Dov, one clarification/question regarding your advice for screen shots... In my commercial printing experience, I found TIFF to be a great option for bitmap files including screen shots. However, I always recommended staying away from the ZIP compression option. Though a "lossless" format, both compression and scaling tended to horribly slow down our RIP process. Though not much of an issue for small files, there also isn't much advantage to compressing such small files, either.
In my experience with large full-color CMYK images, the ZIP compression saved roughly 15% of the file size. For that smaller size, the RIP time would often increase by a factor of 4x or 5x. Scaling the image within the application (with the exception of InDesign) would also slow the RIP. In each case, the application passes the processing (decompression, scaling, and rotating) off to the RIP. If we're all saving to PDF & printing the PDF, then most RIP's will hardly hiccup, and given the speed of most PDF generation, it's doubtful you'll be troubled by a (statistically) slower conversion. Lesson: Convert to PDF with appropriate settings prior to printing. Back to scren shots: From my point of view, if saving to PDF the compression is unnecessary, as you can choose to compress in the Distilling process. If sending for commercial print, then the file savings is likely outweighed by additional RIP (processing) time. For screen captures, my clients have the best success simply pasting from SnagIt, or their application of choice. As the files would almost never be modified in a bitmap editor, but simply re-captured, the image on disk is a bit redundant. Anyone care to comment on the pro's and con's of simply pasting SCREEN CAPTURES only? Matt Sullivan GRAFIX Training, Inc. 888/882-2819 -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Dov Isaacs Sent: Sunday, January 28, 2007 12:48 AM To: Sean; framers@lists.frameusers.com Subject: RE: High quality images I must strongly disagree with ANY advice to resample screen shots at any stage of the workflow prior to the RIP. Although this might not be intuitive, upsampling a screen shot in Photoshop (or name whatever tool you like) prior to importing or placing into FrameMaker (or name your favorite layout program) can indeed lead to lossiness. Despite what many print service providers will tell you, all images are resampled at the RIP (whether downsampled or upsampled) to match the combination of the device's actual resolution and the screening algorithms in use. And such resampling is typically of quality comparable to the best you can do in Photoshop. Since resampling is done at the RIP anyway, doing a "manual" upsampling prior to the RIP process may cause real content in your image to be lost. For screen shots, such data lossiness can yield really crufty results. And such extra resampling prior to the RIP process violates the "reliable PDF workflow" principles. - Dov _______________________________________________ You are currently subscribed to Framers as [EMAIL PROTECTED] Send list messages to [EMAIL PROTECTED] To unsubscribe send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] or visit http://lists.frameusers.com/mailman/options/framers/archive%40mail-archive.com Send administrative questions to [EMAIL PROTECTED] Visit http://www.frameusers.com/ for more resources and info.
