Email Proofs

[ajr]

What makes a customer think that they can send me files over 1GB in size and than expect a low res PDF proof just "pinged" over to them to be only a few K in size. Am I missing something here, it just aint gonna happen!

The FTP is too technical for them as they have to enter a username and password!!

A

 

[Jackie]

Yes and then they wonder why the images are low res in the proof PDF! It's just another brick in the wall of the uneducated customer. Most of my problems come from the fact that my customers are PC based and are firewalled to the max. They usually can't access my FTP site over their network because of built in restrictions set up by their IT department. They can't understand that my FTP site is on a mac server and won't transfer any nasty viruses.

 

[gordo]

Try www.yousendit.com

It's free - although there are chargeable options - and easy. Your customer just clicks on a link to download.

best, gordon p

 

[ajr]

Gordo,

They insist on email, its painful.

A

 

[PDL]

How about if instead they got an email with a hyperlink to a webpage with their artwork in it and a fully integrated viewing tool, complete with the ability to view the separations, apply comments (sticky notes), view and compare between versions, and send approval notifications to you and anyone else concerned. WebCenter: Web-based project management and pre-production approval

 

[mglouis]

ajr,

Gordo's suggestion will send your client an email with an URL to the file, hosted by yousendit. Links last about a week and sizes are limited to 100MB for the free service.

Matt Louis

 

[Lukas Engqvist]

What are they sending you PDF files or packaged documents? We usually send low res pdfs, settings are sRGB and simulate overprint, this gives the customer a good impression of what the work would look like, Simulate overprint is a key though! If they send finished PDF files, then i do not see the value in bouncing it back to them.

 

[pcmodem]

What are they sending you PDF files or packaged documents? We usually send low res pdfs, settings are sRGB and simulate overprint, this gives the customer a good impression of what the work would look like, Simulate overprint is a key though! If they send finished PDF files, then i do not see the value in bouncing it back to them.

The interesting thing is. We have customers who ask for a PDF proof back after they send us a PDF for the final file.

How many of you have this happen?

 

[Gil-719]

I get that all the time and hate it! Why send me a PDF then ask for a PDF proof back? I have noticed, however, that sometimes the PDF they send has problems that need correcting. I will correct them, but am very careful not to send the PDF to them. I send them a low res jpg file instead and explain to the customer that the PDF was "too large" to fit as an attachment.

 

[Lukas Engqvist]

Ye get that happen, funny thing is those customers sometimes find mistakes in those files you bounce back to them, lol

 

[TheProcessIStheproduct]

simulated overprint?

simulated overprint?

How do you "force" simulated overprint preview? Try to tell customers to view with overprint, but this has kicked our ass many times... "it looked right on my PDF..."???

 

[geoman]

The interesting thing is. We have customers who ask for a PDF proof back after they send us a PDF for the final file.

How many of you have this happen?

All the time. I get ready to print PDFs from my customers and they'd insist on seeing a PDF back, so I would simply apply rego marks (if none there), put on a color bars and some other "furniture" to make it look technical, and send it straight back.

They loved it.

 

[Magpie]

That happens to us quite often as well. It is a real pain in the neck when we are very busy in the studio but what can you do.

This actually brings up a line from the Family Guy Star Wars when Aunt Beru says to Luke 'Tell Uncle Owen not to tell you that your father is Darth Vader.'

 

[mjoep123]

We use Accellion Secure File Transfer. Web based, customers do not need to install anything, Outlook plugin for our CSRs, over 120 customers using it and a "e-mail" user interface.

By far the best FTP service when we did our evaluation, not cheap but our customers wanted simplicity.

Secure File Transfer - Managed File Transfer - Enterprise File Transfer - Accellion

 

[Stephen Marsh]

How do you "force" simulated overprint preview? Try to tell customers to view with overprint, but this has kicked our ass many times... "it looked right on my PDF..."???

I was recently was caught by this. I thought that in some "older" versions of Acrobat Reader that overprints were automatic - just to avoid this issue. Perhaps my memory was wrong...

In Reader version 9 (not sure about 8 or earlier), the default is to only honour overprint preview in PDF/X files. As most clients do not change the defaults, I now send proofs in PDF/X format.

In Acrobat Pro, I personally have overprint preview set to "auto", as we don't use PDF/X for our press or other common PDF files.

Off the top of my head I can't think of a way to force this display to override the user settings, if for example they had overprint display turned off for all files.


Stephen Marsh

 

[david]

Online High Res Zoomable Proofing

Online High Res Zoomable Proofing

Hello,

Here is one idea. Instead of sending your customers a low res PDF file that causes so many problems with jagged lines and overprint issues - why not just send them a link like the one below to the actual high resolution data.

The image below is a very good example. It is made from screened 1 bit TIFF's at 2400 DPI.



This uses the free Microsoft Silverlight plugin for either Mac or PC. It is so nice that you can use your mouse wheel to roll into and out from the image and you can click and drag to move around. It is extremely smooth and easy to use. You can zoom into the actual dot structure of the job - and it is a REAL proof because it is the actual data going on plates.

These proofs are made from this amazing inexpensive software:
TIFFPager The Everything Tool for all Flavors of TIFF files!

David Lewis

 

[Lukas Engqvist]

Hmm, works once you install Microsoft software, wich limits any claims to repair anything to 5 dollars. Not sure I want to install it, just don't know what it affects.

 

[david]

Silverlight

Silverlight

Hello,

I have never been a fan of Microsoft's offerings - however this is one thing they really "Got Right"!
We could have done this using Flash however:
Flash does not support the Mouse Wheel on the Mac
Flash does not have background threading for image processing - which makes the viewing much more jerky!

Viewing this in SilverLight does not tire the eyes by jerking around as you try and move to different locations and it is super smooth.

It takes 90 seconds to install Silverlight - and you will be glad you did!

Take a look at this sample:


This is:
1.48 GB CMYK data
H 14,401 pixels
W 27,601 pixels

Find the 1 pt Text!

David Lewis

 

[pcmodem]

Take a look at this sample:


David Lewis

This one isn't a 1-bit tiff though.

 

[david]

All Kinds of TIFF's

All Kinds of TIFF's

Hello,

Our TIFF Pager can create these proofs from all kinds of TIFF files. You can work with full sets of screened one bit TIFF, you can work with Contone CMYK TIFF, you can even work with RGB TIFF - and in the case of RGB TIFF - it can be configured for browser based zooming without the need for any plugin.

If you want to see a similar file as the one above - take a look at this example from one of our OEM partners.



This has the screened dots and the one point type.
The same software can create both the zoomable proofs, the thumbnails, and even PDf versions and more. All for around $1600. It can crop, scale, rotate, deimpose and more. We can show you how to integrate this into your own web server or we can provide a fully integrated solution for you.

David Lewis