InDesign Imposition Letter Half Page

[sherrera99]

I'm sorry, either I'm not interpreting the questions right, or the actual question is not here.

I have a 60 page document. Pages are 1/2 Letter size, tall orientation. I need to set this up with imposition, so that there are 2 pages on each side of an 8-1/2x11. I've played with these settings until I'm bleary-eyed. All I get is a .ps file that when I open in Acrobat DC, the pages are the wrong orientation and are cut off.

I want to end up with a PDF, 15 sheets of paper in landscape mode, printed front and back, so that when folded I end up with a 60 page booklet.

I suspect I'm missing something simple. Can some point me in the right direction? Thank you!

PS: Using InDesign 13.1 on MacOS High Sierra (10.13.6)

[Derek Cross]

Are you printing this yourself on your desktop duplex printer or putting it out to be printed by a commercial printer?

If it's the latter, then the printer will do the imposition from your single page PDF – they will supply a spec, if not choose PDF/X-4 from the InDesign Adobe PDF Presets, and under the Marks and Bleeds tab tick Crop Marks and tick Use Document Bleed Settings.

[sherrera99]

This size document, I normally send to a printer, but ... I do some smaller projects with the same issue!

I want to be able to create the pdf, and then make decisions on printing. Most of the time these are not complicated projects. Almost always black and white/grayscale.

So, do I do a print booklet? Do I export the file as a pdf?

I have not been successful on any front and to be honest with you ... I've been running in circles!

[Derek Cross]

I'm still not clear if you're printing yourself, if so, what maximum size sheet does your printer print and is it a duplex printer and what size in inches or mm is your trimmed page size* and does in include images that bleed?

* I'm in the UK so half letter doesn't mean much here, and the term is Portrait.

[sherrera99]

Thank you for being patient with me.

The paper is what we call letter size 8-1/2x11 inches. When creating the document, that is actually an option (Letter-Half). So the page itself is 5-1/2" wide x 8-1/2" tall. I want a pdf that puts those half pages 2-up, imposed. (the end result of these pages is that they are in landscape mode)

These are simple documents. no bleeds. There will be times that I'll print at home on my laser printer that will duplex 8-1/2x11 sheets of paper. But there are times when I will farm it out.

My goal is not so much where it's printed ... because it doesn't matter. I want a pdf. Then I can send it where ever I want. Again - much of this is text with some pics, but no bleeds, nothing fancy.

When I print a booklet ... I choose a postscript file. (because I can't print to pdf in InDesign). I doest' matter what booklet type I select. When I open the postscript file in Acrobat, it comes up in Portrait mode, with half of the right page cut off.

I suspect that I'm missing a very basic setting, but for the life of me I can't figure out where to find it.

I'm going to attempt to put my steps here...

1. Page setup on document is 60 pages Letter-Half (5.5x8.5 portrait) pic 1a

2. Print Booklet. 2-up Saddle Stitch, print to postscript file.

3. This is a preview of my settings. It looks ok, but what I can't see is what size paper this is!

4. So - I print it to the postscript file, open it up in Acrobat DC. and this is what I get ...

The file itself has the page cut off. So, messing around in Acrobat DC, I'm able to rotate the paper, but the image is still cut off.

So, I'm thinking I'm missing something really basic.

[Derek Cross]

What is the maximum size paper your printer will print and presumably it doesn't print to the edge of the sheet?

[sherrera99]

8.5x14", but I have 8/5x11" paper in the tray. (Brother laser printer - home office style)

[rob day]

You need to choose Print Settings... to setup the paper size and the PPD, which should be Adobe PDF 9.0 for printing to PDF

[caring_Rainbow5C41]

how do you convert the PPD to PDF 9.0?

the only option when i open print settings is "Device Independent"

[rob day]

See #5 here:

Re: Print booklet to post script does not work

[Srishti Bali]

Hi there,

I would like to know if the steps suggested above worked for you, or the issue still persists.

Kindly update the discussion if you need further assistance with it.

Thanks,

Srishti

[sherrera99]

I will. Slammed with work. I’ll get back to it when I can breathe. Soon! This is a problem I want to solve.

—

Susie Herrera

MacUser for Life

=^..=/////

[Erica Gamet]

Why are you unable to export to a PDF? And do you want any resulting PDF to be in printers spreads or readers spreads? Sorry to hit your question with more questions.