Looks good on Screen; Looks Good in .PDF; Print Margins Terrible?

[xxxTerpxxx]

I am quite new to InDesign; my time working with it is still being measured in days.

I used one of the brochure templates and modified the contents to create a cover page for one of my reports. It looks perfect on the screen and the exported .pdf version also looks fine.

When I go to print, however, the margins are not equally, with the right margin being wider than the rest, and it doesn't appear to be centered...would like the 1/8" or whatever it is set to be maintained, much like it looks on the screen.

I thought that it's perhaps a function of the paper source size, originally set to a4, I think. I am trying to print a standard 8.5x11 sheet.

I went into the document settings and selected letter (also tried a custom setting entering 8.5i and 11.5i), ensured letter was selected in the print setting for both the document and the printer. This expanded the top and bottom margins off the screen in InDesign, but it printed okay...little closer to the edge that I would like, but the left and right margins are still screwed up.

In short, is there an easy way to set each document to print on 8.5x11 and have it adjust the document on the screen to look exactly as it will be printed, if that makes sense?

I sure am wasting some serious ink and glossy paper trying to get this thing to print right.

Lastly, are there and respected site with some free templates and objects that one could use? My drop shadow boxes I tried to create to have a quote stand out or a "Quick Facts" column in the margins look terrible, given that I am graphically challenged.

I welcome any and all advice.

Thanks, guys.

PS...while the learning curve is steep, I really like this program and will do my best to get up to speed quickly, as this is one powerful joker!

 

[jimoblak]

One common printing issue with Acrobat or Reader is that it may default to scale your designed page to fit the printed page. Check the print dialog options and make sure page scaling is not enabled.

 

[apepp]

...ensure you have page position in the print setup dialog to 'centre' this is in the setup options of the print dialog...

...if this prints off centre then it is your desktop printer that is the problem, most desktop printers just don't provide accurate millimetre perfect prints, if it's an old printer a bit of a service to it can help. To see how accurate your printer might be you can set up a document smaller than the sheet you are printing to, enable crop marks to print, then with an accurate ruler measure it to see how near it is to your indesign document...

...also bear in mind that unless your printer supports borderless printing you won't be able to print anything very near to the edge of the sheet...

...Indesign CS2 has templates available as part of the basic installation:

http://indesignsecrets.com/free-indesign-templates.php

Andrew

 

[eugenetyson]

More than likely your printer. Open a blank document and place a box that covers the entire page and fill it with colour and print it out. If it doesn't go to the edge of the page then it's your printer.

InDesign is pretty much a wysiwyg in terms of design.

 

[xxxTerpxxx]

Thanks, everyone! I did, in fact, have scaling on and had other issues.

I looked at the .pdf preview and is showed a paper size of 8.5 x 11, but the "document size" was 8.3 x 11.7; therefore, I want back into InDesign, changed the document to letter, then adjusted all the boxes to fit within the margins as it looked when set to a4....looks perfect in the pdf now and the size and the document source are in agreement, so I think I might be good-to-go.

On a different note, what exactly are the red and blue lines? I'll watch some more of the tutorials on the Adober site, as I had a blue line up top that was off the page when I pulled the graphic box down to stay within the margins. I first tried to pull the blue bar down onto the document area, which worked, but it did not pull the box that extended off the page with it, if that makes sense.

Also, thanks for the link to the secrets page...some great information there to help me get started!

I am using of the stock brochure pages, but thought perhaps there were more sites people use as resources...not never creative, so like to see what others are doing to style their brochures...but I am making due with the stock templates.

Okay, one more. I am assuming I can't apply rounded corners and the like to tables? I can get it to work for other text boxes with borders, but when I try to apply one to a table (that I have learned is also considered a text box), it applys the look around the table but not to the table border itself...sort of strange.

Thanks again, guys...great help!

 

[eugenetyson]

No you can't round corners of a table.

You can select the table. Cut it. Fit the box to the table and then apply rounded corners to it.

When you have this done, cut it again. Place your cursor inside the text original text box. Paste it in. Now it's an inline frame.

You can pull this down to line up. Text Wrap to make the text go below it.

Then if you want to cutomise the anchored object right click on it when highlighted and go to Anchored Objects menu and edit it.

This is a little tricky with anchored objects. There should be some material online about it.

I know it sounds like a lot of steps, but it's quicker than you think.

Once you have the box right for you table, save it as an object style. That's just for the rounded frame and not the actual table.