Reply To: Index and transparency questions

Just in case this helps anyone:
I have just finished a book containing some hundreds of embedded images in Word documents, but also URLs and cross references. Flattening the pdf would have lost these links, but the images were all pngs with (apparent) transparencies, with the obvious effect on the text colours and boldness.
The simplest solution I could come up with, without risking getting some illustrations in the wrong places was as below.

1. Make separate copy of the Word doc and break into chapters.
2. Save as html, with each chapter in a separate folder.
3. Discard all except the graphics folders. Put these ready to link to the InDesign files.
4. Convert graphics to jpeg (I used Pixillion for this – very quick and easy).
5. Produce InDesign files from the original Word doc(s) and lay out as usual.
6. Link each embedded graphic to the corresponding jpg. Since the jpgs are numbered consecutively on extraction in Word, their numbers should match the Figure numbers in InDesign.

Still fiddly, but easier than unembedding the graphics from within InDesign, then converting each one and being sure to link the right ones despite the odd numbering.
The graphics can then be re-embedded or left as links.

I hope this may be of use to someone!

Chazz