Most of the printing companies I work with request native InDesign files for the print job. These native files allow them to more easily fix things in the layout before sending it to press. While reviewing the proof of a recent print job, I noticed something in the proof that I wanted to change. Typically there are two choices when making a change to a printer’s proof:
- Tell the prepress department what the change is and have them make it.
- Submit a brand new layout file.
But what if there was a third alternative? Having worked in prepress departments, I want to share with you a common scenario. For designers, the proofing process in a print job goes something like this.
- Designer submits a layout file to the printer.
- Prepress department sends proof back to designer.
- Designer has a change to their layout and submits a brand new layout file to the printer.
- Prepress department creates new proof.
However, in reality, this scenario looks a bit different from within the dark cave of the prepress department. Here’s what they see.
- Designer submits a layout file to the printer.
- Prepress department spends hours fixing the file by doing things such as: adding bleed, slightly adjusting placement of items so that the printed piece folds correctly, swapping out customer’s corrupt fonts with a non-corrupt version, swapping out customer’s low-res raster logo with a vector version of the logo, fixing rich black text to plain black text, and correctly mapping spot colors so that the job doesn’t require 17 colors of ink.
- Prepress department sends proof back to designer.
- Designer has a change to their layout and submits a brand new layout file to the printer.
- Prepress department curses in angst.
- Repeat step 2.
- Prepress department creates new proof and submits to designer.
If the changes are simple (such as fixing a typo), let me be clear that the prepress department generally prefers make the changes. However, if the changes are more significant, and you’re a designer about to submit a brand new layout file to your prepress department during the proofing round, I have one word for you… STOP.
While in theory, submitting a new file might seem like a helpful thing to save the prepress department some time, in reality this can often cause them much more work for the prepress staff. Having worked in prepress departments, I need to let you in on a little secret: prepress technicians have to fix nearly all of your files. In the shops I’ve worked at, there is usually one hour of prepress time built into the price of every job. But for some extra special customers (like the ones who are apt to lose their own logo files), the print shops might add even more prepress time into the quote.
So, back to the proofing dilemma: if submitting a brand new layout file causes the prepress department more work (with the potential of a price increase for the added time required), what then is an an acceptable alternative to resubmitting your entire live InDesign layout? I submit to you: InDesign snippets.
InDesign snippets allow the designer to make changes to a small portion of the layout, and then submit just that portion of the layout to the prepress department. This allows all the prepress staff to not have to redo all the prep work they initially did on the layout file.
But for those of you who are wondering, “What is a snippet?”, take a moment and read this article by Anne-Marie Concepcion, Who’s Using Snippets?
A couple of things to keep in mind when submitting a snippet: if you are using fonts and images that weren’t used in the original layout, be sure to provide those as well.
If you work in a prepress department, I’d love to hear your feedback on this idea.
This article was last modified on December 30, 2021
This article was first published on March 2, 2013
Commenting is easier and faster when you're logged in!
