Recombining separated PDF's

[madbugger]

Oddly enough XMF has a way to recombine and spit out a pdf with the vectors and fonts intact.
I can't say I have ever used it, but I just gave it a try and it seems to work pretty good, at least I got a pdf with everything showing up.

You have to create a master template, as that is the only place you can turn the function on, and you also have to respect the documents overprints. Let me know if you want more info.

Thanks, sadly we don't have XMF.

[madbugger]

just curious, what program are they using to make the separated pdfs?
Curious about that too. I think you used to be able to makes seps from InDesign but you can't via export. If you have the Adobe PDF Printer on your system I think you could. But I don't have it so can't verify it.

Yes, Joe it can still be done. I/we still have a postscript printer option in InDesign just for this. As every once in a while we need to send seps out to a vendor or even more rare to a customer as they don't believe us about the spot color. And it still works great, except for the fact that you get a PS file that you have to run through Distiller to get a PDF. But at least it's doable.

I use a normal pdf to create separations for our ink profiler by exporting to postscript and selecting separations. Then process the .ps file thru PressPerCent to create the file I need for press profile. It outputs a separated pdf as part of the process but I don't need or use ithat.

Maybe my clients supplier is doing something similar, not sure and client has no idea what I'm talking about, I may as well be speaking Klingon to them.  Its a once or twice a year scenario for us, and I'm at the point of just telling them we can no longer handle that file type.

I think they may originally be coming from a sign writer, which is another whole rant in itself.  

[scottrsimons]

I made a separated .ps file from ID last night to try it but it would not distill.

Well Joe. Thanks for making me try Distiller again and kill 30 minutes getting it to talk with Adobe again so I can run it.

I found one minor thing that you might not have. We are running Kodak Prinergy and have for years so we have the Prinergy Rifiner.ppd when we select PostScript© File. Maybe that is the difference.

I have included my test InDesign and PS file in the Archive.zip. Incase you want to look at it. Also the PDF that I made.

And I threw in the Prinergy Refinder.ppd too, for testing. Which goes in the application folder for InDesign/Presets/PPDs. The PPDs folder you may need to create if it is not there. And this file should work both on Mac and PC.

[Joe]

Thanks for all of that.

First issue is that the individual separations are all in the black channel. I can open it in Acrobat and remap the CMY pages to the CMY channels with Pitstop. However when I place them in InDesign, even setting each color to have transparent background, it is still knocking out when placed over each color. And InDesign will not let me set each separation to overprint. This is on the path right now of "too much trouble to mess with and the customer needs to supply correct files".

[madbugger]

This is on the path right now of "too much trouble to mess with and the customer needs to supply correct files".

more commonly known as "not my problem"

It's now official, customer will be told next time to supply a composite pdf or we can't proceed.

Really, how hard is it ffs? Even that well know virus  Publisher can produce (admittedly poorly) a pdf.

I was hoping there was an app that I didn't know about that you could just drop file into and it would re combine it. I'm guessing there is not a lot of call for it.

[DCurry]

...And InDesign will not let me set each separation to overprint.

Multiply, perhaps?

[David]

...And InDesign will not let me set each separation to overprint.

Multiply, perhaps?

that's the only way I can get it to work

[Joe]

...And InDesign will not let me set each separation to overprint.

Multiply, perhaps?

Yeah that sort of works but not really. If you have let's say a magenta tint panel partially over a cyan tint panel the magenta is supposed to knockout the cyan tint panel...multiply changes the magenta to overprint so instead of a magenta tint panel knocking out the cyan you get a block of purple where the magenta is over the cyan.

[Joe]

Man I haven't done this much prepress for over a year and a half. I am exhausted!

[swampymarsh]

I have one client who occasionally sends in separated pdf's, apparently that is all he has access to. Major pain in ass to process to plate.

Anyone know of an easy way to recombine back to single composite pdf.

Only way I have been able to find to do it is to take into photoshop and do it there, but lose all vector and end with only raster file.

I can make a separated file from composite, there just seems no way to go back the other way that I can find in Acrobat or Pitstop.

Cheers.

It should be possible to create a PitStop Pro Action List to recombine.

[madbugger]

it should be possible to just supply the damn pdfs correctly in the first place

[pspdfppdfxhd]

That's a tall order.

[DCurry]

...And InDesign will not let me set each separation to overprint.

Multiply, perhaps?

Yeah that sort of works but not really. If you have let's say a magenta tint panel partially over a cyan tint panel the magenta is supposed to knockout the cyan tint panel...multiply changes the magenta to overprint so instead of a magenta tint panel knocking out the cyan you get a block of purple where the magenta is over the cyan.

But since you are dealing with a separated PDF, the knockout has already occurred by the time you're multiplying.

Multiply is essentially the same as telling the entire sep to OP, which is what you were trying to do.

[Joe]

But since you are dealing with a separated PDF, the knockout has already occurred by the time you're multiplying.

Multiply is essentially the same as telling the entire sep to OP, which is what you were trying to do.

AHA...my first attempt was setting the final PDF objects to multiply which gave me what I saw in the post before. Setting the individual seps to multiply in InDesign before making the PDF works. But again...this is really more work than it is worth it for a production environment.

[Tracy]

  I'm exhausted just reading all this.