Since I'm no longer employed at false hopes and regret printing I no longer have access to any Adobe products. Well, legal access. I just bought a new laptop with windows 10 (sucks balls) and I would like to install something like CC for content creation. The laptop has a nifty wacom stylus that's pressure sensitive so that would be a bonus if the software supported that as well.

I basically need a replacement for PS, indy and illustrator. Are there any free options out there that can produce not utter poop files?

Spot varnish, does anyone still do it? Pretty much everything we do gets AQ but we just ran a spot varnish for a customer because they insisted you can't inkjet on AQ. I'm pretty sure that's false. Even the ink guy had to scrape the bottom of the barrel because nobody uses varnish anymore.

Just wondering how those not stuck in 2003 do it.

I need to save a PDF out of an .ai file. Shouldn't be an issue but if I change the preset to anything it locks me out of any of the options. If I manage to click on say barks and bleeds, then change the preset I can click boxes and input things but it doesn't do anything. All I Need is marks but it refuses to put them on there.

It's CS6 and it could just be this file but I don't have the time to figure it out right now. Has anyone else seen this?

I'm trying to fix our plating issues. All the targets I have are for positive plates. The Azura TS is a negative plate. Does the target matter or do I need to invert the image? I only ask because the first test I ran didn't produce the results that were expected. I don't want to waste more plates going down the wrong path.

The thickness tests all look the same when they should be visible differences but I'm not seeing them. It's possible I'm doing the test wrong as well. I think I need to go back and test the fluence because if that's out it affects the thickness (focus) as well.

I'm trying to output a PDF from a website in chrome. THe thing is it's not opening the save to dialog, it just prints to somewhere and I can't locate it. Anyone have an idea where the default location is in slow leopard?

I will assume that most have your platemakers in an isolated room. Maybe it's in with you in prepress, maybe a dedicated room. If you can please bring in or maybe read the thermostat in the room and give me the ambient air temperature. I'm curious since I've been having issues that only manifest when there is a major temperature swing. I walk in in the morning and it's downright cold. All the metal is cold to the touch, including the plates.

I have a calendar I have to build every year. Normally I use a online template to output the months and then place them in a base indy document. The issue now is it seems the designer moved it from a online form that I can get a PDF out of to a CC addon or something. Since I don't have CC it seems that I'm now locked out of that option.

Juliana Halvorson's InDesign Template is what I've been using but I can't seem to find it anywhere in my files or on the web except for this one site. Not sure what I'm going to do. Of course it needs to have a proof tonight.

I do have a script that might be able to do what I want but I want to recreate it as I have for the past 4 years or so. I've been fighting trying to make the script do what I want but when I looked at the info in the PDF I realized I didn't use the script, that's why it's not working.

Does anyone else have something they use to create calendars? It really doesn't have to be fancy but I want it to look decent. I attached a screenshot of what I'm going for.

The boss has me looking around for prices for lawn signs. We need the plastic signs with legs 2/2 18x24 in 500/1m qtys. Anyone out there do them for under $4.15 each or is that a decent price?

Seems to be from what I've seen but just wondering.

Not sure if this is Adobe, pitstop or just my old ass computer's fault but here we go.

I need to embed fonts but the ones in the system panel aren't reporting correctly. For example font that's named bold actually shows as an italic. Obviously that's not going to work. I've cleaned the font cache with onyx and even tried font explorer but it won't go away. Is there a way to purge all the fonts in acrobat/pitstop?

Does anyone happen to have a copy of PDF to ID. In the infinite wisdom of the boss he just got PDF's of all the materials instead of the natives. He should know better since he's in the GD printing business. We have massive edits and doing them all in the PDf is going to be far harder than it needs to.

I need to find and email solution that allows multiple accounts that separates the sent emails into their own folder. The boss needs to be able to search them individually. He's currently using an ancient version of live mail that lumps all the accounts together. Is anyone using outlook 365 and does it have this ability? I know it's possible as I'm sitting here looking at apple mail that does it but that won't work for him.

So I have a little project here that's outlines with compound paths. I need to change the color of the first letter. If I try to change it, it changes the whole line. I've found that I can track down the compound path in layers and release it then I can change the first letter.

The thing is when I do that and there are letterforms like O, P, e and the like the inner path fills in with the color of the letter. I can make it work by playing with the layer order and filling it with white but there has to be a better way to do it. At least I assume there is a better way. I can manage to click on things in illustrator and eventually make things work most of the time. That's great when I'm not pressed for time but I'd rather learn the correct way to accomplish it than hacking through it all the time.

I use release compound (build) to get it to work, is there another, more correct way?

It's a pretty simple question and I used to know the answer.

I have my output set to keep the files together and not output single pages. Where do I change this? I happen to need to break apart a file because the client is a mess and having single pages would help.

Digi, this is pointed at you as I know you run it bet anyone can chime in.

How hard is plex to set up? I see they started a live TV thing and I'm interested. I was considering youtube TV as well. I wouldn't mind live TV but I've survived this long without I don't want it to be too much of a pain in the ass.

I know we should all be smart enough to not open unknown attachments.

I also know how ignorant CSR's and salesmen can be. Watch out for these.

http://lifehacker.com/ransomware-is-being-hidden-inside-attachments-of-attach-1794610034

I don't believe I've seen this before and it could be related to me running CS6. Has anyone placed a PDF and have images drop off? The piece I'm dealing with has a spot that fades out into a 4c image and when I place it, it drops the 4c image.

It wouldn't matter if the designer set the job up right but we all know how that goes.

I don't remember seeing it done before but that doesn't mean it's not possible. Has anyone done a spot UV with a gradient in it?

I attached a screenshot from the UV file. Since nobody calls the printer first I have to change it from spot to K and there is a pretty big step I may have to fix. Don't want to go crazy fixing a file that isn't going to work. The outside finisher has seen the files and the only thing they say is the UV isn't going to hit dead on and there will be a halo. I assume they looked past the first page and saw the gradient. These are also the same people that can't convert a spot color to K for some reason. 

Yes, I know it's probably excel but is there a free one for Mac that won't pork things too bad? I have libre office but I've seen what it can do to word docs and it's not pretty.

Let's go back in time folks. I'm running 10.6.8 and I want to connect to a NT box running real VNC. Right now I have it where I remote into the windows server, VNC from there to the NT box and I have control. I want to remove the remote into the win server part.

I read you can use screen sharing but all I get is endless contacting. I know there is chicken of the VNC and others but I'd rather not install anything if there is already a built-in service.

I have a customer that when trying to use a glow effect it came out 72 dpi. I've seen the same effect used but it was 150+. is there something wonky in their settings that's causing this? I'm pretty sure I've been though my settings and saw something like that and I made sure it was maxed out.