Re: crop marks in PDF for printing

[Urs Liska]

Am 04.11.2016 um 12:48 schrieb Federico Bruni:
> Il giorno ven 4 nov 2016 alle 11:56, Henning Hraban Ramm
> <address@hidden> ha scritto:
>> Am 2016-11-03 um 17:22 schrieb Federico Bruni <address@hidden>:
>>
>>>  Tomorrow morning I need to print a book and I've just been asked to
>>> add "crop marks" (I think this is the right expression) to the final
>>> PDF. IIUC crop marks are not needed when printing with normal
>>> printers, but it's needed for serious digital and offset printing
>>> machines.
>>
>> Hi Federico,
>>
>> even if you could solve the problem, it should not have been necessary.
>>
>> Crop marks are not needed for printing, but for cutting the final
>> product, independent of the printing method.
>
> I have a friend who works as graphic designer and he is taking care of
> the printing.
> He quickly explained to me that the printshop needs crop marks to cut
> the final product. If I've understood correctly, this cutting is
> needed when printing on special printers (which I've never seen).
> He also said that the "imposition software" (?) needs these crops.
>
>>
>> I guess your PDF pages are not bigger than those of your printed book
>> and you don’t have any elements dangling ("bleeding") over the edge?
>> Then there is no need for crop marks.
>
> Yes, initially I sent an A4 PDF generated by LilyPond, but my friend
> said that it was not correct.
> So I made a bigger PDF with crop marks and he said "Ok!".

In real life you come across all three sorts of requirements with print
shops:
* Plain document format
* Document plus bleeding area
* Document plus bleeding area plus crop marks

But as Henning said *actually* it is not needed that *you* provide any
of these. Either the printer/cutter combination can handle by itself or
the imposition software should be able to process the original document
(with the added benefit that the marks exactly match the expectations).

Best
Urs


>
>>
>> Even if your PDF pages are bigger than the intended printed pages,
>> you could easily define "trim box" and "bleed box" of the PDF. A
>> printshop that cannot handle these nowadays is no serious business.
>> But then they could do that for you, too.
>>
>> (BTW I studied typesetter and printing engineer, worked in printshops
>> for decades.)
>
> Well, I know nothing about it :)
>
> Thanks for sharing this information
> Federico
>
>
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