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williamb46580945
Participating Frequently
January 8, 2023
Answered

Alternative to Blurb to print Lightroom Books?

  • January 8, 2023
  • 2 replies
  • 1223 views

The newest version of Lightroom is fantastic, particularly the "Book Module". I love the layout options in the Book Module, but for some unexplained reason, it seems to only work well with a single source printing vendor, namely Blurb. While you can export the final layout as a .pdf, the  limitation created by the unique sizes makes it largely unusable with a printing service other than Blurb.   Is Blurb owned by Adobe, or is there some type of kickback arrangement here?  We all pay Adobe a fair amount of money each month, and it seems as though they should be looking out for our best interests, rather than a single source third party vendor.   I hope I am mistaken here, but if true, Adobe should come clean here and disclose the exclusive arrangement and make it clear that the "Book Module" is more of a third party plug-in from an outside source, and may only be fully functional if you use Blurb to do your printing. I have nothing against Blurb, but their pricing, and breadth of services and sizes is not competitive with other printing vendors. 


Are my concerns here misplaced? Is there a work around that would allow me to routinely use the layout functions in "Lightroom Book Module" with other printing companies?

 

This topic has been closed for replies.
Correct answer dj_paige

Is Blurb owned by Adobe, or is there some type of kickback arrangement here?

 

No, but they are business partners.

2 replies

TheDigitalDog
TheDigitalDog
Inspiring
January 8, 2023
quoteAre my concerns here misplaced?

 


By @williamb46580945

 

Yes. 

Any printer worth its salt should be able to use this:

Author “Color Management for Photographers" & "Photoshop CC Color Management/pluralsight"
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williamb46580945Author
Participating Frequently
January 8, 2023

Thanks, but I don't think I want to leave it to the printer to try and resize the file to make it fit their standard sizes and evaluate the color changes imposed by switching to CMYK.  

So how would one go about using the Book Module in Lightroom to do a book layout for a standard 8.5x11 landscape book to send to another printer? Blurb uses a different 8x10 size, so it is not offered as an option.  If we can solve that problem, the next is how to then view the final .pdf in Photoshop to change to CMYK and make any necessary changes?

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williamb46580945Author
Participating Frequently
January 8, 2023
quote

Thanks.  Interesting you say that the printer should be doing the CMYK conversion.  BookBaby specifically warns against having them do it. They correctly point out that changing from RGB to CMYK can cause some color changes, and if they are you may or may not want to make adjustments before they print it.  


By @williamb46580945

 

ALL the on-demand printers (Indigo, Xeikon, NexPress) and those that Blurb and many other print providers use, output from CMYK. How RGB becomes CMYK is key here.

LR only outputs RGB. A CMYK conversion must take place at some point. 

Bookbaby is wrong in this case, so perhaps you'll tell us exactly what kind of printer they use. 

Blurb absolutely uses CMYK for output at some point. They even provide a bogus CMYK profile for "soft proofing" which is a joke: The Blurb ICC profile is definitely GRACoL2006 Coated1, right down to the paper white L*a*b*. What they're using is essentially a copy of the IDEAlliance GRACoL profile and has little to do with how they're actually printing.

I have measured all the papers Blurb provides, and just the papers alone are not even close to GRACol 2006. In fact, the deltaE differences in just the two most different papers are nearly dE4!


Bookbaby has never said anything about LR.  They do provide the following info for Photoshop:

 

"We use one primary ICC color profile all of our CMYK press output; the file is AVL CMYK 2012 - GRACoL2006_Coated1v2.icc and was included in the .zip file."

 

I could probably do everything in Photoshop using the proper profile, but doing the layouts there seems far more complicated than in the LR Book Module.  I have never used Bookbaby, but they are a large printing company and the cost of printing orders of 100 or more books seems to be far less than half of the price of Blurb.

dj_paige
dj_paigeCorrect answer
Legend
January 8, 2023

Is Blurb owned by Adobe, or is there some type of kickback arrangement here?

 

No, but they are business partners.

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    williamb46580945Author
    Participating Frequently
    January 8, 2023

    If the "Book Module" is effectively just a "Plug-In" almost exclusively for Blurb, shouldn't that be disclosed with some kind of warning?

    dj_paige
    dj_paige
    Legend
    January 8, 2023

    I am not a lawyer, I don't know.

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