PDF spreads from InDesign: radio button vs dropdown

May 18, 2021 Leave a comment

When proofing PDFs of books to clients, it is often important that the client sees the proof as a series of left and right page spreads. PDFs made with any of InDesign’s default settings (these are the options in the Export Adobe PDF dialog box in the top dropdown field in square brackets) will show the PDF in Adobe Acrobat as it’s default view – single pages.

Adobe Acrobat does allow for pages to be presented in two-page appearance, but this is controlled by the user. If the user is unaware of this feature, then they will be viewing the PDF using Acrobat’s default single page view.

It is possible to change the view settings of a specific PDF while in Adobe Acrobat and this is done from the Properties option from the File menu.

The page viewing defaults of Acrobat itself can also be changed, but this will view any PDF that has not had its preferences changed when the PDF was made.

It is worth noting though that prior to 2015, the widely accepted method to prepare a PDF as readers spreads was to do this from InDesign’s Spreads radio button in the Export Adobe PDF dialog box.

While this does prepare what appears to be readers spreads, it does so with some disadvantages:

  • The centre spread line cannot be seen. This can be addressed by using the page border script from Indiscripts that applies a page border to all pages. Run this script prior to exporting the PDF to generate the page border and then export the PDF, then rerun the script to turn the border off.
  • The page count is incorrect. The folios will still appear to be correct within the PDF, but the page navigation itself will show the page count as half the number of original pages plus one (e.g. a 16pp file saved as spreads will now show up as 9pp in the PDF’s navigation).

However, from June 2015 it has been possible to set the default view options when exporting a PDF from InDesign for viewing in Adobe Acrobat.

This allows PDFs to contain the correct page count and to also show the page split between the spreads while still showing the pages as spreads.

Should be problem solved, right?

Unfortunately, no. Despite the dropdown now being available, there’s no ideal way to prepare readers spreads to suit all PDF readers or platforms.

  • Unless InDesign users read all of InDesign’s patch notes (maintained by James Wamser) or were otherwise made aware of this change, then normal habits would persist, and users would continue to prepare spreads using the spreads radio button.
  • If the dropdowns had been used, this only makes viewing the spreads possible in Adobe Acrobat (Reader or Pro), but unfortunately this software is no longer the preferred option for viewing PDFs. Besides Mozilla Firefox and Adobe Acrobat, most PDF readers only support single page view.
  • Even if Acrobat or Firefox are being used, users can still override the view either manually, or using Acrobat it can be done by default using accessibility in the preferences

So what can be done?

There are effectively four options:

First option is to prepare PDFs based on an audience using Acrobat only as their reader and use the dropdown option for spreads. If the PDF is exported from InDesign using a PDF/X standard, Acrobat will also show the PDF as it appears in InDesign’s overprint preview.

Second option is to prepare a PDF using the pre-2015 method of using the spreads button and the Indiscripts page border script.

Third option is to lobby the manufacturers of the non-Adobe PDF reader software to bring their software into line with the PDF specifications set out by Adobe itself (and while they are doing that, also update their readers to also accept form fields and commenting functions!).

Last option is to do nothing and leave the pages as single spreads… and that isn’t necessarily a bad option. If the PDF is being created for onscreen viewing only, and the viewer must see something that is intentionally spread over two pages such as an image that crosses over two pages, then single pages should be fine.

Last word

It is of note that people are not just consuming information on a single desktop monitor, but may have two or more monitors in which software windows are being juggled around; or on a mobile device that is more natural to be held in a portrait fashion. Social media apps such as TikTok and Instagram are designed for mobile devices to be held in a portrait orientation. It’s hard for me to admit, but left and right hand pages are just a legacy of printed books as their assembly creates this phenomenon. Unless there is a crossover between the two pages, a reader will usually read the content on one page, adjust their gaze and read another – their focus of vision can’t be on both pages at the same time.

Also, if the PDF is intended for print by a printing company, don’t provide them a PDF as readers spreads as they won’t be able to impose the pages for printing without breaking the PDF back into single pages.

Filed under Communication, Page Layout, PDFs, Proofing Tagged with , , , , , , , , , ,

Inklude (sic) Mixed Inks into Illustrator

April 26, 2021 Leave a comment

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!

https://illustrator.uservoice.com/forums/333657-illustrator-desktop-feature-requests/suggestions/31966252-mixed-ink-swatch-like-indesign

Filed under Embellishments, Handover, Housekeeping, PDFs, Post-Press, Proofing Tagged with , , , , , , ,

Export many PDFs at once… plus security

March 8, 2021 Leave a comment

A recent question on Reddit’s InDesign subreddit was whether two PDFs could be exported at the same time from the same document, but have two different properties – one with trims and one without. The answer is yes, but via a custom script written for the task.

I use such a script on a daily basis so that I can prepare a PDF for client proofing via email; and a separate PDF that has trim and crops that is sent directly to a hot-folder that prints it for me.

I’d submitted my script as a solution (that can be downloaded from the scripts page), but then realised that this concept was not a new idea. Ariel Walden over at ID-Extras had already written a similar script within a blog post of his own.

Similarly, Peter Kahrel’s Batch Convert script can perform the same task, with the added advantage that it can also do this for all open InDesign documents;

Or if no documents are open, a specified folder (and subfolders if desired) of InDesign files.

Can’t make these secure

One feature that all three scripts have in common is that the exports are based on the PDF presets available on the user’s machine. One feature that can’t be added to a PDF preset is security – this can only be done when a request to export the document is made, as security settings aren’t saved into PDF presets.

This is a problem if there are lots of documents that need to be exported with security settings as it requires the user to enter the security details each time a PDF is exported.

I’ve made an additional script

For this purpose, I thought I would make a script that not only makes several PDFs, but can also add password security to one version. The script can be downloaded from the scripts page.

When the script is run, it will generate two PDFs using different PDF export settings, but one will have the suffix “_secure” added to the filename, and a dialog box will appear once the export is finished:

Adjustability

The script can also be adjusted by opening the script in any text editing application and making the necessary changes, such as.

Use the same password for every document

Look for the line

    openDocumentPassword = myPassOpen; // requires a password to open the document

and change the myPassOpen to the desired password in quotations. For example:

    openDocumentPassword = "OpenSesame"; // requires a password to open the document

Similarly, do the same thing for the line underneath, making sure that the open password and edit password are not the same.

    changeSecurityPassword = myPassWrite; // requires a password to change the document

change to

    changeSecurityPassword = "EditSesame"; // requires a password to change the document

then search for the lines

dialog.show();
//alert("Done");

and swap the forward slashes in the lines around so that the lines now read like this.

//dialog.show();
alert("Done");

Only require a password to edit the document

Look for the following line:

    openDocumentPassword = myPassOpen; // requires a password to open the document

and add two forward slashes to the start of the line.

//    openDocumentPassword = myPassOpen; // requires a password to open the document

Adding two forward slashes to a line in a javascript tells the script to ignore the rest of the line and go to the next line of code.

Don’t show the “done” message

The default script has a dialog at the end for showing what the opening and editing passwords are, but if you want to edit the script so it makes a PDF that applies security to edit the document but does not provide the password (e.g. for the purpose of handing PDFs over to parties who may seek to deconstruct them in other applications) then make the adjustment mentioned a moment ago to restrict passwording to editing only, and then search for the lines

dialog.show();
//alert("Done");

and swap the forward slashes in the lines around so that the lines now read like this.

//dialog.show();
alert("Done");

Add more PDF exports

Look for the line

app.activeDocument.exportFile(ExportFormat.pdfType, File(resultsFolder + "/" + app.activeDocument.name.split(".indd")[0] + ".pdf"), false, "[High Quality Print]");

make a copy of the line and make the appropriate changes:

  • Replace the “[High Quality Print]” to the desired PDF preset exactly as it is written in the PDF export dialog box and put it in quotes. For example, if your PDF preset is called My Export then type “My Export”
  • Replace the “.pdf” with a suffix that denotes that this is an additional PDF. For example, if the pdf is a high res print, perhaps replace this with “_hi-res.pdf” so that the resulting file has _hi-res.pdf at the end of its filename.

Otherwise if you are after specific changes to the script to suit your needs, contact me via the contact page.

Things to know about the script

Opening and editing passwords must be different

One condition of preparing a secure PDF from Adobe InDesign is that the password required to open the PDF must be different to the password to edit the PDF, so if editing the script to replace the randomly generated password to a known one, the opening and editing passwords must be different. If the passwords are the same, the PDF will be made without security.

PDF Standard in the preset must be set to “None”

PDFs that use a PDFX standards can’t have security applied to them as the security panel of the PDF export box is greyed out, preventing security to be applied. The standards dropdown box in the desired PDF preset must be set to None.

Only password security is applied

When exporting a PDF from InDesign, only password security can be applied, unlike Adobe Acrobat’s choices of security that it can offer (as shown below).

While password security may deter or prevent a layperson from editing the PDF, the security can be broken through some effort. Several websites offer services where users can drag and drop a PDF to the site, and within moments the PDF will have the PDF password removed.

Similarly, there are desktop applications that can also be purchased to remove the security (as one of their many features), such as PDFsam Visual.

Filed under Communication, Handover, PDFs, Proofing, Scripts Tagged with , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Outlining the problem… text outlining

February 15, 2021 Leave a comment

From time to time, I will prepare PDF artwork for third party providers and then note that their specifications indicate “Convert all text to outlines” (also known as converting to curves or paths). But why do some third parties recommend this practice?

The PDF is opened in software other than Acrobat

For commercial printers, PDFs are usually imported into Raster Image Processing (RIP) software that will impose and trap the artwork for their printing methods. However, not all providers work this way and may need to open the PDF in applications other than Adobe Acrobat. For example, a third party that prepares cutting formes may open the file in Corel Draw or a CAD application that supports its CNC software.

This means that as the file opens, the application may ask for fonts not available to the third party.

This can be exacerbated if the PDF is opened not only in a different application than Adobe Acrobat, but also a different alphabet and writing system. Converting the type to outlines maintains the appearance of the type without requiring the font to be present.

Other reasons that text is converted to outlines

So special effects can be applied

InDesign, Illustrator and Photoshop can apply interesting special effects to vector objects, but not all of those effects can be applied to live type. The solution is to convert the type to outlines, thus converting the type to vector shapes that can have the desired effect applied.

To prevent editing by third parties

Limited editing is possible within PDFs using either Acrobat’s own editing tools or using plugins such as Enfocus Pitstop Professional. These tools can allow last minute alterations to text so long as the text is type and not converted to outlines.

Locking the PDF with password protection isn’t an option as this can prevent the file from being placed into layout software or RIP software for output, so the password is then required to unlock the file. PDF password protection is also somewhat breakable, with many websites offering services where PDFs can be uploaded, and then unlocked and then downloaded without the password protection. There are also PDF editing and viewing applications such as PDF Sam that allow for decryption of PDFs.

Even without the Enfocus Pitstop plug-in, it is possible to open PDFs in Adobe Illustrator or Affinity Publisher and then – if the fonts are available – make the necessary alterations… though converting type to outlines will prevent this.

To circumvent the font EULA

A client may have acquired a font that has allowed for screen use only and prohibits embedding in a PDF, preventing the font from appearing correctly in the PDF. A way around this is to convert the type to outlines in the native application prior to PDF export, though it is worth noting that the End User Licence Agreement (EULA) of the font may forbid this workaround, so it is worth reading the font EULA.

That doesn’t mean it should be done!

There are issues that arise from converting type to outlines. Dov Isaacs – Principal Scientist for Adobe Systems – has a brilliant PDF that details this (and much more) but the basic takeaways concerning type to outlines are:

  • Increased filesize that takes forever to download or view onscreen
  • Smaller typefaces do not render as well
  • May potentially breach the font’s EULA

In addition, there are other issues such as:

  • Potential issues with fonts where type overlaps itself (it can knock out holes in the joins)
  • If the conversion from type to outlines has been done in the native application and then accidentally saved and closed, this means the type will no longer be live in the native application.
  • It can prevent or hinder minor type alterations being made in a PDF submitted for print.
  • Text (as outlines) that has special effects applied (as described earlier) may not always be able to have the same effect applied to live type. This can create issues with variable data campaigns where the effect needs to be applied to a text variable.
  • It can make it difficult to identify the font used, as the font’s information is no longer in the PDF and the only other way to identify the font is visually or with apps such as what the font, adobe capture, or identifont.
  • The conversion is usually a one-way conversion. There is a fantastic Adobe Illustrator plug-in from Astute Graphics called Vector First Aid 2 that – in some circumstances – can convert outlines back to type, but it isn’t a magic bullet (though definitely worth a look).

If your hand is forced…

In a perfect world, I’d only deal with providers that fully supported PDF/X-4 files. Unfortunately, not all providers do, and occasionally our hands will be forced into providing PDFs specifically as the provider has requested, which may mean converting text to outlines. Rather than doing this in the native application (e.g. InDesign or Illustrator) there is a great way to quickly convert all type to outlines using an Adobe Acrobat Preflight that is detailed over at CreativePro.

Filed under Handover, PDFs Tagged with , , , , , , , , , , , ,

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