? re: creating PDFs from InDesign! PLEASE HELP!!! 1

[jschultz]

Hi! I am new to the board and somewhat new to Adobe InDesign. My company just landed a HUGE InDesign (in v2.0) project and we are still overcoming the learning curve here and there. One issue that we are having has to do with creating PDFs from InDesign.

Let me explain our "typical" (i.e., Quark XPress) workflow for creating PDFs. Normally, we print postscripts from Quark XPress (on Mac OS 9) using a Color Central queue on a Windows 2000 Server. The postscripts are then distilled into PDFs on that same Windows 2000 Server using Acrobat Distiller 5.0. The PDFs are then post-processed in PitStop Server on another Windows 2000 Server. This process has been both seamless and flawless for our needs.

Now, with Adobe InDesign, I am having a couple of problems. First, if I try and create a PDF using the process listed above, InDesign quits whenever it hits a page that has a placed PDF on it. Otherwise, the pages without placed PDFs will postscript and distill correctly.

If I create a PDF using InDesign's native PDF Export, I am able to create PDFs of every page (even the ones with placed PDFs), but the problem that I am having there is that when I output proofs to my Xerox DocuColor 12 with Fiery RIP, a "discolored" box appears wherever there is a drop shadow and/or transparency. Additionally, when I try and proof these same PDFs on my Epson 7000 color proofer, it crashes the RIP (Windows NT). The odd thing is that I also have a Xerox DocuColor 12 with Splash G640 RIP and it prints out fine and when I view the PDF on screen in Adobe Acrobat 5.0, the "discoloration" is not there. Is this an issue with having RIPs (Fiery and Epson) that do not support transparency as opposed to one that does (Splash)? I would much prefer to be making my PDFs straight through InDesign, but I need to overcome this drop shadow / transparency issue

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

 

[jimoblak]

First problem: What type of PDFs are being placed in InDesign? Could they be on a level beyond what your RIP and PitStop server can handle? Can you dumb them down?

Transparency is the cool new feature of InDesign and, at the same time, the hassle of RIPs that are not up to the challenge yet. There are two things you can do...

1) Check for compatibility of your RIP with your vendor. They may have updated software available for download. Even though you are correctly using Acrobat 5 (which is the first Acrobat that supports transparency), your RIPs may not.

2) Make sure that you have designed your transparencies correctly in InDesign. You cannot mix color models in InDesign transparency effects. For example, you cannot place an RGB PSD file over a CMYK TIFF and apply a drop shadow. You can neither place a spot color over a CMYK background and create a drop shadow.

Consider printing one separation to your final plate/film to see if the discolored transparency effect regions appear. There is no point in wrestling with your proofing systems if your final output cannot handle InDesign's transparencies.

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