Your wait staff for the evening.
11/09/2005
POS PC
I've finished all the conversions from RGB -> Output Sharpener -> CMYK -> Adjustment Levels -> 8-bit so it can be saved as JPG for the calendar. And the biggest pain in the you-know-where is my POS computer which wasn't always a POS. But for what I'm doing now is. And I just can't afford a new one this year.
It was fine when my Photoshop needs were simple, but with lots of layers - it is slow as you-know-what.
Really freakin' annoying since now the most time-consuming part of what I'm doing is waiting for the POS PC to do its' thing.
I still need to upload all the new images, and then order another calendar. God only knows how long it will take for the new calendar to arrive (still don't see the previous one as shipped).
At this point - I'm sort of leaning towards dealing with a printer in the States who can do a short run, say 500. I have one printer in mind - who was helpful with the specs for Lulu and when this is over I may contact him for a quote.
It is really wonderful to actually speak with the actual printer who will do your work as opposed to the monolithic (sp?) Lulu. How about actually being able to choose the paper you want to use? Good God. What a concept. I don't think the time with Lulu is wasted as I've learned a fair amount about offset printing and workflow for same, but egads - I wish their turn-around time was quicker.
Maybe I shouldn't talk because my own turnaround time for prints is getting worse and worse - but if someone says, hey - I need this fast - then I do it fast.
* * *
Terrible day with the calendar. I went through the conversion to CMYK and uploaded all the jpgs - which took about 45 minutes to upload with no progress bar, just the infernal blinking of the hard drive light - and then the thing is converted by Lulu to PDF and guess what - looks like pure cyan tint.
So I'm figuring that at least for the calendar, where you don't have control over the PDF conversion settings - you'd better just give 'em RGB like they say. Books may be different since you can do your own conversion to PDF.
Anyway - I need to use the original RGBs again, though this time with what is hopefully proper sharpening settings (this is taking the whole day so far).
May be time to pick up a bottle of Vodka.
* * *
6:30 pm.
Okay. Everything looks fine now, at least in the PDF. Now I'm going to wait for the first copy of the calendar (basically the same as what I did today but without output specific sharpening). So if all works out I'll have one slightly soft version and one sharp version (or if they apply sharpening after all: one sharp one, and one over-sharp one).
* * *
Tomorrow back to the real world: developing film and printing.
It was fine when my Photoshop needs were simple, but with lots of layers - it is slow as you-know-what.
Really freakin' annoying since now the most time-consuming part of what I'm doing is waiting for the POS PC to do its' thing.
I still need to upload all the new images, and then order another calendar. God only knows how long it will take for the new calendar to arrive (still don't see the previous one as shipped).
At this point - I'm sort of leaning towards dealing with a printer in the States who can do a short run, say 500. I have one printer in mind - who was helpful with the specs for Lulu and when this is over I may contact him for a quote.
It is really wonderful to actually speak with the actual printer who will do your work as opposed to the monolithic (sp?) Lulu. How about actually being able to choose the paper you want to use? Good God. What a concept. I don't think the time with Lulu is wasted as I've learned a fair amount about offset printing and workflow for same, but egads - I wish their turn-around time was quicker.
Maybe I shouldn't talk because my own turnaround time for prints is getting worse and worse - but if someone says, hey - I need this fast - then I do it fast.
* * *
Terrible day with the calendar. I went through the conversion to CMYK and uploaded all the jpgs - which took about 45 minutes to upload with no progress bar, just the infernal blinking of the hard drive light - and then the thing is converted by Lulu to PDF and guess what - looks like pure cyan tint.
So I'm figuring that at least for the calendar, where you don't have control over the PDF conversion settings - you'd better just give 'em RGB like they say. Books may be different since you can do your own conversion to PDF.
Anyway - I need to use the original RGBs again, though this time with what is hopefully proper sharpening settings (this is taking the whole day so far).
May be time to pick up a bottle of Vodka.
* * *
6:30 pm.
Okay. Everything looks fine now, at least in the PDF. Now I'm going to wait for the first copy of the calendar (basically the same as what I did today but without output specific sharpening). So if all works out I'll have one slightly soft version and one sharp version (or if they apply sharpening after all: one sharp one, and one over-sharp one).
* * *
Tomorrow back to the real world: developing film and printing.
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