Printers Marks in PDF

[Cameron]

I have my ai file there is no crop area specified. When I save a copy as a pdf I specify printers marks and bleed. When the resulting pdf is viewed in Acrobat I can see my artwork along with my printers marks. Illustrator has used the artboard to determine where the printers marks go. This is good and is exactly what should happen.

What I want to do is arbitrarily draw a rectangle around any part of my artwork, choose Object>Crop Area>Make, save a copy as a pdf, specify printers marks and bleed, and view the file in Acrobat with printers marks and bleed intact. What actually happens though is I get my artwork cropped to the area I specified (good) but the printers marks don't appear (bad).

Is there a way, without making the artboard the size of the area I want to crop, to do what I described above? That is; specify a crop area, save a copy as a pdf, specify printers marks and bleed, and see the result in Acrobat.

[Paths]

Instead of: Object > Crop Area > make (which actually crops for save as or printing)

Try: Filter > Create > crop marks (which just puts crop marks on your document)

[Cameron]

Thanks Paths. I thought I used to be able to do this but now I'm not so sure, must have all been a dream.

[Paths]

Maybe then, what you did before was 'print to PDF' (by choosing PDF as your printer), instead of 'save as PDF'. I just tried and got it to work like that.
In the print dialogue under 'setup' - make sure you choose 'Crop Artwork to: crop area' (from the drop down menu)...you can use the 'offset', under 'Marks and Bleed' to move the marks closer or further away from the cropped area.

Hope that helps :)

[Cameron]

Thanks again Paths. Yeah I know, the print to PDF method gives me almost what I want, except the artwork is then centered on a page the size of your artboard. I want Illustrator to crop my artwork and then add just enough white space to accommodate the printers marks. I actually thought I used to do this all the time... obviously not! :-)

[Paths]

You've still got my attention. I'm curious to know if it is possible too. So if anyone else can help - please do and if you figure it out - please share!

Thanks :)