Are there FOSS tool to prepare pdf file for offset printing? This involve rearranging of pages (4 pages on big page, with different orientation and different sequence), and then colour separation.
On Thu, 2011-02-10 at 07:49 +0530, H.S.Rai wrote:
Are there FOSS tool to prepare pdf file for offset printing? This involve rearranging of pages (4 pages on big page, with different orientation and different sequence), and then colour separation.
no
2011/2/10 Kenneth Gonsalves lawgon@thenilgiris.com:
On Thu, 2011-02-10 at 07:49 +0530, H.S.Rai wrote:
Are there FOSS tool to prepare pdf file for offset printing? This involve rearranging of pages (4 pages on big page, with different orientation and different sequence), and then colour separation.
no
Well... Scribus - www.scribus.net - seems to be able to do what H. S. Rai wants to do. Otherwise there's always TeX.
Binand
On Thu, 2011-02-10 at 12:25 +0530, Binand Sethumadhavan wrote:
Well... Scribus - www.scribus.net - seems to be able to do what H. S. Rai wants to do. Otherwise there's always TeX.
they do colour separation?
2011/2/10 Kenneth Gonsalves lawgon@thenilgiris.com:
On Thu, 2011-02-10 at 12:25 +0530, Binand Sethumadhavan wrote:
Well... Scribus - www.scribus.net - seems to be able to do what H. S. Rai wants to do. Otherwise there's always TeX.
they do colour separation?
Click and see? Their homepage says "Scribus supports professional publishing features, such as color separations, CMYK and Spot Color support, ICC color management or versatile PDF creation".
Binand
On Thu, 2011-02-10 at 12:55 +0530, Binand Sethumadhavan wrote:
2011/2/10 Kenneth Gonsalves lawgon@thenilgiris.com:
On Thu, 2011-02-10 at 12:25 +0530, Binand Sethumadhavan wrote:
Well... Scribus - www.scribus.net - seems to be able to do what H.
S.
Rai wants to do. Otherwise there's always TeX.
they do colour separation?
Click and see? Their homepage says "Scribus supports professional publishing features, such as color separations, CMYK and Spot Color support, ICC color management or versatile PDF creation".
I know what they say - but can they do professional quality colour separations?
On 02/10/2011 01:14 PM, Kenneth Gonsalves wrote:
On Thu, 2011-02-10 at 12:55 +0530, Binand Sethumadhavan wrote:
2011/2/10 Kenneth Gonsalveslawgon@thenilgiris.com:
On Thu, 2011-02-10 at 12:25 +0530, Binand Sethumadhavan wrote:
Well... Scribus - www.scribus.net - seems to be able to do what H.
S.
Rai wants to do. Otherwise there's always TeX.
they do colour separation?
Click and see? Their homepage says "Scribus supports professional publishing features, such as color separations, CMYK and Spot Color support, ICC color management or versatile PDF creation".
I know what they say - but can they do professional quality colour separations?
Although I do not know anything about DTP. I have heard good things about scribus. I found it just a little bit perturbing that you replied back with a one word `no` answer without mentioning scribus after making the assumption that the OP was indeed looking for `professional quality colour separations` -- what if the OP's primary objective is just page layout (which I believe scribus handles rather well) and is quite happy with the quality of `colour separation` it offers ?
Please offer the alternatives and if, in your opinion, they are not up to the mark, say so. Let the users evaluate and decide what works best for them. By not doing this, you are not only discouraging potential users but also potential improvement of the app. (would the users bother with reporting bug ? - who knows ? but still ...)
cheers, - steve
On Thu, 2011-02-10 at 13:43 +0530, steve wrote:
I know what they say - but can they do professional quality colour separations?
Although I do not know anything about DTP. I have heard good things about scribus. I found it just a little bit perturbing that you replied back with a one word `no` answer without mentioning scribus after making the assumption that the OP was indeed looking for `professional quality colour separations` -- what if the OP's primary objective is just page layout (which I believe scribus handles rather well) and is quite happy with the quality of `colour separation` it offers ?
sorry for being abrupt - but this has come up several times on this list and other lists and I am fed up with the discussion. I ran a printing press for several years and used to know what I was talking about - it is 6 years since I closed it, so maybe things have changed since then. Two points I have to make:
1. the question of ups - if you want to make a four page brochure for example, you have to produce a plate with two pages right side up and two pages upside down. Then you print one side of the paper, flip the paper around and print the other side. So if you want 1000 copies of a 4 A4 pages, you print 500 sheets of double A4 size, cut them and you get your brochure. If you have a quad demy press then you can print 8 pages at at time instead of two - hence a run of 1000 sheets (back and front gives a print run of 2000 - which will give you 8000 brochures. Now imagine a 64 page magazine. We used to do this manually, you need to calculate which pages are upside down. Which are left to right etc etc. DTP software needs to do this - scribus does not do this (as far as I can see). It can give you one fold brochure, two fold, 3 fold - but if you want to print on the back also, you need to manually do it. And a book? normal A3 page size books are printed 64 pages at a time - imagine doing that manually.
2. I was one of the pioneers of doing colour separation using coreldraw/pagemaker, laser printer and polymasters. Good enough for newsprint output. But professional colour separation to make 4 colour plates is done by imagesetters - previously on film, now direct to plate and these are run with proprietary software. (this was 2004). And image setters were (and probably still are) hugely expensive. Few presses have them - most go to a professional plate making lab.
So what is the solution? PDF is now a standard. Make a high resolution PDF (or even PNG) file and give it to the printer. He will do the rest.
Please offer the alternatives and if, in your opinion, they are not up to the mark, say so. Let the users evaluate and decide what works best for them. By not doing this, you are not only discouraging potential users but also potential improvement of the app. (would the users bother with reporting bug ? - who knows ? but still ...)
ok teach - I hope I have made amends now?
On Thursday 10 February 2011 15:55:55 Kenneth Gonsalves wrote:
On Thu, 2011-02-10 at 13:43 +0530, steve wrote:
I know what they say - but can they do professional quality colour separations?
Although I do not know anything about DTP. I have heard good things about scribus. I found it just a little bit perturbing that you replied back with a one word `no` answer without mentioning scribus after making the assumption that the OP was indeed looking for `professional quality colour separations` -- what if the OP's primary objective is just page layout (which I believe scribus handles rather well) and is quite happy with the quality of `colour separation` it offers ?
sorry for being abrupt - but this has come up several times on this list and other lists and I am fed up with the discussion. I ran a printing press for several years and used to know what I was talking about - it is 6 years since I closed it, so maybe things have changed since then. Two points I have to make:
http://multivalent.sourceforge.net/Tools/pdf/Impose.html
Looks like it can do quite complex impositions. The licence is unclear. One will have to download and check the relevant files.
On Thu, 2011-02-10 at 16:33 +0530, jtd wrote:
http://multivalent.sourceforge.net/Tools/pdf/Impose.html
Looks like it can do quite complex impositions. The licence is unclear. One will have to download and check the relevant files.
clearly not open source
On Thursday 10 February 2011 17:11:57 Kenneth Gonsalves wrote:
On Thu, 2011-02-10 at 16:33 +0530, jtd wrote:
http://multivalent.sourceforge.net/Tools/pdf/Impose.html
Looks like it can do quite complex impositions. The licence is unclear. One will have to download and check the relevant files.
clearly not open source
Not neccessarily correct. Individual parts are licenced differently. One will have to check each one individually.
-- regards KG http://lawgon.livejournal.com Coimbatore LUG rox http://ilugcbe.techstud.org/
On Thu, 2011-02-10 at 18:28 +0530, jtd wrote:
clearly not open source
Not neccessarily correct. Individual parts are licenced differently. One will have to check each one individually.
preferably with a bargepole - btw, please trim your posts and do your bit in the fight against global warming.
2011/2/11 Kenneth Gonsalves lawgon@thenilgiris.com:
Not neccessarily correct. Individual parts are licenced differently. One will have to check each one individually.
preferably with a bargepole
It isn't that bad. The core library (Multivalent) is dual/tri-licensed (GPL is one of them). The add-on tools are free (not sure of -as-in-speech). Commercial license is needed only for "advanced" stuff (point-and-drool interfaces, browser plugins etc.).
http://multivalent.sourceforge.net/license.html
Binand
On Friday 11 February 2011 08:50:11 Binand Sethumadhavan wrote:
2011/2/11 Kenneth Gonsalves lawgon@thenilgiris.com:
Not neccessarily correct. Individual parts are licenced differently. One will have to check each one individually.
preferably with a bargepole
It isn't that bad. The core library (Multivalent) is dual/tri-licensed (GPL is one of them). The add-on tools are free (not sure of -as-in-speech). Commercial license is needed only for "advanced" stuff (point-and-drool interfaces, browser plugins etc.).
This page is really sketchy.
I downloaded and checked. ALL files are distributed under 4 licences Apache UC (BSD like) Adobe (14 AFM font fiies) which has no restrictions on use or distribution, save using the same licence file GPL.
So it can be used, modified and distributed under the same set of licences without requring extra permissions from the authors or licence holders.
On Thu, Feb 10, 2011 at 3:55 PM, Kenneth Gonsalves lawgon@thenilgiris.com wrote:
So what is the solution? PDF is now a standard. Make a high resolution PDF (or even PNG) file and give it to the printer. He will do the rest.
I have pdf file which has lot of coloured photograph, which I want printer should process. But, my printer refused to accept it. On saying that I will not give him job, he said that he will try. Then he reported it is not possible, and every body in city (Ludhiana) used CorelDraw. If any printer can take my pdf, and print, in that case I am happy.
Thanks to all who responded, I will given try to all options listed / discussed.
With regards,
On Thu, 2011-02-10 at 20:45 +0530, H.S.Rai wrote:
On Thu, Feb 10, 2011 at 3:55 PM, Kenneth Gonsalves lawgon@thenilgiris.com wrote:
So what is the solution? PDF is now a standard. Make a high
resolution
PDF (or even PNG) file and give it to the printer. He will do the
rest.
I have pdf file which has lot of coloured photograph, which I want printer should process. But, my printer refused to accept it. On saying that I will not give him job, he said that he will try. Then he reported it is not possible, and every body in city (Ludhiana) used CorelDraw. If any printer can take my pdf, and print, in that case I am happy.
very strange - I was under the impression that *anything* is possible in Ludhiana. If not, you could send the file to Delhi or Chandigarh and get the positives made and couriered back. (from what you say, Ludhiana printers seem to be still in the 'filmy' stage - and have not reached the direct-to-plate technology)
On Thursday 10 February 2011 13:14:12 Kenneth Gonsalves wrote:
On Thu, 2011-02-10 at 12:55 +0530, Binand Sethumadhavan wrote:
2011/2/10 Kenneth Gonsalves lawgon@thenilgiris.com:
On Thu, 2011-02-10 at 12:25 +0530, Binand Sethumadhavan wrote:
Well... Scribus - www.scribus.net - seems to be able to do what H.
S.
Rai wants to do. Otherwise there's always TeX.
they do colour separation?
Click and see? Their homepage says "Scribus supports professional publishing features, such as color separations, CMYK and Spot Color support, ICC color management or versatile PDF creation".
I know what they say - but can they do professional quality colour separations?
They can. The process is a little warped to setup, but you cant fault them.
http://wiki.scribus.net/canvas/How_to_legally_obtain_spot_colour_palettes_fo...
http://wiki.scribus.net/canvas/Scribus_Friendly_Print_Shops
-- regards KG http://lawgon.livejournal.com Coimbatore LUG rox http://ilugcbe.techstud.org/
Greetings,
On 2/10/11, H.S.Rai hardeep.rai@gmail.com wrote:
Are there FOSS tool to prepare pdf file for offset printing? This involve rearranging of pages (4 pages on big page, with different orientation and different sequence), and then colour separation.
Have you checked Scribus lately? I am told it has good CMYK support and of course being a DTP program, provides excellent control over placement.
It is GPL.
HTH
Regards
Rajagopal
-
Binand Sethumadhavan -
H.S.Rai -
jtd -
Kenneth Gonsalves -
Rajagopal Swaminathan -
steve