We’ve named the final pair of randomly selected
winners in our now-closed promotional contest to give away to
members of our global community free copies of the book ‘HREF=’http://www.gain.net/store/item.cfm?productid=920′
TARGET=’_NEW’>PDF Print Production Guide, Second
Edition,’ by Joseph Marin and Julie Shaffer of GATF. HREF=’http://www.planetpdf.com/creative/article.asp?ContentID=6829’>Enter
soon to qualify!

ALSO: Browse the HREF=’http://www.planetpdf.com/creative/article.asp?ContentID=6830’>Table
of Contents for the updated version. You can also
download a free excerpt from Chapter 6 — ‘HREF=’http://www.gain.net/store/images/PDF-Guide164-165.pdf’
TARGET=’_NEW’>In the Trenches‘ [PDF: 949kb], featuring an
illustrated tip on how to change the colors within a
duotone.

QUALIFYING QUESTION:

src=’http://www.planetpdf.com/images/printprodguide2_cvr.jpg’ width=’140′
height=’162′ align=’right’ border=’1′ alt=’PDF Print
Production Guide’>Briefly (1-2 paragraphs at most) describe
either your current or intended use of PDF in
printing/prepress, noting the key benefit(s) of PDF for your
particular project or situation.

Final List of Winners:

• Denise Rudnay
  Prepress
  WS
  Packaging Group, Inc.

  A: ‘Our prepress department is desiring to implement
  automated workflows via JDF files and PDF workflow systems. I
  like the various page size and other pre-press specific
  features of putting a PDF into our workflow rather than a
  postscript file.’

• Gordon Reed
  
  Pre-press Manager

  Island Publishers – Goldstream Press

  A: ‘We have just installed a new imagesetter and
  imposition software, Dynastrip, which imposes PDF pages in a
  specified template and then creates a new PDF file for the
  RIP. Our page layout program is InDesign CS and we are
  struggling with whether to make our PDF files directly from
  InDesign (exporting as PDF) or printing as PS files and
  handling them through a watched folder. The trouble we are
  having is that it appears (but not confirmed yet — more
  testing required) that exporting from InDesign causes some of
  the fonts to jumble/mix up — transposing or deleting
  characters. It’s never the whole job, just certain areas, but
  it’s always repeatable. Solution — If I re-postscript the
  files in Acrobat and then distill them the problem
  disappears. So I am looking at getting the Print Production
  Guide 2 as it looks like some valuable info is there that we
  could benefit from. I don’t necessarily think that resolving
  our specific problem will be dealt with in the book, but one
  can hope. I am currently working with Adobe to see if they
  can offer any explanation — no results yet.’

• Gary Little
  
  Senior Prepress Operator

  The Lowe-Martin Group

  A: ‘We are a large printing company in Ottawa, Canada. We
  use PDFs for many uses ranging from sending proofs of jobs to
  utilizing customer-created PDFs for printing.

  One of our customers, Pfizer Pharmaceutical, sends the
  PDFs all around the world for proof approvals. Once we get an
  OK, we can use the PDF for imposition, then to make press
  plates. Since we are a total CTP printing company, we do not
  have to make new files therefore ensuring that the job is
  printed using the latest, approved PDFs.

  We encourage our customers to submit hi-res PDFs for
  printing rather than sending us InDesign or Quark files.’

• Bron Kowal
  
  Senior Production Manager

  Digital Vision

  A: ‘All of our magazines, catalogues and marketing mailers
  are sent to print as PDF files. Files are generally small
  enough to send as e-mail attachments or can be uploaded
  quickly, saving on time and courier costs. I would hate to go
  back to the old way of doing things.’

• Portia Westfall
  
  Documentation Services Manager

  Lenel Systems International, Inc.

  A: ‘PDF has been a very convenient format for our documentation. We save our FrameMaker documents to PDF so they can be reviewed by engineers in our company who do not have FrameMaker; Acrobat’s note feature works very well for this. We also release our user guides to customers in PDF because we can provide stable formatting, as well as utilize the security features to control what can be done with the content in the document.’

• Collin Kelso
  
  Director

  Kelso Colour Print

  Australia

  A: ‘We use PDF extensively to:

  • Send proofs to customers for review-and-comment

  • Send medium- to large-volume jobs to be printed

  • Produce images from Photoshop & Illustrator for placing in InDesign
    documents

  • Publish some documents that we distribute for customers for their
    own printing’

• Laura Foley
  
  Graphic Designer

  AlphaGraphics US271

  A: ‘We’re a small quick-print shop, and we get all manner of files for printing: Excel spreadsheets, Word brochures, Publisher files, FrameMaker documents. It’s hard, if not impossible, to get print-ready files with these formats.

  Now, I deal with clients with varying levels of computer expertise, everything from ‘Do you need me to save that as a Press Quality PDF with no compression and embedded fonts?’ to ‘What’s a mouse?’ But everyone knows how to create a PDF file, so that’s what I tell them to send me. If they can’t, then I usually create PDFs from the files they submit.

  If it weren’t for PDFs, I’d be doing a lot more re-creation of my client’s files!’

• Wade Gillespie
  
  Art Director

  Tri-Auto Enterprises

  A: ‘Our current use of PDF files is our means of sending print products to press. We receive a lot of PDF files for print production. We don’t care what layout program, or platform it was created in, as long as it’s a properly created PDF file we’ll accept it. But, only about 20 percent of the PDF files we receive are press ready or PDF/X-complaint. I need a good resource to refer to so that I can better teach other graphic artist about creating a PDF for press. The more resources I have, the better I will be at troubleshooting PDF files.’