Mike Chaney's Tech Corner

Hi,

Something I remembered to have seen in the release notes one time. But I can't find it anymore.
This is my situation:

I've got many images that have to be printed on the centre of a small "page".
The white space around the image is not the same all around, so I can't use the border option.
I would like to put all these "pages" on one large roll of paper.
Of course I need edges at the size of the "pages" to cut them.

This is what I think I remember how to get edges or crop marks at the right place:
Create a page with template boxes at the size of the "pages".
Save this as a layout.
Place the images with the "Layout: predefined page set" option.

In this case the edges or crop marks should appear around the templates but they don't
They still mark the edges of the image.

What am I doing wrong? Or am I completely wrong and is this not possible anyway.

Please explain in more detail exactly what you are trying to accomplish.
What size pages? What size images, what size prints? Are all the prints the same size?
How many to a page?
Where approx. will they be located on the page; upper right, left, center, lower?
How many pages??
If the image is in the center of the page and not even, can you use the crop scissors to fill out the required size?

Any more information will help.

Fred

Fred,

What I read is "how do I create multiple images on one print page with unequal borders around them?".

And the rest describing a method that may work or not.

Something I would like to know too if it is an easier method than adding some extra canvas at one side of the image in Photoshop or elsewhere.
Nicest way would be an extra one or two side border feature in Qimage. But that doesn't exist.


met vriendelijke groeten, Ernst Dinkla

Try: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Wide_Inkjet_Printers/

Thanks for the help.
I am reading this: I've got many images that have to be printed on the centre of a small "page".
The white space around the image is not the same all around, so I can't use the border option.

He wants to print in the center, and then uses the singular, "the white space around the image" is not the same.
That sort of makes me wonder if he has various sized prints which are not the same from page to page.
I am confused at this point.
If he has multiple images on a page and wants to position them close to each other which would call for a thinner border on one side that could be accomplished by using freehand mode.

Maybe we will get clarification from him.
Stay well.
Fred

Hi Fred,

Ernst is giving the right idea. Described in an easier way.  ;)
With only a little difference:
All the frames must have the same size (with edges/crop marks).
Inside the frames I want to place images with different sizes, no cropping.

Before I used to add a border in Photoshop. But lately I had some problems with that solution.
I added a colour correction filter in Qimage. But then the borders were not white anymore  >:(
In the mean time I put the images (without border) centered on a small page and printed them to a file.
Next I could put all these images on a roll paper, with edges/crop marks at the right place.

This is my top wish for 5 years now.

Arjo,
I think there is confusion between a "page" and an "image".
Templates hold an IMAGE and therefore crop marks & guide lines apply to the image, not the page even  though the page may actually on a roll and not a separate sheet.
That is the way it works, crop and guide lines apply to the image; a template is equivalent to an image.

Ernst has said there is no way of having unequal borders in Q, if that were the case, you'd be on a winner  ;)

A workaround for this is to create a plain white image and place that behind the main image. Make the plain white image the same size as your page and use freehand mode in the full page editor. Position the white image central on the page and the main image as required. You'll get a double set of Guide Lines but that should not matter.
To make life easier with many images/pages, make a template with the above arrangement.
Terry.

Arjo,
I can move the images inside the template and thereby change the border on one side or the other, but I can't make the cutting guides appear at the template edges unless I use a border.
I add a border and now the cutting guides attach to the edges of the border.

After that I can go into the Full Page Editor screen and by tapping the arrow keys, move an image closer to its neighbor and thereby effectively changing the border size on one side.
One over laps the other.
It is tedious if you have a lot to do.
Fred

I thought of that too with the white underneath, but then I read: I added a colour correction filter in Qimage. But then the borders were not white anymore.

I figured Oh Oh... that wont work for him.

Maybe there's a compromise.?

Fred

So no solution for this yet I guess  :(

I'm running a print service. I'm looking for a fast solution.
Manually placing images on top of each other is too time consuming.
Fastest I could come up with is what I described.
Adding filters and then print to file.

IF unequal borders were implemented in Qimage, using the "B" setting, rather than "B+", would ensure all the "frames" were the same size.
Terry.

Right. I had that in mind too for this (Arjo's) case. The borders then not subject to color changes that affect the image.
Another function could be negative values in that extra 1-2 border feature so no 3 border setting is needed.

Not unlike Arjo I use a print filter to let the Z printers put gloss enhancer on the total image but not the borders, Economy mode. Then the canvas addition made in PS will get covered too so I can not use that. Then one either takes wider borders to be cut back or the crop marks are not used and the image is placed where some waste paper on the roll can be used to get the unequal border. The creation of templates, frames etc usually isn't worth the work if the job isn't repeated that often. And as described gives the same color issue.

An argument could be that Qimage isn't a desktop publishing tool but there's a twilight zone between document creation and plain image prints. I often need slightly more border underneath a print for signing. Last time I had to make 4 leperello's, each 8 images, next to one another on 44" wide paper and 16 feet long. I used Print to File to put 8 images after another with 5 mm border around each and at the sides, no crop marks, so the images with 10 mm in between. Then in PS I added 15 mm canvas to one side of the Leperello as there would be text written on that side. The 4 long images brought back in Qimage and 3 mm border added + dashed lines for manual cutting over the length. The 3 mm to chop off after the folding. Printing took a long time but was perfect. 550 MB per leperello, something like 2.3 GB in the print spooler. With unequal borders possible it would have been even easier. Using DTP software it would have taken more time and at printing not producing the Qimage quality.

met vriendelijke groeten, Ernst Dinkla

Try: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Wide_Inkjet_Printers/

I am probably wrong, but, this looks like something that could be solved by using batch, actions and canvas size in Photoshop.  Make an action to increase canvas size to page size,  Run it as a batch.  Then the edge should be the page size.

Hi, welcome to the forum, god to have you aboard  ;)
I don't think this would solve Arjo's problem as it's still another operation in the work flow. He's already doing the equivalent in Qimage by using print to file. Just looked back at the previous posts and in fact he said he tried that but ran into colour problems with the "white".
Terry.

I do not know if this would work, and maybe not a smooth enough workflow. If you apply a global filter to the image, to get the colour correction, it applies to all images, except ones with their own filter - so the help file says. If you create a white background image, and associate a dummy filter to that - a filter that does nothing - then I would expect that when you position the image on top of the white one, then no colour correction should be applied to the white parts when the page is printed.

Best wishes,

Ray

Thank you all,

I think we can close the discussion. I'm not looking for workarounds. As I wrote before I've got a working one.
As I wrote in the first post. I thought I remembered a remark written by Mike somewhere that in one of the updates cropmarks were placed at the edges of the template boxes rather then around the image when using the "Layout: predefined page set" option.
But I guess I'm completely wrong.

I do agree that there's no need to turn Qimage into a dtp package. There's good software for that already.
But IMHO my question is more related to printing than to publishing.

Maybe most Qimage users work with sheets and not wide format printers that work with rolls of paper.
There are enough tools to put images on page that is a single sheet of paper. But on a roll printer the "page" is hardly ever the final sheet. Most of the time you put many "pages" on a large roll of paper. Several times I had to print an entire exhibition of maybe 20 images that had all different sizes, but were mounted in glass frames of the same size.

So maybe Mike would like to consider a special version beside the normal and pro version of Qimage. One that has some special tools to ease the workflow on a wide format printer.
I would have no problem paying for this kind of update. I've been paying an extra bit of money only once in five years, when I upgraded to the pro version. In the past I've seen that Mike is always listening to the users of Qimage to improve it. :)

Printing more and more images for custom made folios I ended up preparing the final images in Photoshop. Adding a larger border at the bottom and two lines of centered text at a fixed position is easer to do Photoshop as in Qimage. The final prints look like the folios of Brooks Jensen.
Example: http://lenswork.com/workshops/FolioSample5/FolioSample5.html

Brooks Jensen has also a fine tutorial on DVD about creating these folios, he uses Indesign to combine the image with text.
http://www.lenswork.com/workshops/folios.html