Pardon the Imposition
page 4

INposition 7

By far, INposition 7 was the most-advanced imposition software that I tested for QuarkXPress. Almost every aspect of the software can be customized to your specific needs. Where QuarkImposer leaves off, INposition 7launches and gives the professional printer all the control they need over their documents. With all the options this software provides, I could only scratch the surface of the possibilities.

Fortunately a demo is available for you to try on your own and see what this XTensions module can do in your workflow. Beware, this product has a price tag to justify all these features, and it’s certainly outside the range of the more casual users.

INposition adds its own drop-down to the menu bar. You’ll start by creating a new plate style. The easiest way to think of plate styles is in relation to QuarkXPress’ paragraph styles. The plate styles in INposition encompass sheet guides, plate format, and imposition order. It’s a good idea to name your plate styles accordingly in this section; it will save you some time in the future should you have similar documents.

Start creating your style by choosing how many pages per plate you would like. The maximum allowable number of pages is 32 per plate. You also get to choose how many pages across you would like your plate to be. The imposition order button lets you preview the plate and define folds and page sequencing. If you choose to have a custom page sequence, the shadow option is a great feature. Select the page you want from the thumbnail view, enter what page of the document you would like it to be, and shadowing will automatically order the pages on the proceeding plates. You only have to specify the layout of the page in the first plate and INposition 7 takes care of the remaining plates.

From the initial plate styles window you will also find a sheet guides button. I mentioned the limitations of Imposer in regard to printer’s marks; INposition far exceeds any expectations of customization in this area.

In sheet guides, you can start editing your page by giving specific values to the spines and folds of your document. This window also allows you to place any type of printer’s marks that you may need. Color bars, grayscale bars, crop marks, trim marks, center marks, and your own custom text, are only few of the options you can place on the plate. Every mark and bar you place can also be positioned on the plate using X, Y coordinates for exact placement. If that weren’t enough, you can also add your own custom marks using EPS or TIFF images. All of this is expected in a high-end product, and INposition delivers.

After creating your plate style, you will need to create a publication style. This is where you can specify binding type, creep, bleed, and crossover. You may also combine multiple signature styles that you previously defined in the plate styles. If your document only calls for one signature style, you can simply select repeat signature and it will be repeated as necessary for the remaining pages in your document.

Now we’re finally ready to start imposing. As I mentioned earlier, a nice feature of QuarkImposer is the ability to keep your original document intact for future editing. INposition 7 takes this idea one step further. When you create a new publication you actually create an INposition publication file. This means that you keep that specific imposition for further use. Should you have to switch jobs for a bit, you can simply save the imposition file and come back to it later. You do not even need to have the original QuarkXPress document open to work on your imposition.

Select new publication from the INposition drop-down menu and you’re ready to start adding pages. The publication palette is where INposition really shines. It’s a fairly intuitive menu, but will take a bit of exploration before you become comfortable. (It would be nice if while you hovered the mouse over buttons and options there would be tool tips, like those in QuarkXPress.) There are two basic views in the publication palette, reader’s spreads and printer’s spreads. While in either view you can nudge, rotate, and scale any page of the document. However, only while in printer’s spreads can you edit the bleed, crossover, and print options. You will also have to switch to this view to send your imposed document to a print device.

Another remarkable feature of this program is its ability to pull pages from virtually any source. You are not limited to the single project you have open at the time. Pages from different QuarkXPress projects can be added at any time in the creation process. Opening a new document in the publication palette will give you the full range of pages within that external document. This is a perfect solution for a workflow where documents are coming from different applications.

Suppose you have different production artists working on separate parts of a magazine. No need to combine the documents within QuarkXPress prior to imposing. Simply open the documents and pull what pages you need. In this same scenario, suppose you have a guest columnist, the due date for the article comes and you are surprised to find the layout in a completely different format, the columnist may not have used QuarkXPress at all. Don’t worry, thanks to the Tempus Plug-in, INposition 7 can pull pages and add them to your layout from a number of sources including EPS, PDF, TIFF, PostScript, PICT, and others. A dialog box will appear when importing for these sources and require you to select the bleed and positioning for your new pages. Files from some sources will require set-up prior to importing them using the Tempus Plug-in, but the added functionality you will receive is worth the time.

To test this against the other products, I ran the same 80-page document through INposition 7 that I ran through QuarkImposer with no problems. Being able to set different plate and publication styles made switching signatures a snap. Jumping from two-up to eight-up with different printer’s marks took no time at all and worked effortlessly. Importing pages from an external PDF worked just as well. I added eight pages from a PDF and was able to rearrange, scale, and reposition them in the reader’s spreads without any problems. From a simple two-up flat to a huge 32-up flat, INposition 7 can handle everything you throw at it. With a price tag of US$2,995 this will not be the imposition solution for everyone. However, for serious and complex imposition needs this is the perfect product, look no further.

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