Script for creating eProof

[CEES SMIT, Inc.]

Hi who could help me with the following.

We are a print shop and receive a lot of pdf files that we then drag into a template in Indesign. We manually type in width, height, quantity, what colors are used, material type, finishing, and export as pdf for client to review and approve.

Is there a way to automate this process, dragging our production ready files into a script to auto generate an eProof with all the values mentioned? I can imagine sizes and colors are embedded in the metadata. Not sure about quantity, material, finishing, and also no idea how to deal with files that are created at a percentage and not 100%. We still like to show the true size in the proof.

Thanks, any help or direction is appreciated.

[brianp311]

You can access any InDesign link's metadata with ...link.linkXmp

You can also parse the PDF file for the relevant info. Not sure where "material type", "finishing" and "quantity" would come from. Where do you get that info now? 

You could have a script run through ID that looks in a folder, opens a template, places and sizes the PDF, extracts any relevant metadata into a defined slug area and export to a desired destination with custom filenaming. This would be a non-trivial amount of work, though, probably outside the scope of what you'll find here. Feel free to PM if you'd like to discuss further. 

[Colin Flashman · Accepted solution]

I have a free script that can add measurement units to the PDF once placed at the correct size - Add measurements to selected objects - https://colecandoo.com/scripts/

Mind you I'm in Australia so it is best suited to metric. A fellow scripter has a similar script that may assist if mine is unable to assist: https://www.drscripto.com/indesign-add-measurements/

[CEES SMIT, Inc.]

Thank you for your reply. I tried both and they do both work very well. The only thing is since we print very large format print, I have to place it scaled on a page. It would be nice somehow to be able to have these measurments noted as true size will be.

Ideally I would love to see both inches and cm.

[CEES SMIT, Inc.]

Here is an example of what our eProofs look like: Example eProof 

All information is added manually. As you can see we list both inches and centimeters because our clients are in the US but our production is in Europe.

Also colors used in the linked file are searched in swatches and then listed manually on the bottom left.

If somehow there is a script possible for these that would be amazing.

P.S. Not sure if this is also applicable on multi pages and/or multiple selections at once. A lot of time we make multi page eProofs with a lot of files.

[CEES SMIT, Inc.]

Thank you for your reply.

"material type", "finishing" and "quantity" are added manually, but we can make it so that the standard is whatever material and finishing are mostly used, and QTY can be changed easily too.