Often just preflighting alone is not enough and here was an interesting post about an issue with Adobe’s InDesign Live Preflighting, which also brings up a good point about preflighting in general:

“Every linked file with a forward or backward slash won’t get collected and will even crash InDesign. I know… I know… you never use slashes in a file-name, right? Well neither do I. But that actually makes it even more dangerous because it’s not something I’m thinking about when I’m creating artwork and I always receive a lot of files from third parties.”
Source: http://www.graphicstart.com/item.php?itemid=1040443

The point being, this bug aside which surely will get fixed- you can better check everything that comes in, perhaps even with a stand-alone tool, such as FlightCheck Professional. The advantage there is FlightCheck can check the native images and files stand-alone, without the need to open Illustrator or Photoshop, for instance. We even have a little movie about using FlightCheck to check images:

Preflight Checking a batch of Images with FlightCheck

Artist in Residence for the Mojave National Preserve, US National Park Service Promotes Awareness Through Killen’s Photographic artwork.

SANTA ANA, California, October 1 , 2008 — Markzware, the leading developer of preflighting, data extraction and conversion software, today announced that it will be showcasing Bob Killen, artist in residence for the Mojave National Preserve, US National Park Service photographic artwork, of our national desert resources, at Graph Expo in Chicago from October 26-29, 2008 at booth #5255.

In order to promote awareness of our national desert resources Markzware has chosen Bob Killen’s breathtaking, photographic works of art…
To read the full press release, see:
http://www.markzware.com/marketing/press_release/html/2008-10-01-BobKillen-Art.php

In the last “Preflighting 101″ post we covered text issues in the entry entitled, “Preflighting 101 – Part 2; Common Issues- text“. Today we are delving into the ever important (both technically and communication wise) area of layout graphics images, which FlightCheck Professional checks with precision- after all, an image speaks a thousand words… I wonder how many words that is with today’s exchange rate, image filled, Internet world… anyway, back to the potential problems and solutions with images in your print-documents:

Preflighting 101-
II Common Preflight Problems

II b. Bitmap (Tiff) Image Problems
Problems with bitmap images often come up when preflighting. Some of the more common difficulties have to do with improper scaling and image resolution, incorrect color models, complex clipping paths and poor image quality.  Read more... (1900 words, estimated 7:36 mins reading time)

Mistakes do happen. Fonts, color and images quality are the prime culprits that damage smooth print workflows. These problems are just some of the topics covered as part of the Graphic Arts Institute [GAI] training program in San Francisco.

Located in the Northern California Print Center, which also is home to the Printing Industries of Northern California [PINC] and a number of other print-related businesses, the GAI’s in-plant uses a four-color 20-inch Heidelberg Speedmaster press to produce fliers, brochures, booklets and envelopes printed in print runs up to 8,000 units. Many of these printed pieces include information about PINC’s and GAI’s health program and health insurance program.

The GAI offers printing companies the opportunity to broaden their employees’ experience with electronic prepress, press and Web technologies. Along with the 20-inch press, the facility houses more than 30 computers, state-of-the-art software and a Creo CTP platesetter driven by a Delta RIP.

Michale Carling, executive director of the GAI, believes preflighting is an important first step toward eliminating print mistakes. One of the tools used at the GAI is Markzware’s FlightCheck. “We look for problems with fonts, images, CMYK vs. RGB and difficult gradients,” says Carling. The examination begins with a check of native files created by staff and students. Using FlightCheck is part of the training that students receive at the GAI facility.  Read more... (865 words, estimated 3:28 mins reading time)

Preflight, in the graphic arts sense, is the process of checking a digital document before it goes to plate, print or otherwise output (exported – such as to PDF). It traditionally is a way to check quality before going to the printing press, digital or otherwise, but can also be used to check online banners and gifs. Preflight is best done on the source document, such as those created in Adobe InDesign, Illustrator, QuarkXPress or Corel!Draw as some examples, before becoming a PDF (Portable Document Format). Similar to a pilot whom walks around and performs a pre take-off pre-flight check, preflighting for designers and prepress operators should be a must.

The term preflight was first used during a presentation in 1990 by Chuck Weger, a well know industry consultant. There were some early on postscript (rips) that interperted data and provided a preflight report of sorts. However the first true preflight application came from Markzware and was wisely called FlightCheck another term pilots also use.

Even before FlightCheck® was out on the market, Markzware applied for and was dully granted a U.S. Patent Number 5,963,641 – ‘Device and method for examining, verifying, correcting and approving electronic documents prior to printing, transmission or recording.’  Read more... (508 words, 1 image, estimated 2:02 mins reading time)

We have heard of many creatives and designers starting to use FlightCheck to check their web banners before posting.

This video explains the quick and easy process of batch checking images files to ensure either web or print quality. Users of Photoshop or other image editing tools, should love this one!