Creating a quality PDF
The quality of a published ad is dependent on the quality of the PDF submitted to us. As the process of creating a quality ad is the advertisers so is the responsibility of creating an appropriate PDF.
Desktop Publishing Applications:
A good PDF starts with the original ad. The ad should be built in an application that provides control over all aspects of the content like typography and color space. Applications like Adobe’s InDesign or Pagemaker, Multi-Ad Creator, or QuarkXPress will all provide excellent results.
Color
When building an ad all colors must be CMYK. This includes images used in the ad (that may have been created in a different application such as Adobe Photoshop), and any color used for type, background gradients, or elements such as bursts or borders.
Image Resolution
The images must have a high enough resolution to reproduce well on the press, but not so high that the file becomes larger that necessary. For continuous tone art a resolution of 150 dpi is ideal. Line art should be saved at 600 dpi.
Embedding Fonts
All the fonts used in the ad need to be embedded. This allows us to faithfully reproduce your ad without having to substitute fonts, a process that can alter the look of an ad. Font embedding occurs during the creation of the PDF in Acrobat Distiller.
Distilling
Once the ad has been built, checked for errors, and saved, it needs to be made into a PDF file. The Portland Press Herald/ Maine Sunday Telegram recommends you use Adobe Acrobat Distiller to convert your file. We also provide a Distiller “Job Options” file, and instructions for its use (See the "File Download" box to the right). The “Job Options” file contains pre-set options for things like font embedding and image sampling.
Important: Please do not use PDFwriter or the “print to PDF” feature of Mac OS X. These options are suitable for business documents, but not for documents intended to be reproduced on a press.
More Information
Learn more about PDF's and their creation. Visit PDF Zone and PDF Planet.