Create, verify and deliver quality PDF's for Print... Connect 11 Announced!

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From my colleague Michael Reiher

Today we (Enfocus) announced an all new product line... Connect ALL and Connect YOU 11.

Enfocus Connect 11 combines PDF creation and quality control with hassle-free file delivery for the graphic arts professional. There are two editions in the family, Connect YOU for designers, and Connect ALL for service providers or creative organizations that work with many outside clients.

More details including informational webinars introducing the new product line can be found on the Enfocus Website at:

Connect YOU: http://www.enfocus.com/en/products/connect-you
Connect ALL: http://www.enfocus.com/en/products/connect-all

Webinars for Connect:
http://www.enfocus.com/en/webinars

Michael Reiher
Product Manager, Enfocus Connect

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I wanted to expand on the above and maybe start some discussion with this group.

One of the big motivations with the development of Connect 11 was to try and look at the production challenges with PDF's in a different way. As we dug into the issues we saw many hurdles for Designers in creating good quality PDFs for print as well as we saw that many service providers (printers) were spending lots of time in production fixing PDFs, chasing down file elements (like fonts) and trying to educate their design customers on how to create and submit better files for print.

With Connect, we set out to help correct this problem by focusing in on correcting common production issues at the designers workstation. The idea with Connect ALL is the service provider makes all the settings for PDF creation, verification and fixing and it's encapsulated in a mini application we call a Connector that the Designer can access easily. Therefore the Designer doesn't have to know what settings to make for the PDF generation or correction.

Obviously, I'm being brief, but I'd love to know your take on this approach and what you see in your production when it comes to the quality of PDF's from your clients.

Michael Reiher
Product Manager, Enfocus Connect

[Slappy]

Very interesting, I'll have to watch the vids here shortly. We seem to be a shop where getting clients to submit decent PDFs has taken a back seat to just "dealing with" whatever we get. I've been here less than a year, I didn't set up the file submission guidelines (if you even want to call them that) and as many times as I've tried to put something in place, I've hit a wall. If this can (economically) help transition clients to celan, verified PDF submission then it will be a miracle!

One big sell may bet that we wouldn't have to subscribe to as many Adobe Cloud licenses as we have workstations if getting actual press-ready PDFs becomes much simpler.

[Joe]

I have literally sat down and wrote novels of very detailed instructions complete with photos and templates for whatever page layout application they are running and gave them the Adobe job options file to use. I've yet to have a customer to use them.

I'm sure this is a great product. Getting our customers to use it would be the issue.

[t-pat]

Agreed, the problem is not a lack of software to generate quality pdfs. The problem lies with owners/managers/salespeople so desperate to get the work they'll take any old shiat and we'll deal with it if possible.

The minute they try to say "we need the files like xxx, maybe you should try this new service we found that will help you..." - the customer rolls out that old "the OTHER printer had NOOOO PROOOBLEEEEMMMZZZZ" chestnut. Then they cave. Lather, rinse, repeat, go home and drink beers until you forget how stupid it all is.

[Slappy]

I have literally sat down and wrote novels of very detailed instructions complete with photos and templates for whatever page layout application they are running and gave them the Adobe job options file to use. I've yet to have a customer to use them.

I'm sure this is a great product. Getting our customers to use it would be the issue.

Yeah, saw that my Mgr was watching the promo vids the other day & when I said it might be a great way to get clients into the PDF submission habit I got the same answer. "Not worth the effort and cost since most of them won't use it."  :rolleyes:

[gnubler]

You guys get PDFs? All we get are shitty JPGs sent from phones.

[David]

all the cool kids are doin' it that way...

[delooch]

I have literally sat down and wrote novels of very detailed instructions complete with photos and templates for whatever page layout application they are running and gave them the Adobe job options file to use. I've yet to have a customer to use them.

I'm sure this is a great product. Getting our customers to use it would be the issue.

...what joe said...

i spoon-feed my clients instructions, templates, everything.  getting them to use it properly is the challenge.

what does seem to work is exorbent prepress charges for workstation time. youd see designers learn this in an instant once it hit them in the wallet, but that isnt going to happen.