Adobe InDesign CS has Live Preflighting; do I still need FlightCheck?
In response to this detailed post, which was well presented, by Rufus Deuchler, worldwide evangelist for Adobe Creative Solutions:
As the preflight inventors, U.S. Patented holders and with more than 14 years of experience, Markzware is in a unique position with vast resources and experience within the print, publishing and graphic markets.
It is our opinion that Adobe InDesign’s CS4 “Live Preflighting” feature, was a necessary inclusion within the InDesign application, mostly for an ‘insurance’ purpose. That is, whenever documents are created within Adobe InDesign CS and have a problem upon output, then Adobe can point to this feature – In other words; could it be this is more for Adobe Indesign’s printing insurance than that of the designers?
Years ago, Markzware developed an in-flight tool, FlightCheck Studio (originally HawkEye) which received rave reviews. However, in our experience we found designers that use InDesign, seldom use preflight. The reason being, performing ‘mechanical checks’ is not in a graphic designer’s or creative’s DNA. They design and create the best work they can to market and sell products, then as quick as the designer is finished with one project – they are off to the next! Designers and creatives, on average do not have time to preflight. (Or it is this type of attitude, “As a professional designer, I don’t make mistakes.”)
Now, many are asking the question: ‘Since InDesign has Live Preflighting do I still need FlightCheck Professional?’
The short answer; Yes
A longer answer can partially be found at InDesignSecrets.com:
In addition to the reasons cited above, Live Preflighting has shortcomings which include (From above link):
- Inability to check Four Color Text
- Inability to check Bleed/trim hazard
- Inability to check Profile Error reporting
- Inability to share the Preflight profile with Acrobat
- Inability to check Fonts not allowed
- Inability for Custom profiles to be shared and downloaded
- Inability to check Non-Proportional Scaling
- Overall Slow performance
FlightCheck Professional (tutorial video demonstrations) has been specifically engineered, not only for designers and creatives – but also print and publishing providers. What’s more FlightCheck, as a stand-alone application that bridges the communication gap between designers and print professionals.
For example, the “Inability to share the Preflight profile with Acrobat,” and “Inability for Custom profiles to be shared and downloaded” issues are solved by the FlightCheck Ground Control sets. Ground Controls (tut film) may be shared with anyone in the print workflow. Furthermore, FlightCheck is broad-based analyzing over 50+ file formats! These include Adobe InDesign, Acrobat PDF, Illustrator, Photoshop, QuarkXPress and many several others. (Your one-stop-app for preflighting all Adobe and other document types!)
For years, FlightCheck Professional has been second to none for all aspects of the workflow, from design to print. Adobe’s Live Preflight is certainly necessary, as part of a larger CS package.
I believe Adobe’s Live Preflighting is important and helps designers and creatives in several ways, including providing useful education on how to produce a properly prepared job for printing. I’m just wondering though if in fact InDesign users are actually using Live Preflight on that level? And, on the same token ‘Are printers receiving perfect files all of a sudden?’
To expect designers to use Live Preflight and be alerted to numerous, often technical, complicated problems and be expected to fix them after working long and hard on their design is a lot to ask. From my experience, the average designer will, at best, perform a surface check, then hand the digital piece to the production and/or print department for further ‘mechanical’ evaluation and correction. Or, just send “the job” to the print-shop.
I expect graphic designers and creatives to explore Live Preflight; hope they do, really. Once they become aware of it, then possibly they will be curious about FlightCheck and other preflight/postflight tools that have been in the marketplace for years. Some may be surprised to learn that FlightCheck can preflight Adobe CS Master Collection files, for instance. The fact remains that, not only do cautious pilots check before take-off, they also check during flight and after landing the plane.
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