Can you omit a separation when printing composite from Acrobat 9?

[schenkadere]

There's an option in the advanced print dialog to use the output preview, but I can't get that to work at all. All seps print no matter what. I tried the ink manager defining the sep as transparent or opaqueignore, no go there either.

[leonardr]

There's an option in the advanced print dialog to use the output preview, but I can't get that to work at all. All seps print no matter what. I tried the ink manager defining the sep as transparent or opaqueignore, no go there either.

If you are printing composite, then you get every plate. Only if you are doing separation can you restrict a plate.

Concerning the Output Preview option - if you read the help text there, it clearly says that it only affects the use of the profile as a simulation profile.

[chevalier]

Leonard,

Is there a major reason this function isn't built in? This is something I've thought would be useful for years in both the export and print functions in Acrobat and across the entire Creative Suite.

Another semi-related question/feature request: Why is Acrobat's print function so dumbed down without the same functionality of Illustrator or InDesign? The placement, tile, and custom scale have always been something l constantly need Acrobat to do but it has never had the functionality. I can of course work around this by performing the extra steps of placing into Illustrator or InDesign but that's a hassle and not every machine that has Acrobat Pro has the rest of the Creative Suite. [See Attached PDF]

Is there a formal form or way to put in a feature request?

[Greg_Firestone]

I would guess that the simpler Acrobat UI is based on the needs of the average computer user while InDesign and Illustrator are typically used by more sophisticated users (or at least we hope) with a graphic arts background. Acrobat comes in a variety of flavors including the free Reader. It's heavily used in non publishing environments (corporate, education, consumer, etc.) Imagine Grandma trying to manually specify placement on a page using X and Y coordinates.

If there was an advanced section under Acrobat for power users, that could be more useful

[chevalier]

Greg, I agree. For Acrobat Professional these features (unless technically unfeasible) shouldn't even be debatable.

[leonardr]

Is there a major reason this function isn't built in? This is something I've thought would be useful for years in both the export and print functions in Acrobat and across the entire Creative Suite.

Two main reasons:
1) The primary customer for Acrobat (be it Standard or Professional) is _NOT_ the creative pro. Our customers and target market are enterprise and government users, with associated industries such as legal, pharma, insurance, etc.

2) The printing industry has been moving away from separated workflows to composite ones for many years now and when we do implement functionality for the creative pro/print production workflows, it will be help them move forward.

I will also point out that there is a wonderful 3rd party eco-system around PDF in the print production workflow. Companies such as Enfocus, Callas, and many others have built great add-ons to Acrobat to provide the functions that we do not.

[chevalier]

Thanks for responding Leonard.

I can only hope that there is room in the Adobe Acrobat Product roadmap for a future "Creative Pro Edition" as so many of our functions are moving into a purely PDF realm.