How to Prepare a Digital Edition PDF Book With Adobe InDesign
This tutorial will offer you some advice on how to use Adobe
InDesign to prepare an optimized digital edition PDF book.
There are two ways to produce a digital edition PDF presented in this tutorial. One way will use InDesign to directly export a PDF at a resolution appropriate for viewing on computers and devices. The other will use Acrobat Pro to optimize an existing high-resolution PDF.
If you do not have Acrobat Pro and wish to test this process, you can download a trial version from the Adobe website: www.adobe.com.
What do I Need?
This tutorial will have you use Adobe InDesign to create your content and cover and prepare them as a print-ready PDF.
The screenshots shown in the tutorial use Adobe InDesign CS5.5 for Mac. If you are using different versions of the software, some of the instructions and screenshots will be slightly different, but you should be able to fi nd the right feature in your software version.
The Tutorial is Broken up into Sections:
1. Setting up your InDesign Document
2. Adding Cover Images and Setting Up Pagination
3. Adding Bookmarks
4. Adding Hyperlinks
6. Optimizing a high-resolution PDF using Acrobat Pro
7. Tips and Things to Remember
8. What do I do Next?
9. I Need More Help!
How do I Get This Software?
Adobe InDesign is available from Adobe at www.adobe.com
. Adobe does have educational discounts on their software if you are able to take advantage of them: https://store1.adobe.com/cfusion/store/html/index.cfm?store=OLS-
EDU&event=displayCatalog&catalogOID=2071995
Or get it as part of the Creative Cloud and pay a monthly fee.
http://www.adobe.com/products/creativesuite/designstandard.html
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1. Setting up your InDesign
Document
2. Adding Cover Images and
Setting Up Pagination
For your convenience, we have created a few template fi les for different standard book sizes to make your layout work easier.
You can fi nd these templates under the
TITLE MANAGEMENT
section of your publisher menu under
DIGITAL TITLES
. Choose the link called Preparing Your Book for Digital Download.
Setting up your fi le is nearly identical to setting up a book for print but the specifi cations are much looser. If you plan to produce both print and digital editions, you should set up your book fi les to print specs and then produce a digital book from the same fi les.
(For more information about the mechanics of setting up your
InDesign fi le for print, e.g., creating Master Pages, importing and styling text using Style Sheets, and placing art, see the DriveThru tutorial for InDesign in the Preparing Your Book for Print menu in the link for
PRINT TEMPLATES & TUTORIALS.
)
Before you begin any method of PDF export described, make sure your front and back cover fi les are the fi rst and second pages of your
PDF digital edition. You can add two pages at the beginning of your interior text fi le document, and then place your cover images on those pages. Save your document before you begin the next step.
Next, you will want to change the pagination of the cover pages to
Roman numerals (i, ii). This is a good idea to do because the cover pages won’t goof up the interior book block pagination. Those page numbers will still reference the Table of Contents.
First, using the Pages palette, expand the palette options from the icon in the upper right corner of the palette. Navigate down to and select Numbering
& Section Options.
The
Numbering & Section options dialog box pops up.
Under
Page Numbering,
select the Roman numerals from the drop-down menu. Click
OK.
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2. Adding Cover Images and
Setting Up Pagination (continued)
The entire book now changes to
Roman numeral pagination. To fi x this, you will need to select page iii
(page 3) in the Pages palette, force a
Section start, and repaginate the rest of the book using Arabic numerals.
With page iii selected in the
Pages palette, expand the palette options, and navigate down to
Numbering &
Section Options
again. This time, check
Section Start.
Make sure the
Start Page
Numbering at:
fi eld is set to
1
. Then in the
Style drop-down under
Page Numbering,
select the
Arabic numerals.
Now if you check your Pages palette, your pagination should be correct.
3. Adding Bookmarks
To make navigating through a large
PDF book easier, bookmarks can be made in your InDesign document, which can be exported and used
You will need to open your
Bookmarks pa the sc
Window
menu from the top of your
Interactive,
then select
Bookmarks
from
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3. Adding Bookmarks (continued)
Next, navigate to the text in your document that you would like to assign as a bookmark. Highlight that text with your cursor. Then, to create a new bookmark, either click the page icon at the bottom of the box next to the Trash Can icon in the Bookmarks palette, or expand the menu options from the top right-hand corner of the palette and select New Bookmark .
The text you have highlighted will now appear in the
Bookmarks palette list. An anchor icon will appear to the left.
You will need to proof this list and rearrange as necessary. To manage the bookmarks in your document, use this palette.
Bookmarks will appear on this list in the order they are made, not in the order they occur in the document. To reorder your bookmarks, expand the menu from the top right-hand corner and choose Sort Bookmarks. This automatically rearranges the bookmark entries by page order as they occur in the document.
You can also create hierarchies in the Bookmark palette. To make a sub-level bookmark, you can drag and drop a bookmark on the list and nest it underneath another. See the screenshot below for an example.
If you are also preparing your digital book for export in the epub format, you can make InDesign autogenerate a Table of Contents for the front or back of your book, which automatically adds and inserts bookmarks in your document based on your TOC information. Find out more about these mechanics under the
DIGITAL
TITLES
section of your publisher menu. Choose the
Epub & Mobi Export link.
4. Adding Hyperlinks
In some digital books, you may want to add links between pages that occur in your document, such as links from the entries in your
Table of Contents to your chapter starts, or links to destinations outside your document, such as a web URL. In Adobe InDesign, you can dictate link sources from text or a placed art fi le. Link destinations can be to other locations inside the same document, to other documents, to an email address, or to a web URL.
In this tutorial, we’ll cover linking within the same document, and linking from inside your document to an outside web URL.
If you choose to add interactivity to your digital edition, make sure to test each created link in your fi nal PDF after export.
You will need to open your
Hyperlinks palette. To fi nd and open it, pull down the
Window
menu from the top of your screen, navigate down to
Interactive, then select
Hyperlinks
from the expanded contextual menu. A check box next to the list item indicates that palette as being open in your workspace.
Adding links between pages
Assigning hyperlinks between pages in your document (or multiple documents) is very easy using InDesign. We’ll begin here by making a hyperlink from the fi rst link of the Table of Contents to the chapter in the book it should jump to.
Using your text cursor, highlight your source text. Then expand the menu of your
Hyperlinks palette from the icon in the top right-hand corner.
Select
New Hyperlink.
The New Hyperlink dialog box will open.
Expand the Link To: options by expanding the drop-down menu.
Choose Page as your link destination.
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4. Adding Hyperlinks (continued)
Now set your Destination information. If you expand the Document drop-down, you will see a list of all the saved
InDesign documents you currently have open.
You can choose from this list if you are linking to the document you are currently working in, choose a different document that is already open, or choose
Browse...
to fi nd and open a different InDesign document to assign your link destination to.
Make sure that you have set your destination page number to refl ect the page number of the source on your TOC. You should also choose your Zoom settings here. If you have already created a Style Sheet for formatting your hyperlink text, you can expand the
Character Style
drop-down menu and choose your style. When you have completed your Destination and Appearance details, click
OK.
Your new hyperlink will appear in the Hyperlink palette.
You can test your new hyperlink by selecting it in your
Hyperlink palette, expanding the
Hyperlink menu options, and selecting Go to
Destination.
Your page view should jump to the destination you have just assigned.
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4. Adding Hyperlinks (continued)
Adding links to web URLs
There are several ways to add hyperlinks to URLs in your document.
Once you become familiar, you will fi nd the way that works best for you.
Using your text cursor to select your source text, expand the options menu of your
Hyperlinks
palette by clicking the top-right icon. From the list, select
New Hyperlink.
The New Hyperlink dialog box will open.
Expand the Link To: drop-down menu and select URL. The URL in the Destination fi eld can be any valid Internet address (http://, ftp://, mailto://, etc.).
When you have completed your Destination and Appearance details, click
OK.
Your new hyperlink will appear in the Hyperlink palette.
Another way to create a hyperlink to a URL is to choose
New Hyperlink from URL from the expanded menu options of the Hyperlink palette. The link will automatically generate and will appear in the list on your
Hyperlink palette. Should you choose this method, make sure to select that URL on your list and review the Hyperlink Options and
Hyperlink Destination Options associated with it. Check to make sure your Destination and
Appearance details are correct before proceeding
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5. Exporting Your InDesign fi le as a PDF ebook
Now that you’ve completed setting up your book for print, exporting it as a digital PDF ebook is easy!
There are three ways to make an optimized digital edition from your InDesign fi le: tablet or other mobile device.
(This method will be covered in the following pages.)
2.
Prefl ight Print Production Tool
. When you open the Prefl ight tool, make sure to choose the
Online Publishing (optimize for quality)
profi le under the
Digital Printing and Online Publishing
profi le options.
(This method will also be covered in the following pages.) called a .joboption fi le, made in Distiller.
(Although this method tends to make more stable fi les that are less prone to errors than ones exported directly from InDesign, it will not be covered here.)
Please do not use any Security settings in your digital edition export.
The ability to copy/paste or print the digital edition can be managed under the File Security settings in your Product File information when you upload the book. Any security settings imposed on your uploaded digital edition will hinder our automatic watermarking process during customer check-out.
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5. Exporting Your InDesign fi le as a PDF ebook (continued)
Export a PDF directly from InDesign
Although the Prefl ight tool in Acrobat Pro is more comprehensive in its profi le settings, and Distiller tends to make more stable PDFs than direct InDesign exports do, the process we’ll be overviewing in this section is the direct export method.
With your newly paginated fi le open, select
Export from the File drop-down menu.
An
Export
dialog box will open. Navigate to the location you would like to save your new
PDF, rename it so as to not overwrite any other fi les, and then make sure
Adobe PDF
(Interactive)
is selected as the
Format.
The
Export to Interactive PDF dialog box will open. Adjust your settings to match the settings shown in the screenshot to the right.
Especially important is to choose JPEG Compression, not
JPEG 2000 compression under
the Image Handling setting.
Many devices don’t render images using JPEG 2000 compression, so it’s best not to set the fi le up for potential viewing errors.
Once you have adjusted your export settings, click OK.
A
Warning dialog box may pop up at this point, to warn you that color shifting may occur in the process because your CMYK fi le will be converted to RGB values. This conversion process is necessary, so just click OK.
Make sure to proof your new PDF when it’s complete.
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6. Optimizing a high-resolution PDF using Acrobat Pro
Using the Prefl ight Print Production tool
You can take a high-resolution PDF and process it for web and device viewing by using this tool in the full version of Adobe Acrobat. Again, your fi le should include the front and back covers at the front of the document and have pagination that sets those pages off from the rest of the book.
Open your PDF fi le in Adobe Acrobat. Depending on the version of
Acrobat that you are using, you can either expand the
Tools
pane from the upper right-hand corner of your window, expand the
Print
Production
tools and navigate down to
Prefl ight
(Version X) or pull down the
Advanced
menu from the application bar, and navigate down to
Prefl ight (Versions 9 and earlier).
The Prefl ight dialog box will open.
Expand the profi les for Digital printing and online publishing , and choose Online publishing (optimize for quality).
Then click the Analyze and fi x button at the bottom righthand corner of the box.
To learn more about using Adobe Acrobat for bookmarking and hyperlinking, refer to DriveThru’s
Quick Specs for Digital Books.
A dialog box will open, prompting you to save the fi le. Make sure to change your fi le name slightly so as not to overwrite your high-resolution print PDF fi le. Click
Save.
Then the Prefl ight process will begin.
Prefl ight dialog box will list a report of tasks completed. If your fi le was successfully processed, a green check mark will appear in the top left-hand corner of the window. If it failed, a red X will appear in the same place. On failure, you can poke through the process report in the dialog box to see what elements failed, and then go back and fi x those elements before trying to
Prefl ight again.
7. Tips and Things to Remember 8. What do I do next?
Specifi cations
Although exporting your PDF using the methods provided will take care of most of the specifi cations required of a digital PDF ebook, there are a few things that are important enough to bring to your attention again. These points are listed in DriveThru’s
Quick
Specs
document and
Checklist for Digital Books,
both of which can be found on the
PREPARING YOUR TITLE FOR DIGITAL
DOWNLOAD
page under the
DIGITAL TITLES
section of your
Publisher Menu.
•
DO NOT
use JPEG2000 compression in any linked or embedded JPEG art fi les, even if it reduces your fi le size.
Apple’s iPad and iPhone cannot display images using
JPEG2000 compression.
• DO NOT use PDF/A profi le compliance for your exported PDF.
•
DO NOT
use transparency in your document or images.
Apple’s iPad and iPhone also have problems displaying
PDFs with transparency attributes.
• DO NOT lock or use security settings in your exported PDF.
This means imposing password protection as well as turning off the ability to copy/paste or print from the PDF.
These options can be managed under the File Security settings in your Product File information on the DriveThru site when you upload your book. Any security settings imposed on your uploaded digital edition will cause errors during the automatic watermarking process at the point of customer check-out.
Once you have fi nished producing and testing your digital PDF edition, you’re ready to upload! Log into your account on site and go to the
TITLE MANAGEMENT
section of your Publisher Menu and use the
SET UP A NEW TITLE
tool.
If you have any questions about how to proceed with fi lling out this form, see the
WALK-THROUGH FOR ENTERING NEW BOOK
TITLES
link under the
TITLE MANAGEMENT
section of your
Publisher Menu. You will fi nd more information there to assist you.
After a successful upload, you can choose to activate your title for live sale! How exciting!
9. I Need More Help!
Your publisher service rep is not really an expert on digital layout, so chances are slim that he or she will be able to answer questions not answered in this tutorial. However, please do email us your questions anyway so we can help fi nd an answer if we can and also so that we can improve this tutorial so it answers more questions for everyone.
You can also fi nd people with professional skills in digital layout and contract them to create your fi les. The cost of this work depends on how much of the work you do yourself before handing it over for layout. We can recommend someone for layout if you would like. Please contact Publisher Service for details.
Or you can also fi nd freelance layout professionals at sites like www.elance.com
.
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