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Resizing pictures?
BookSmart
Hi Ben; Agreed – for the purposes of BookSmart, there is no need to convert from 240dpi to 300dpi in PS – IF that’s all you’re going to do, AND you have an understanding of the relationship between DPI & Image Size etc. That said, I always START with 300dpi, so I know what my optimum image sizing is going to be, and then work from there… The "bicubic" tools all have a differing purpose… Best to go to the HELP menu in PS & read-up so you have an understanding of what they do, but, in short; - Bicubic – Best for smooth gradients - Bicubic Smoother – Best for Enlarging / UP-sizing - Bicubic Sharper – Best for Reduction / DOWN-sizing Cheers; Lee
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automatic pagination - post edit
BookSmart
Haraldo; Are you saying that the drop-down menus for editing Footers don’t work for you? If so, report it to Blurb’s Tech Support here… They are pretty good at fixing up these glitches… AuntCarolyn; When you say "...it won’t do a thing…"; you know that you have to re-set the Footer to show "Page Number" – right? Then, you can set Pagination… As it is – you have a "don’t display anything" command in place! Also, the Pagination will only display within the book itself. The Page navigator panel will continue to show the "true" page number/count… If that still doesn’t work for you, then use the same link above to report the problem to Blurb… Lee
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there is ink where it should be white - first book: satisfied, but not b...
Book Printing
For printing problems – you should contact Blurb’s Order Support here… Lee
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Title Page problems
BookSmart
To contact Blurb; Go to HELP (at the head of this page) , Search FAQs, and you’ll see a string of "Contact" bars; select Tech Support… - Black background; works OK for me… What do you mean by "copy block" ? - Back cover: Just select a cover template that allows you to place your small image wherever you want… Use the templates with grey areas for images… Then just use the Zoom Slider & other placement tools to position your image where you want it… Hope that helps; Lee
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automatic pagination - post edit
BookSmart
Haraldo; Where it says "Page Number" and "This Page Only" there are drop-down menus… Click on the arrows to pull them up, and select away… I suggest you start by deleting all content from the Footers, and Apply to All, then you can re-set and re-start your page numbering, or other Footer contect at will… Lee
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Resizing pictures?
BookSmart
NOTE: The Yellow Warning Sign ONLY triggers IF print resolution falls BELOW 150DPI… and… with respect… at 150DPI – you are NOT OK! Haraldo; From your Home page, just scroll down and you will see your last 5/6 posts. Just click on the "Show All" button… Lee
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automatic pagination - post edit
BookSmart
Haraldo; In the "Page Navigator" pane at the bottom of the Edit window, right-click on the page where you want Pagination to start, and select "Start Pagination Here" (or some such…) If you are getting "4s" on all pages, it’s because you have hard-coded a page number in and have the Footer set to "Apply to All"... re-set it to "Apply Page Number"... That should do it… Lee
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Printed book adjustments help !
Book Design and Imaging
Hi sapata; Sharpening – yes – I generally push the on-screen image just to the point of being "over-sharpened", and that generally works for me in print… Over time, you get accustomed to how much you can push and what your end results will be. Try a few test prints… Dots – provided you are applying 300dpi, you should NOT be seing any dots! Pushing a 3000 pixel image into a 7×7 full bleed page will result in a DPI of 430+. All that will happen is that BookSmart will re-size the image for you back to 300DPI on upload, with the consequence that you will lose control over how that re-sizing is done, and what effect it will have on your image; so that is not the solution… Really you should not be seeing any dots! If it’s noticeable you might want to take it up with Blurb’s Order Support Team here… They will investigate any printing problems for you… The B3 process is aimed at professional book-makers. I would suggest you get a bit of practice in first before jumping in there… Cheers; Lee
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Panoramas (two page spread)
Tips and Tricks
Hello mtmt; Generating the 2-page spread really is not that difficult! I have done many… ...but… what other Pod vendor makes this easy? As far as I know there is simply no way to know what any gutter-loss will be, because of the varying book-size! All will differ! But on your point 2 – I agree whole-heartedly that Blurb ned to make "free-flow" templates available as a matter of priority… Cheers; Lee
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Resizing pictures?
BookSmart
Ben; Sorry; I meant to say… "dpi as a stand-alone measurement is largely irrelevant…" About time Blurb allowed us to edit our posts! Cheers; Lee
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Resizing pictures?
BookSmart
Hi Ben; dpi is largely irrelevant to BookSmart, and what you see as a "resolution" will vary dependant on the software you are using from 72, to 180, to 240 to 300 or more… What really matters is pixel dimensions… Take a look at this thread… which sets out to explain these things… (Hope it’s not too basic for you…) IF you decide to re-size your images in PS to 300dpi (and there is no need to do so, once you have an understanding of resolution), then just make sure that the "Resample Image" box is UN-checked! That will preserve the full pixel dimensions, and only vary the print dimensions… Cheers; Lee
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Resizing pictures?
BookSmart
Hi Ben; Well, I think you have two options… - Easy one; instead of using the "full-bleed" page, use the "almost full-bleed" layout right next-door to it. This will give you a page layout with a small "space" all round the image container. You can then use BookSmart’s own "Borders" to append a "box" to your image. (Borders CAN’T be used in layouts where the image bleeds to any edge.) - Hard one; you need to learn how to create a new blank image in PhotoShop, and then how to use "Layers" to pull images on top of the [new blank image] background layer, and then how to apply the various features (Frames, Drop-Shadows, Text etc. etc.] contained within PhotoShop. A very steep learning curve; but well worth the effort! Scott Kelby’s books are very good for learning PS, and there are variations for whatever flavour of PS you are using… Just enter "Scott Kelby PhotoShop" in Amazon… Cheers; Lee
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Don't wasts your money here!
Tips and Tricks
Hi Kristina; I think I should point you first here… Hopefuly that will answer a lot of your questions… I’m sorry – but I don’t know what you are referring to when you say "...there’s a place where you can "export" files and maximize the pixels and quality…" That seems to be referring to a whole bunch of different things! If you can either point me in the direction of where you saw this, or, expand a little, I’ll try & provide some help… Just because you have modified an image does not mean the quality is degraded; but there are things you can do to maximise retention of image quality… The "benefit" of going through those hoops will depend largely on the quality of the original image… If, for example, the image is from a "Point & Shoot" compact, then little needs to be done to those in post-processing, and little can be done to preserve quality… On the other hand, if the image is from a decent D-SLR then there is MUCH benefit in taking as much care as possible… Again, a little more info would be helpful to point you in the right direction… Anyhow, take a look at the link above, and then come back if you have more questions… but… a request… PLEASE don’t just append them to this thread. It helps when searching the forums for answers to keep posts "on-topic"... so… best to append to either a related topic, or, start a new thread… Cheers; Lee
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Table of Contents
BookSmart
Hello Mapletree; - BookSmart hates formated Word text and in general terms can’t cope. You should almost always use the "import as plain text" routine, and format within BookSmart itself… - There are no automated "Table of Contents" facilities. You have to build them yourself. - I have not found a way to "split-justify" text. You need to use a two column layout to do what you want, with the left coloumn left-justified, and the right column right-justified. Hope that helps; Lee
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error on upload
BookSmart
Hello albachocolat; This is definately one for the tech guys at Blurb… Contact them here… Good luck; Lee
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Panoramas (two page spread)
Tips and Tricks
Hi Marc; And half the world can’t think in terms of cm or mm… Next you’ll be wanting us to do away with our miles, pints, pounds & ounces, sterling & imperial measurements… aaahhh – I must be getting old! Metric – Ugh! Cheers; Lee
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automatic pagination - post edit
BookSmart
Hello Haraldo; I’m not sure I understand your question… You have two choices; - Allow BookSmart to automatically page-number. It re-computes each time you add, insert or delete pages… - Use the "Pagination" tool. You can apply that – or re-apply it at any time you want. So if you are adding, deleting, moving pages a great deal, then I would leave the whole Pagination issue until you have completely finished your book, and then apply "Pagination" as the final step! Does that answer your question? Lee
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Printed book adjustments help !
Book Design and Imaging
Hello sapata; Printed images (normally) require more "sharpening" than displayed images. Use your photo-editing software to apply some "Unsharp Mask", and play around with the results. It’s a very subjective issue… Some people (like me) prefer sharp images… others are content with softer images… added to that, you almost can’t apply a "universal" factor across all images, because they are all different! However, I think you are possibly describing something a little different when you say "...you can see the dots more clearly than other books…" That sounds to me like a pixellation issue, which would be related to image resolution! If that’s the case, then you also need to take a look at your original image sizes, and the containerrs you’re dragging them into… If you "stretch" the original too far, then you will see pixellation arising… As for making changes; although you don’t have to delete the first upload, it saves any complications arising if you do, specially if the first upload is no longer required… Good luck; Lee
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Please help a newbie >>> two page photo spread?
Book Design and Imaging
Hello jcastle; YEP – you got it in one! That’s exactly what we mean by "overlap"... Cheers; Lee
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Final Result
Book Printing
Hello Kylie; First things first… Before you make ANY adjustments to your images, you should ensure that your monitor is calibrated. A non-calibrated monitor will only complicate matters when dealing with colour correction… (Search the forums for "calibrate" or "calibration") Next, there is NO one answer to ALL images as far as colour correction is concerned, since all images carry differing colour values… Although "auto-correct" tools will sometimes do a good job, they won’t always do a good job, so you need to use it very carefully – and not at all until you have a calibrated monitor! If you don’t know what your doing then I would start by simply making a small test book (you can do one of 20 pages) without making any adjustments to your images, so you have a starting point to go by… The importance of doing this is that a book printed commercially on a CMYK printer will generate images quite different to those from a regular print-shop on glossy photo paper… It’s a sttep learning curve if you want a "quality" product, but it’s worth ti in the end… Good luck; Lee
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Resizing pictures?
BookSmart
Hi Ben; The 5D Mk1 is a "full-frame" unit and produces images of c, 13Mp at c. 4400×2900 pixels… There are just sooooo many different aspect ratios and pixel dimensions around today that it would be an impossibility to produce templates to cater for all possible varients, and so, Blurb have chosen to produce "standard templates" that have a pleasing aesthetic appeal in comparison to the various book sizes on offer… There are two key reasons why you should re-size in PS first; - Overloading BookSmart with "over-sized" files will slow all processing down horrendously and will increase the upload processing time enourmously. If all images are pre-sized to fit the containers first, this keeps that overhead to a minimum… - Although BookSmart is pretty good at re-sizing files to fit (at 300dpi maximum) there are circumstances where "pixellation issues" present themselves. This is specially true if you want to drag a large sized image into a small container… Again, it’s best to do all re-sizing in PS first. You get a controlled result ! As to the "how to’s" of re-sizing; in PhotoShop, use "Image, Re-Size, Image Size". If you’re unfamiliar with the various options and tools available then read the HELP files. Make sure you work on COPIES of your images while you’re experimenting… Cheers; Lee
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"technical glitch"
BookSmart
Hello jfheenan; For these issues you should contact Blurb tech support directly… the are VERY good at responding… This is a user form. If you post a specific question, we can try & help you out, but a "generic" along the lines you describe doesn’t help! Good luck; Lee
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Just Received Book With Premium Paper
Book Printing
Hello Chronicler; That is REALLY good to hear! I am planning a simple 20 page test book at 13×11 with the new premium paper, in readiness for a large project I will be working on next year, and this gives me more encouragement to do so! Cheers; Lee
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Lost menu bar at bottom of page
BookSmart
Go to View on the Menu bar, and check "Page Navigator"... Lee
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THE SECOND BAD EXPERIENCE WITH BLURB: BUYER BEWARE
Ordering and Shipping
Pen4you; There will ALWAYS be users who have problems with ANY vendor ANYWHERE, for ANYTHING! I think you must balance these comments out against the HUGE number of books that get published that do NOT have any issues… Blurb’s Customer Service (IMO) is very good and very helpful… In the event of any printing issues arising, they will make good on their promise to rectify those problems… Apart from a binding issue I had with my first (test) book (which was put right – FoC), I have cpmpleted 4 large-sized landscape books and ALL have been near perfect! There’s always two-sides to every story! Cheers; Lee
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