Import of Multi-Page PDFs and PDF Options

[CKPrints]

To whom it may  concern,

I have been using your Affinity Publisher since the beta came out last August. I work  in prepress and have been looking for an alternative to InDesign to set up proofing and manual impositioning for output. Needed one app to be able to quickly adjust images and vector graphics in submitted files instead of jumping around multiple apps. Resolved was the handling of separations. Love everything about it except for the following: Lack of import options for multi-page PDFs, does not recognize the built-in bleeds in PDFs and inconsistent nature of embedded typefaces in the PDFs being placed. Will these be resolved or should i look elsewhere?

Please advise. Gave a presentation to a group of 25 other designers and illustrators for my local PC Users Group (CDPUG.org) recently to advocate the merits of your Affinity app suite and give them some insight to their capabilities. Many promising aspects. Amazing first effort. Looking forward to hearing back from you.

[Engineer]

+1 here

This are the most important features for me!!

I would really like to know if there's some hope to see this functionality in the near future..

 

[walt.farrell]

On 8/2/2019 at 3:00 PM, CKPrints said:

Lack of import options for multi-page PDFs,

Can you explain that a bit more, and provide some examples of what you're looking for?

[Fixx]

4 hours ago, walt.farrell said:

Can you explain that a bit more, and provide some examples of what you're looking for?

You can open multipage PDFs easily. When you place them it is not so obvious how to handle them: you can place (or drag copies) PDFs and use context bar to select right pages, and page box of the placed PDF to show bleed. 

[CKPrints]

Apologies for the delay in responding to everyone. Thank You, Thank You Fixx! That did the trick. It was not immediately obvious until you pointed it out and I looked for the change in the context bar. YOU are the master! 

This is the last major piece of the puzzle in order to fully utilize Publisher in our Prepress workflow. Now if someone could show us how to save Swatch sets in assets so it can be used for multiple documents. : )

Edited August 8, 2019 by CKPrints

[CKPrints]

On 8/4/2019 at 8:33 AM, walt.farrell said:

Can you explain that a bit more, and provide some examples of what you're looking for?

In our prepress department, we use Publisher to check the dimensions, artwork and other factors for customer supplied files and set up a digital proof that gets emailed back to the client for review to ensure file accuracy and one more review before production. We ask that file submissions be in PDF format since the majority if not all apps can export to this. Some PDFs are multi-paged and/or have built-in bleed/trim data. InDesign displays a dialogue box in the import window that gives you various options for page range and media boxes to allow the user to import what is desired. Publisher does not display the import options in the same manner.

Thanks to user Fixx, i now know it is displayed in the context bar in keeping with the UI doctrine established by Affinity.

[Fixx]

3 hours ago, CKPrints said:

we use Publisher to check the dimensions, artwork and other factors for customer supplied files and set up a digital proof

How do you work around the limitation Publisher cannot use embedded fonts in PDF? Do you have all fonts available from customer? Also I heard even if the fonts are present type is not necessarily 100 % true to original.

[walt.farrell]

8 hours ago, CKPrints said:

Now if someone could show us how to save Swatch sets in assets so it can be used for multiple documents. : )

I don't think you can save them as Assets, but you can save them as Application palettes, which allows use across multiple documents. Or (if you're on a Mac) you can save them as System palettes.