Preps and transparency

Brian G

Active member
-In a PDF to PDF workflow, has anyone had problems with Preps 5.2.2 or 5.3.1 causing drop shadows to disappear from PDFs generated by Adobe InDesign CS or CS 3?

-Does anyone have a copy of the "Creating Files for Preps Guides" mentioned in the press release for Preps 5.3.1?

thanks,

bg
 
Re: Preps and transparency

Hi bg

As far as I know, Preps will not handle transparency in pdfs very well if, at any point, you try to have it convert to ps. (this you can do if you use "mixed files" instead of "pdf-pdf", but also if you print to ps in a pdf native job). However, if you keep it pdf in and pdf out - strictly, there should not be a problem. One way to establish if it is Preps that is causing the problem (and not maybe your RIP) would be to bypass Preps and see how the original file RIPs - chances are the file would have done that without Preps.

As far as the "Creating Files for Preps Guides" are concerned, you should have these on the Preps CD under "extras", or you can download them from ecentral at :
https://ecentral.creo.com/eCentral/...rchMethod=Any&SortBy=CREATING FILES FOR PREPS
(You may need to register first)

Hope this helps

Mills
 
Re: Preps and transparency

Hi Brian,

Don't know exactly what your files are but I haven't had any problems with transparency in PDFs, but then again maybe they're getting flattened upon being printed out of Preps? I use CS3, export to PDF 1.4, place pdf in Preps using mixed workflow then print to rip, postscript out of Preps.

Had a job yesterday, color background from Photoshop placed in Indesign, graycale gradient over laid on it in Indesign with opacity to let texture of background show thru. Then they had color and b&w images placed on top of that with drop shadows applied in Indesign to those images also. Went thru the process above without any problems.

My rip is a Xitron Navigator rip, no workflow. I have tried the PDF-PDF workflow out of Preps and in-rip seps (I do in-rip seps normally) but haven't been able to get that to work just right for us. Reason was that it creates a separation for each color whether its needed or not, like on a spot color job I may map the spot to cyan and use our regular color bars, then at the rip it generates 4 seps, one for the cyan and then for myk also. By sending .ps from Preps I can turn on or off which seps I want to print and it works that way at rip, but pdf to pdf generates all the seps in the job no matter what I set at Preps.

Terry
 
Re: Preps and transparency

Preps is crap for transparency. Preps flattens on all output. You are best to output jdf from preps and use a native pdf workflow like Odystar or others that can work with PDF 1.4 or higher.
 
Re: Preps and transparency

When I started this thread, I did not describe our workflow or how we create PDFs:
The majority of our jobs go through a PDF - PDF workflow in Preps. Odystar is ahead of Preps and it creates a trapped PDF for Preps. Ahead of Odystar, our file prep team is working on some sort of a standard way of creating PDFs for Odystar. We were NOT printing to postscript and distilling. That's what Kodak recommended.
Saving the PDF as version 1.5 and flattening in Pitstop and then sending through Odystar is one procedure that is yielding positive results so far and does not seem to be dropping drop shadows.

brian
 
Re: Preps and transparency

Brian,

Odystar should not have any problem dealing with live transparency. There is no need to flatten it before sending into Odystar. What you need to do is instead of having Preps create a PDF you should have it create a JDF and then send that JDF back into Odystar to the JDF to PDF gateway. You will get an imposed, trapped PDF with live transparency intact.
 
Re: Preps and transparency

Thanks for all of the input. As to the JDF approach, we haven't tried it yet, but we're looking into it.
Regards,
brian
 
Re: Preps and transparency

We've used PDF -> PDF through Preps for over a year and haven't had any transparency issues???? We do a Save As out of Illy and Export out of Indy (v 1.5 for the PDF) Somewhere in your workflow it must get flattened.?

T
 
Re: Preps and transparency

Just in the last month we've had a rash of job files from IDCS3 that the drop shadows poop out in Preps 5.3.1. ?? I heard (from here I think) that down saving from CS3 to CS2 works. And it seems to work? Is there any official word from Adobe or Kodak about this??
 
Re: Preps and transparency

When we first started using Prinergy we were having problems with drop shadows as well out of CS3. After much searching we found buried in the Prinergy help menu the fact that you should be using PDF version 1.3 which will flatten the transparency. Now we make sure all our PDFs are 1.3 and voila no more transparency so no more transparency problems. The only ime this hasn't worked has been with jobs that also have spot colours.
 
Re: Preps and transparency

Better solution is to upgrade to Prinergy 4 which can handle live transparency natively if you use its Adobe PDF Print Engine option. No stink'in PostScript with that option and no need to flatten. Make sure you don't "refine" with a conversion to PostScript and back to PDF when you use the Adobe PDF Print Engine option.

- Dov
 
Re: Preps and transparency

Sorry, but it is Preps. We have the same issue and the 1-up PDFs work just fine through Metrix and their JDF workflow. But Preps drops effect applied in native software. (randomly, though)

T
 

PressWise

A 30-day Fix for Managed Chaos

As any print professional knows, printing can be managed chaos. Software that solves multiple problems and provides measurable and monetizable value has a direct impact on the bottom-line.

“We reduced order entry costs by about 40%.” Significant savings in a shop that turns about 500 jobs a month.


Learn how…….

   
Back
Top