were transparent and not print at all, though it will appear in the PDF. This eliminates the need to toggle a dieline layer on and off in the application that made the artwork, and eliminates any errors associated with art being mapped to incorrect layers.
However, if the artwork contained a color named as “Dieforme” for example, the RIP would not identify the color as “Dieline” and the formeshape would be visible on the final print. This issue could be resolved by adding the color “Dieforme” manually to on the RIP, but the concept is to have every file the same so that operators aren’t interrupted having to make adjustments on the RIP for specific tasks.
A solution via Acrobat
My preferred solution is to use a custom fixup from Adobe Acrobat’s Preflight dialog. In this example, I’ve created a PDF that contains ten variations of Dieline spot color using different names, but the color value is identical. Here is what the separation preview looks like:
Acrobat does have pre-made fixups for similar tasks, such as Make custom spot color names consistent.
Let’s give that a go.
The fix has reduced the number of spot colors but only down to five. Names that had different casing have been merged together, and spaces or dashes have been removed and then merged together with the results.
Let’s revert that and try an alternative fixup Merge spot color name if appearance is identical.
OK, that has remapped all of these spots to one spot color.
However, this color is the wrong name. It is also unlikely that the forme-shape colors would ever be set with different names yet have the same underlying CMYK color conversion. The following would be more likely:
Let’s run the Merge spot color name if appearance is identical fixup again.
Some names have been culled but there similar names such as die and Die have not been mapped together, so this solution hasn’t worked.
Make a custom fixup in the Preflight panel
Luckily we can make our own solution from the Preflight panel by clicking on the options button at the top right of the panel and selecting Create Fixup…
In the new window, the fix will be given the name Diecut Fix. Choose Color spaces, spot colors, inks from the Fixup category in the top centre dialog; and select Map spot and process colors in the Type of fixup dialog on the top right hand side.
In the options at the bottom of that dialog box, make sure the Source color name matches with RegEx and in the field to the right, type the GREP ^die.*?$ – this will look for any word that begins with die. The destination should Map or rename, and the destination color name will be Dieline, with a CMYK value of 100% magenta, overprint on, and applied to Spot color is used. The checkbox should be checked on for ignore upper/lower case. Once OK’d from the bottom right hand corner, the fixup can then be activated using the Fix button on the bottom right of the Prepress dialog.
The fixup has worked – all of the colours have been mapped to the one color with the correct name and color value. An added bonus is that the color is set to overprint so that the color beneath won’t knock out.
Other applications
In this instance, the fixup has been used to fix a one-off issue concerning an incorrectly named spot color. But this fixup can be added to a larger workflow so that artwork from external sources can be cleansed for a workflow. See this article for more information (https://colecandoo.com/2019/02/24/droplet-like-its-hot/)
This particular fixup is also used to fix artwork that – while being set in the right color and name – did not have an overprint applied to the color. This fixup will correct this issue.
UPDATE 2014-07-22: Since the release of Adobe InDesign CC 2014, variable QR codes via Data Merge is now possible. A post will be written about this feature once it has been thoroughly tested, but in the meantime this article has been edited to reflect the update.
Since the invention of QR codes, a burning question has been “how to incorporate these barcodes into a Data Merge?” There are lots of ways to generate one-off QR codes such as:
QR code generating websites;
An InDesign Javascript written by Jongware that is suitable for CS4-6;
Built into InDesign CC and above; and
Third party plug-ins that offer one-off creation as a “taster”.
But what if there are 30, 300, 3,000 or 30,000+ codes that need to be made as a direct mail campaign? Creating 30,000 QR codes is not a task that anyone would want to do individually.
So can Adobe InDesign, fresh from the shelf, create a Data Merge with variable QR codes? Apart from the latest release of Adobe InDesign CC 2014, no – not without the use of a third party plug-in. However, this workaround does the next best thing: Creates lots of QR codes all at once, export them as uniquely named PDFs for reference in a Data Merge, and then use the built-in Data Merge feature from InDesign.
The following example is a business card for fictional clothing manufacturer “Mean Jeans”. The client would like QRcodes that feature the staff member’s email address, and if no email address appears then no QR code needs to appear. The client has supplied the database in Microsoft Excel.
There is a way to automate this task thanks to three scripts
QRcode.jsxbin by Jongware (as previously mentioned). When this script is used on its own, a user interface appears asking the user for the text to be coded and then a level of error correction. Jongware did allow other scripts to call upon the QRcode script, and that leads into the next script;
A slight modification of a script supplied by an Adobe Forums user by the handle of sergemca. The original script (found in the same Adobe Forum link as Jongware’s QRcode.jsxbin) by sergemca searched an open InDesign document for any textboxes that contained the starting words MECARD: and would then convert the contents of the complete textbox into a QR code and then apply formatting such as scaling and rotation. As this example is creating QRcodes from email addresses, the modification in this example searches an open InDesign document for any textboxes that contain the starting word mailto: . Modifications to this script are best dealt with by the scripting forum of the Adobe InDesign forum.
PDFStyleExporter.jsxbin by Loic Aigon. This script has featured on Colecandoo before and it is used to split a large InDesign file into single page PDFs with unique names. While researching this story I have noticed that Loic will update this script in due course, so stay tuned.
To create variable QR codes:
Open the Excel file and create two fields in the database in addition to the other fields that need to appear: order, and ‘@QRcode (the ‘ will disappear in Excel after it is typed, this is intentional). In the order column, use the autofill function of Excel to add sequential numbers to this column. Leave the contents of the @QRcode field for now.
Save the Excel file but also save it as a “Windows Formatted Text .txt” file, and give it a name that reflects that this database is purely for the QRcoding only e.g. forcodingonly.txt
In Adobe InDesign, create a new file that will be used to create the QR codes first. In this example, a file that is business card size has been created (90x55mm). Once open, go to the Data Merge panel and select the data source as the recently created txt file. Once the data is available in the Data Merge panel, create two text boxes. One with the word mailto: followed by the <email> field, and another text box with the <order> field. The document should look like this
The order text will provide the filename in a later script, but it also must appear in the file but not get in the way of the QRcode graphic that will appear later. To make sure that this text will be live but not output in the resulting QRcode, select the textbox containing the <order> field, give the text a paragraph style called “order” – the only change is that it has no fill and stroke. Also, align the text box to be in the centre of the page. The document should now look like this
From the Data Merge panel, select “Create Merged Document” and merge to a new single page document.
This will create a large document that will contain one mailto: address per page. It is important at this stage that any mailto: addresses that don’t have email addresses in the text boxes be deleted (or else the QRcode script will make QRcodes that contain the word “mailto:” only and clearly won’t work). To delete these addresses open the Find/Change dialog box and in the GREP panel type in the word mailto:$ , leave the change field blank (as well as the formatting fields) and click Change All.
The document is ready to have the QR codes applied. To do this, the altered version of sergemca’s script needs to be run.
var _d = app.documents[0];
var _allStories = _d.stories;
for(var nx=_allStories.length-1;nx>=0;nx--){
var _storyAllTextFrames = _allStories[nx].textContainers;
for(var mx=_storyAllTextFrames.length-1;mx>=0;mx--){
_storyAllTextFrames[mx].select(); // change page
if(_storyAllTextFrames[mx].contents.indexOf('mailto:')==0){
var obj = app.doScript(new File(app.activeScript.path+'/qrcode.jsxbin'), ScriptLanguage.JAVASCRIPT, [_storyAllTextFrames[mx].contents, 3], UndoModes.ENTIRE_SCRIPT);
_storyAllTextFrames[mx].contents = "";
};
};
};
If done successfully, the InDesign file should now contain QRcodes in place of the text that contained the email addresses.
To export these QRcodes with their unique names
Run the script PDFStyleExporter.jsxbin (called PDFExportCropper.jsxbin on my machine)
In the user interface that appears, select the paragraph style “order” and leave the rest of the dialog box as it is. In the PDF options dropdown field, select the destination to save the resulting PDFs. Once done, click the Export button.
Again, if done successfully, the resulting PDF QR codes should now save to the nominated directory.
There are other ways to export single page PDFs but Loic’s script is used in the example in case a reference other than a sequential number is to be used, such as a person’s name, phone number, etc.
To incorporate these QR codes into the data merge:
Return to the Excel file and in the @QRcode field, use the CONCATENATE function to take the order number and apply the .pdf suffix to it. The formula to use is: =CONCATENATE(A2,”.pdf”)
Save the Excel file and again, also save it as a “Windows Formatted Text .txt” file, and give it a name that reflects that this database has been qrcoded QRcoding only e.g. qrcoded.txt
In Adobe InDesign, create (or open) the card that needs the QRcodes applied. Once ready for the data, go to the Data Merge panel and select the data source as the newly created txt file. Place the name, address references etc as necessary, and create a frame for the QR codes to appear.
Apply the qrcode field to this frame and go to the Data Merge panel and select Content Placement Options. In the dropdown field “Image Placement” select the fitting “Fill frames proportionally”.
Instead of using the “preview” function, go to the Data Merge panel and select the Export to PDF function and export one record only. In the example, page 7 was chosen at random.
Once satisfied that the merge looks like it will work, again use the Export to PDF function to export the entire merge to a PDF.
For the barcodes to fit the image, the PDFs need to import PDFs based on the bounding box. If the images are not fitting the frame properly, an additional script originally by Dave Saunders (but improved upon by Marc Autret) will allow the import option to change. The script is available from this forum and once loaded and run into InDesign, the option to select is “Content All Layers”
So there it is. It is worth noting that this is a workaround and not a direct live Data Merge solution. There are limitations to this solution:
Resulting codes can’t be colorised on-the-fly;
If the database changes, this will mean repeating the entire process, rather than simply updating the data in the data merge file once, and removing all QRcodes created previously.
Because the codes are not human readable without a decoder, there is added emphasis to check, recheck and check again to make sure the merge is behaving properly.
While this is a workaround, there is no doubt that a turnkey solution is preferable. There are enough third party providers making variable barcode solutions for Adobe InDesign. The full list is available here. From memory here is a list of third party providers that provide variable QR codes as part of a complete VDP package:
Rorohiko’s Tada QR;
XMPie’s uDirect;
Meadows Publishing Software
Cacidi LiveMerge;
Teacup Software’s BarcodeMaker;
DirectSmile;
Objectif Lune’s Printshop Mail;
Several edits since this was first published:
Added a list of third party providers who provide variable QR codes and moved a reference to an individual one earlier on in the article into that list;
Fixed type within field chevrons that did not appear when the article was published;
Acknowledged that variable QR codes via Data Merge are now possible in Adobe InDesign CC 2014
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