Can you automate RGB>CMYK conversions and resolution corrections?

[JohnCitizen]

When preflighting, I've always thought it would be SUPER handy to have an action (or similar) that simply runs through your document, changing all RGB images to CMYK, resolution to 300dpi if needed, and resaved as a copy in TIF format, then relinked to the new 300dpi CMYK TIF file.

I know you can use actions to change color mode, resolution and file format in Photoshop - but all images have to reside in the same folder - something that may not always be true for links in an InDesign document.

Can this process be intelligently automated via InDesign?

(I guess one work around could be to perform a collect on all linked images, and then run a Pshop action on the resulting folder, and then re-link the images from your document to the new folder - but that is not really 100% automated)

 

[spamjim]

What you seek is called "File menu->Export->PDF".

Using a PDF profile like PDF/X-1a will reduce images to 300 ppi and CMYK.

 

[JohnCitizen]

Thats great - but what if one chooses to output a packaged InDesign file with fonts and links?

 

[spamjim]

Why would one do that? That's redundant and wasteful. Is your printer your designer?