David RevoyScribus , the open source desktop publishing software I use for my comics, just had two new releases!
- 1.6.6 (stable) https://www.scribus.net/scribus-1-6-6-released/
- 1.7.3 (unstable) https://www.scribus.net/scribus-1-7-3-released/
🎁
Carl C@davidrevoy Scribus can have a rough on-boarding experience (especially if you've never used a frame-based layout package), but it's a solid piece of software. Unfortunately, it was confusing enough for newbies that DriveThruRPG quit supporting it for their print-on-demand.
I'm using it to lay out my PDFs, but I'm not sure what I'm going to do if I decide to take a product to POD. Get by without support, or lay it out in a different package.
Looking forward to trying the new stable, though.
Corvus@raven @davidrevoy what is the input format for a print on demand product? I expected that would be a PDF adhering to certain rules.
Sneezyi was thinking the same
why would they care as long as the PDFs are conformant
i've done POD from google docs as well as LaTeX - they don't care as long as the PDF is correct
@rapsneezy2 @corvus_ch @davidrevoy Because the people submitting PDFs for POD proofs are amateurs, and they get it wrong over and over again (especially cover color profiles), and are waiting weeks and paying $20-40 per attempt, and expect DTRPG to help them figure out what's going wrong, or to refund their money (that was paid to the third party printer).
And most of the beginners on DTRPG are losing money trying to start a tiny publishing business.
@rapsneezy2 @corvus_ch @davidrevoy I, on the other hand, am an _experienced_ amateur and can read and understand documentation. I'm not starting with "WTH is a 'color profile'? What is a 'bleed'?"
@raven @rapsneezy2 @corvus_ch It took me 7 failed print proof to find a setting with DriveThruRPG/Comics: I'm sharing it here https://www.davidrevoy.com/article757/the-english-book-printed-project-production-report-3
I understand they officially stopped their support; their machines needs a PDF/X-1a support with a broken ICC color profile that the FLOSS LittleCMS project refused to make a workaround (so it's broken in Gimp/Krita/Scribus/everything)
It's really specific PDF, and it was a nightmare to make the right type of files. Took me 3 years...
David - i just read your journey - wow, what a journey.
It does show how, even after many years, basic things are still a challenge with open source software. Understandable as these tasks are very much specialist and not what most users do at home - and so attract less developer attention.
I was surprised by the Scribus bugs given how they have long centred themselves as a serious DTP option.
Hopefully your feedback and findings will result in improvements.
I had similar colour frustrations about 10 years ago and in the end I moved to Affinity software on macos which did a better job.
But the quality of colour rendition of POD publishers was so poor, even with excellent PDFs (inlcuding variability, good one day, bad the next, and they don't always the same printers depending on workload) .. i just gave up.
for my books I avoid any assumptions of colour inside the book now.
(that wouldn't work for "art" like yours)
@rapsneezy2 @davidrevoy @corvus_ch Yeah, this surprises me with Scribus, claiming it can be used for professional publishing. I didn't expect it to be so fiddly.
@rapsneezy2 @raven @corvus_ch Thank you for reading! Yes, I'm still surprised this compatibility between Scribus and DriveThruRPG/Comic printing system wasn't a central point of Scribus. Lightning Source print on demand machines are still the number one indi printing solution, and Scribus could position themselves on offering a premium experience for this audience. But worst, they lost it.
A bit like if a video editor project ignored they couldn't export to a major player like Youtube.
A bit like if a video editor project ignored they couldn't export to a major player like Youtube.
@davidrevoy @rapsneezy2 @corvus_ch And with Affinity Studio going free, and working very well with OneBookShelf, that's quite a blow.
@davidrevoy @rapsneezy2 @corvus_ch I've also been unclear how much of this is Lightning Source, and how much of it is OBS has a very old and poorly maintained layer in between.
Canageek@davidrevoy @rapsneezy2 @raven @corvus_ch It's so weird to me that with them being such a major publisher, there isn't some sort of a pre-configured setting for them.
LisPi@rapsneezy2 @davidrevoy @raven @corvus_ch > basic things are still a challenge with open source software
I'm personally quite appalled that in just as long the publisher still haven't fixed their machine.
I'm personally quite appalled that in just as long the publisher still haven't fixed their machine.
@lispi314 Their machines perfectly works ... with Adobe tool chain.
So, for the publishers, it's a software issue and a problem of the graphic designer, not their. ¯\(ツ)/¯