Building Your CD-Based Portfolio

Acrobat: Edit/Prepare PDF
Acrobat 4.05 fixes several bugs — including JPEG compression, PostScript printing, and color-management problems — that compromised v4.0 of the program. Open the new PDF document in Acrobat. Here, you’ll establish links to Audio files or QuickTime and QuickTime VR movie files, and insert rollover Navigation buttons where needed in the nearly finished document. Final Security features for opening, editing, and printing the file will be selected.

Figure 5: The Adobe Acrobat (version 4.05) interface and a page from photographer George Wedding’s completed photography CD portfolio.

1. Gather all Movie and/or Audio files planned for the document and place them in the same folder as the new PDF file. Insert them where needed.
2. Audio and QuickTime movie files can now be added using the Acrobat Movie Tool. For detailed instructions, use the Acrobat Help menu to select Acrobat Guide. When open, select the Adding Interactive Features section for step-by-step guidance.
3. Interactive buttons can be created when the Acrobat Forms Tool is selected. For detailed instructions, use the Acrobat Help menu to select Acrobat Guide. When open, select the Adding Interactive Features section. If you like, add Previous Page and Next Page, Back to Start, and End of Document rollover Navigation Buttons to the Acrobat file. On the Mac, the Zapf Dingbats font provides the appropriate icons for this, or you can create your own in Photoshop.This is the most tedious part of the entire show creation process. Unfortunately, Acrobat 4.05 offers no way (that I discovered) to globally add interactive navigation buttons to designated pages in a document. Instead, the buttons have to be added manually — one page at a time. One can only hope that Acrobat 5 will fix this glaring oversight.
   
   Figure 6: Using the Acrobat 4.05 Form Tool opens a dialog box that allows the creation of interactive buttons.
4. From the File menu, select Document Info and establish settings in the General and Open Info dialog boxes. The Open Info dialog box settings are especially important: This is where you establish that viewers will see a full screen slide show without the distracting Acrobat Menu and Toolbar controls.
   
   Figure 7: The Acrobat 4.05 Open Info dialog box is where full screen slide show settings are established (Magnification: Fit Width), but other controls also appear in the General Preferences dialog box that is accessible from the File

   GENERAL INFO
   Enter Title, Subject, Author and Keywords, as desired.

   OPEN INFO
   INITIAL VIEW: Page Only
   MAGNIFICATION: Fit Width (of screen)
   PAGE LAYOUT: Default
   WINDOW OPTIONS: Check all boxes except Hide Window Controls

   In addition, check the File: Preferences menu. Other Full Screen setting options are here, including one Navigation setting that automatically advances pages every few seconds if desired. Under the same File: Preference menu, Select General. A new dialog box appears. Check all the settings, especially the Color Manager. I use Built-in.

5. Select Save As. In the Save dialog box, select Security: Standard and then the Settings button. A new dialog box should appear. Under the “Do Not Allow” section, check the features you want to disable, particularly Changing the Document and Selecting Text and Graphics. Click OK and you’ll be returned to the main Save dialog box.Rename the file by adding the characters “01” to the end of the filename. Do not overwrite the main Acrobat PDF file, so that you can go back to it if you’ve made some mistake in setting up the final show! Click the Save button.

Adaptec Toast: Burn CD
Prepare to burn a CD containing the new presentation. Still photographs and artwork will be securely embedded in the PDF document, but movie and sound files will be links and must be ncluded separately on the CD. (This is the only copyright protection security problem the process creates, but it is one Adobe should fix, by allowing these files to be embedded in Acrobat, if possible.)

When burning the CD, choose the hybrid (cross-platform) format and name files using the ISO 9660 filename conventions. In Acrobat, select the Help menu and Acrobat Guide for details, which can be found under the heading: Distributing PDF Documents on a CD. After you’ve burned the first CD, test it on several Macs and PCs at different monitor resolutions to make sure it works. Be prepared to make revisions and repairs.

Some recipients might not be multi-media prepared. You legally can include copies of the installers for Acrobat Reader for the Mac and PC on the CD, along with Apple’s free QuickTime Installer, or provide links to the appropriate Web sites for downloading the applications. Prepare a Read Me file that provides instructions for using the CD and PDF file. Use your favorite CD-writing software to create the cross-platform disc.

To make a good first impression, you’ll probably want to use CDs with no imprinted (manufacturer’s) logos. To highlight my presentation, I used Photoshop to create a CD cover with inside jacket, and printed copies on semi-glossy paper using an Epson StylusPhoto 2000p inkjet printer. To ensure reliable operation, I stick with Verbatim, TDK, or Eastman Kodak blank discs with durable protective coatings (preferably gold or silver on both sides for aesthetic reasons, which can be difficult to find). The price of discount brands are attractive, but the dye coatings used by some manufacturers are so thin that the discs may not be readable by some CD or DVD-ROM players.

The final CD contents should include:

1. The Acrobat PDF file.
2. Linked Movie and Audio files.
3. Copies of the latest Mac and Windows Acrobat installers.
4. Copies of the latest Mac and PC QuickTime installers or links to these installers in the ReadMe file.
5. Read Me file with CD instructions, copyright information, author information, system requirements (64 MB of RAM or more), viewing information that includes display calibration and RAM recommendations (16MB or more for Acrobat).

Read more by George Wedding

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