DCS2 instead of PDF/X-1a? PDF problem

Widmark

Active member
Hello-

I am a print designer/production artist with a little bit of pre-press/service bureau experience. Like many, I've been releasing files as PDF/X-1a's these days, but my printer is having trouble with the latest job, a 4c booklet created in Quark. The previous job I did with them was in InDesign and didn't have any issues.

I made my PDF/X-1a's and preflighted them in Acrobat, which confirmed compliance. The printer is getting the error "internal error in PDFLibrary".

They're asking if I can save them as a DCS2 file. My only experience with with DCS files was creating multichannel EPS files to mix spot colors with CMYK in photoshop. I don't understand what they're asking for (and yes, I'm asking them, but I thought I'd do some research here as well.) Is it like a separated Quark file? I can't imagine they'd want files supplied from photoshop with rasterized type.

Is there another version of DCS2 I'm not familiar with? Searching these forums I saw some mentions of ripping files as DCS2, but I assume that's something I'd need special software or a RIP for? Alternately, any ideas what could be causing the initial error with the PDF?

Any thoughts, help or suggestions, much appreciated, thank you.
 
You can save a DCS2 out of Quark if that is what they would rather have. Are you exporting to PDF or printing Postscript and distilling?
 
Leonard is right.
If this printer really needs DCS2 files instead of PDF/X-1a, run. Run fast.
They are not up to date (or should I say several years behind the times), either on their equipment or their knowledge. Or both.

I can only imagine why they would need DCS2 ... maybe they try to impose your files with an ancient version of QuarkXPress or want to make adjustments.

Anyway, if previous PDFs from InDesign (which are for the most part more "troublesome" for older equipment) worked without problems, your PDF from Quark may as well have some interesting "features" that are causing this error on their end. Is there any chance to gather more information what they are doing and with what software?


If the original PDF/X-1a passes Acrobat's PreFlight without errors, it should not cause problems on a RIP.
I can take a look at the PDF and try to RIP it on a Harlequin-RIP (v7) and an Adobe PDF Print Engine if you wish.
 
Thank you for all the responses.

It's not that they need DCS2, I suppose, they only asked for that after encountering an error with my PDF.

In both cases I've just been exporting to PDF. The prior job was designed in InDesign and exported as PDF. This job was an old job from 2004 that had been designed in Quark 6. Because we needed to re-print, I had to download the trial version of Quark 8 to even open the files, as I don't even own a working copy of Quark any more! I placed the layout in the printer's templates and exported as PDF/x-1a directly from Quark, then opened in Acrobat and ran Acrobat's preflight to check with compliance. I didn't try printing postscript and distilling but can.

I've got a message from the printer and should be able to talk to them today, (I'm a few steps removed from dealing directly with them), so hopefully I'll have some more information about what could be wrong or what they want me to do.

I still don't see how to save a DCS2 out of Quark.

I think I may have just figured it out...the files were released as 4 seperate printer's spreads and they said 1 of them was fine while the other 3 weren't. I just noticed a difference, all 4 spreads have descriptive copy on top of which page it is and on the page that was fine, that type is art, but on the 3 pages giving problems, I typed the info in what is apparently the Helvetica .dfont. Something I've wrestled with before. I'm going to remove that and re-upload and see if that helps.

Thanks for all the feedback, will let you know if that fixes it.
 
Hadn't heard back from the printer or the go-between till I followed up today. The latest files are fine. I'm confidant the problem had something to do with using .dfonts as that was the only fix I did and now it's fine. Thanks again for the responses in any case.
 

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