Does anyone have any suggestions as to how I can reduce the time for Preflighting these supplied – poorly created and bloated hybrid PDF files.
We receive hundreds of PDF's from web based clients daily. These PDF files are created via a PDF Server (not under our control). The files produced by the server are large in size, ranging from 8 Mb to 100 Mb depending on page content. The files contain a mixture of colourspaces; RGB, CalRGB, CMYK, as well as images of various dpi's that need resampling. Add to that clients are allowed to even place PDF files within the final PDF using either RGB or CMYK. All of these files have to be converted to CMYK with custom colours corrected and profiled for individual printers.
This to me, is a poorly implemented workflow that I have no control over and feel that the final PDF presented to us is not of an industrial expectable standard.
We Preflight files for about 150 clients with their various custom colours and page sizes. The time taken in Preflight ranges from four and a half to eight and a half minutes per page. This is mainly because of the colourspace conversion, resampling of images and file optimization.
I have tried to explain the needs to the company that host and develops software for the PDF Server with to no avail.
The only way I have found to improve the workflow is to either to postscript and then redistill or by using a virtual desktop printer to convert directly to a usable PDF file. Either of these methods converts the PDF to a PDF/X1-a specification, thereby converting the PDF to a CMYK colourspace and reduces the file size to below 10 Mb, which processes through the Preflight in under ten seconds.
The problem with the above methods is due to the various page sizes supplied, all page sizes have to be entered manually as custom page sizes.
I am trying at present to implement an applescript spool queue that reads each PDF file size and automates the creation process (writing new PPD's to fit new page sizes, if not available in the print queue) and presents the final PDF/X1-a file for Preflighting.
Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
We receive hundreds of PDF's from web based clients daily. These PDF files are created via a PDF Server (not under our control). The files produced by the server are large in size, ranging from 8 Mb to 100 Mb depending on page content. The files contain a mixture of colourspaces; RGB, CalRGB, CMYK, as well as images of various dpi's that need resampling. Add to that clients are allowed to even place PDF files within the final PDF using either RGB or CMYK. All of these files have to be converted to CMYK with custom colours corrected and profiled for individual printers.
This to me, is a poorly implemented workflow that I have no control over and feel that the final PDF presented to us is not of an industrial expectable standard.
We Preflight files for about 150 clients with their various custom colours and page sizes. The time taken in Preflight ranges from four and a half to eight and a half minutes per page. This is mainly because of the colourspace conversion, resampling of images and file optimization.
I have tried to explain the needs to the company that host and develops software for the PDF Server with to no avail.
The only way I have found to improve the workflow is to either to postscript and then redistill or by using a virtual desktop printer to convert directly to a usable PDF file. Either of these methods converts the PDF to a PDF/X1-a specification, thereby converting the PDF to a CMYK colourspace and reduces the file size to below 10 Mb, which processes through the Preflight in under ten seconds.
The problem with the above methods is due to the various page sizes supplied, all page sizes have to be entered manually as custom page sizes.
I am trying at present to implement an applescript spool queue that reads each PDF file size and automates the creation process (writing new PPD's to fit new page sizes, if not available in the print queue) and presents the final PDF/X1-a file for Preflighting.
Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.