oh my god i need help - i have to compile a magazine

[mops]

:confused: :confused: :confused: Hello people

i've only just registered here - hope i can jump on board

i've just started using in-design - and i mean just started - i needed to create 20 different separate documents in indesign - which was fine, but now i regret smiling and feeling pleased with my work

what i didnt realise was that i now need to compile them into 1 document in order for them to print out in a magazine format

i'm pulling my hair out - i'm completely new to this and i havent a clue where to start - can anyone help - i have a deadline for this week and i just dont know where to go from here

thanks for any help coming this way - i appreciate it

mops

[DCurry]

First, welcome aboard and welcome to InDesign.

The nice thing is that you don't have to combine these 20 docs into one new one - use InDesign's Book feature to lay them out as chapters - you can print, export, and rearrange the chapters from one palette without actually combining them into one InDesign document.

Check out the Help file in InDesign and look under "Books" - there's way more info there than I can give you here.

Good luck!

[mops]

Hi Dan

Thank you ever so much for your help and the welcome - i'll go and check the books thing now - the printers have suggested that i combine all the pages in acrobat (full version), but i'm not comfortable doing it as it doesnt have the flexibility indesign does - i've asked whether i would lose quality if i set upa main document in i/d and 'placed' in each document - i'm waiting for answer from them

it's my fault i should have researched this, i just thought the documents would be easy to combine into one - but the book suggestion sounds the most professional way - so i'll go and take a look now - thanks dan, much appreciated

[DCurry]

True, you could combine the PDFs, though I don't know why you'd want to - couldn't you just give the printer 20 PDFs and a dummy showing how you expect the finished piece to read?

To combine PDFs, open the first one in Acrobat (I'm using Acrobat 6, so these instructions are based on that). Go to Document>Pages>Insert and navigate to the next PDF and so on. When you are done, do a Save As and rename so you don't overwrite your original PDF. You won't lose any quality - each PDF retains whatever settings it was distilled with.

[mops]

thanks dan - i'm using a/bat 6 also - do you think it would work the same if i did it in reverse and 'placed' the pdf's back into and i/d document (just so i can lay it out myself)?

thanks again

[DCurry]

Yep, that'll work.

[mops]

dan - thanks for helping me out - you've saved my neck and a lot of time - much appreciated - mops