Having trouble exporting a Booklet with the proper spreads

[daniell49157318]

So way back, the way I used to print booklets in InDesign was fairly straight forward by printing the booklet into PDF format. After numerous years, I attempted to do again that recently and had several issues.

1. PDF is now gone which I understand is an Mac OSX security measure, so the next best option looked like it would be to print a PostScript file and then use Adobe Destiller to convert that to PDF if need be.
2. When I actually attempted this, there were a couple issues.
   1. First, the title slide would always render blank
   2. The PostScript file would still only export each page by itself rather than export the entire Spread. For this case, we wanted to print onto 11x17 so we could fold it into an 8.5" x 11" booklet. Maybe there was logic in there that identifies this..? But it definintely wasn't intuitive.

Am I missing something here? Should have been a simple job.

[Migintosh]

Why do you need an imposed PDF?

[Eugene Tyson]

InDesign is not a great programme for impositions.

Export to PDF and use the Print Booklet from the File>Print Dialog.

https://helpx.adobe.com/ie/acrobat/using/ways-print-pdfs.html

[Derek Cross]

"PDF is now gone which I understand is an Mac OSX" – this is not true. Your suggested practice to use Distiller for creating a PDF is obsolete.

For sending PDFs to commercial printers from InDesign, the recommeneded workflow is to select PDF/X-4, choose Pages (not Spreads), tick Crop Marks and tick Use Document Bleed Settings. Your printer will do the imposition.

[rob day · Accepted solution]

When I actually attempted this, there were a couple issues.

To reliably create Print Booklet postscript files you need the Adobe PDF 9.0 PPD installed. Also make sure your page count is divisible by 4, and check Print Blank Pages in Print Settings:

[daniell49157318]

Looks like that was the solution to my specific problem! I was missing the Adobe PDF 9.0 PPD, so the result was messed up when using "Device Independent".

The solution from Derek seems sound too. I tend to stay digital these days, so my experience working with printers is definitely outdated.

[rob day]

The solution from Derek seems sound too.

Yes, Print Booklet is only useful if you are printing in house. You would never want to deliver imposed spreads to a printer—you wouldn't know the press details needed for proper imposition.

[marezj2012]

Hi. I was looking up how to deliver a print ready file for booklet but there is No Way to do that?