Improve "Book" Printing

[efc]

Currently using the "Book" option in the "Document Layout" function of the Affinity Publisher print dialog box only results in "signatures" of a single sheet. But this is very uncommon in publishing. Usually signatures are gathered of more than one sheet, often 2, 3, or 4 sheets (or more, in some cases). It would be wonderful if the "Book" option for Affinity Publisher included a "number of sheets per signature" option which offered options from 1-8 sheets. Then I could print a book from Affinity Publisher and properly sew and glue it myself.

It is frustrating that currently Affinity Publisher requires third party tools to accomplish this, and many of those tools are not very polished. I have seen, for example, Bookbinder's Collator on the Mac App Store, but it is pretty odd in its UI. Affinity could do much better with a single selection for signature sheet options. If anyone has other suggestions of third party tools to accomplish this while waiting for a feature like this, please share!

[Old Bruce]

Imposition is something that is done by Pre-Press workers. There are people here on this forum with experience working in such environments and there is a consensus among them that people handing over imposed files results in more work than people giving single page PDFs. I don't recall ever being asked to deliver an imposed file..It is a niche market. Many many more people ask for Right to Left text input than ask for the ability to impose files. 

In my opinion there is no need for Affinity to add this, I believe it would result in many more mistakes than successes. Just my opinion

[efc]

Yes, of course. But the current "Book" feature in "Document Layouts" is itself also useless from a pre-print point of view. This is not the point of the current feature or of my request. I am asking for this because in my own workflow I would like to produce in-house something as close to the final book as possible. I will print, cut and assemble the book just to see what problems I notice from holding the object in my hand.

The current feature is meant to allow the user to produce something close to the final product as a means of output. It is a PRINTING feature, not a PDF to the printer feature. I'd just like it to be a slightly more capable printing feature.

[Old Bruce]

I think you may be confusing Printer Drivers with Affinity's software. Can you see the same sort of options if you choose to print from ... say Microsoft Word or any Word Processor?

[efc]

No, macOS allows programs to add panes to the print dialog and Affinity Publisher does this to provide the "Document Layout" option which includes this "Book" feature. This is an Affinity Publisher feature, not a feature of the operating system. It does not appear in the print dialog of other software.

[fde101]

I have two major issues with the way that imposition is currently implemented in Publisher.  One is the limitation expressed here (only one sheet per signature with the book mode).  The other is the fact that it is only available when printing and not when exporting.

 

Granted they didn't need to offer the feature at all, but if they are going to do so, it seems kind of silly to saddle it with these seemingly arbitrary limitations.

[garrettm30]

On 12/9/2021 at 12:21 PM, efc said:

If anyone has other suggestions of third party tools to accomplish this while waiting for a feature like this, please share!

I regularly use Create Booklet 2 for our in-house printing needs. It is available on the Mac App Store. Here is the website of the developer: https://www.thekeptpromise.com/CreateBooklet/

[efc]

Thanks for the pointer @garrettm30. I may end up going that way myself. But I also really believe that this is something Publisher should be able to do for itself.

[jessq]

I downloaded Publisher to try it out yesterday. After laying out my book, I came here to look for instructions on how to do this and lay out the book, and it's disappointing that I'll need to download additional software in order to print anything. I do appreciate the suggestions!

[Fixx]

On 1/31/2022 at 4:44 PM, jessq said:

I'll need to download additional software in order to print anything

No you don't. Printing works just fine (RGB print mode can present some tonal problems though). If your printer machine supports booklet mode in-printer you can do that also. If it does not, Create Booklet 2 helps.

[John Kay]

Or you could use the method I use to publish. Print out the whole document as an A5 booklet on A4 paper. Cut the pages out as separate pages using an old school type guillotine cutter and perfect fan bind them with PVA glue.

John

[Mr. Kronborg]

I was looking for the same feature. Right now I have a trial version Affinity and love the features of this app. But without the possibility to print signatures I do not want to buy this.
"Old Bruce" is asking, rather impolite I think, if other apps are offering this print feature. Yes - Microsoft Word is offering this. So that will be my go-to-too in the future. Too bad when Affinity has so many other good features.

[Komatös]

@Mr. Kronborg

You could use an appropriately styled image file to insert into your documents.

[jessq]

@Mr. Kronborg

I've since found a free tool for imposing! Now I can export files from affinity normally, and then impose them. This may help you and others who find this thread and well, even if it's not within Affinity Publisher.

https://momijizukamori.github.io/bookbinder-js/