Advice on preparing M8 files for Blurb

[ziggurat]

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Hello, can anyone give me a heads up on the sharpening regime, or not, for M8 files for Blurb.

 

I am used to applying sharpening for their printing process to Digilux 3 files but obviously the M8 files are a lot sharper to begin with.

 

Any help gratefully received.

Regards

Johnny

[erl]

For both M8 and M9 files I find no sharpening is necessary. I regularly print to A2 size with excellent results (technically speaking ) and I have just published a Blurb book at the large landscape size. I made sure the files I created were close to, or larger than the reproduction size. I then allowed Blurb to 'modify' as required.

 

I did use Adobe InDesign 4 to create the book rather than the Blurb software. That gave me more control. Just make sure that the software you use applies the appropriate profiles to the PDF's for Blurb.

[ziggurat]

Thanks Erl

 

That's what I suspected. Saves me wasting money and time on a test.

 

Cheers

Johnny

[jedi996sps]

Hello, can anyone give me a heads up on the sharpening regime, or not, for M8 files for Blurb.

 

I am used to applying sharpening for their printing process to Digilux 3 files but obviously the M8 files are a lot sharper to begin with.

 

Any help gratefully received.

Regards

Johnny

 

If you pm me in a weeks time i will let you know, as i am awaiting delivery of my first Blurb Book.

 

I uploaded all my images in jpeg format which were resized to suit the Blurb maximum pixel dimension, most of them had sharpening applied using photoshop. Images with people i applied 50% at 0.5radius, others were generally at 100% at 1radius. All images were taken on M8 with in camera settings of colour and sharpness set to medium.

 

Regards

 

Ali

[Alberti]

In the past few years I have made many Blurb books (tens...).

As much as possible I use the standard M8 sharpening settings in Capture One:

- version 3.7 standard look (amount 130/radius 1,3, threshold 1,0);

- but on portraits I use 'soft look' and go to amount 110/radius 0,8, threshold 1,0.

I have even made two page flows on the large square from M8 images.

 

Just a tip: I have noticed that one should not resize several times in the Blurb software - that gives some artifacts; instead I note the enlargement percentage and then import the image again and directly set it to the final size. I noted that only in the large square. These came out great.

 

I get good colours. But myself I am pondering how to check the colour rendering; some mention on this forum that they have used a kind of preview using the Blurb ICC profile, but I don't have any clue how to get that to work in Capture One, i.e. without Photoshop.

 

I find the Kodak books are really a lot better in image quality (sharpness, detail, colour sophistication), but the lack of proper editing tools makes me use Blurb.

albert