ALAP
Imposer
Imposition
software for QuarkXPress (Mac/Win)
by
J.V. Bolkan
Special
to Digital Media Designer
jvbolkan@home.com
Not every
publishing job requires the imposition step. Even when imposition
is required, it has almost always been done by a technician
in the back of the service bureau or print house using expensive,
often custom imposition software as the last step before ripping
and generating film or a proof. Quark can't even do imposition
without forcing the designer to jump through hoops—unless
you've added ALAP's (A Lowly Apprentice Production)
Imposer 2.1.3.
At about
$200, Imposer is almost a no-brainer when compared to the imposition
software commonly used in professional print houses and service
bureaus, which often cost many thousands. Although Imposer isn't
going to replace these industrial products, it does give the
mid-level bureau a powerful tool and helps bring self-publishing
a bit closer to being practical.
Almost as
refreshing and easy as the price is the Imposer's installation
routine. ALAP software is sold online—you download the
software, pay for the serial number that unlocks the full functionality
and get to work. You can use the unregistered software in demo
mode for 15 days. Note: The demo mode used to cause QuarkXPress
to go into demo mode as well, but this has recently changed.
You now get a full 15-day evaluation. Once you've gotten the
download onto your drive, you run the self-extracting, self-launching
application, and, after you fill out a brief form with your
serial number, Imposer snoops around to find QuarkXPress, installs
itself and even adds a shortcut to QuarkXPress in the Imposer
folder.
What
it does
When you next run Quark, you'll see a new item in the File
menu, directly below the Print option. Choosing Imposer from
the File list brings up the deceptively simple Imposer dialog
box (see screenshot). A pair of tabs enable you to switch between
print preview and layout dialog boxes. Simply input your specifications
and print. The actual QuarkXPress document is untouched; the
pages are shuffled and arranged in the print-spooling phase.
The Preview
tab shows a thumbnail of your job and gives you the option of
adding printer's marks either centered or off-center, choosing
a signature size from 8 to 64 in multiples of 8 with a count
of one or two. Obviously, this means that if you're printing
a document beyond 128 pages, you'll need to do imposition in
multiple passes. If you're looking for precise, custom printer's
mark location, you're out of luck. ALAP does have another extension
for QuarkXPress (MarkIt) that does enable custom printer marks
from within Imposer, but MarkIt is currently available only
for Macintosh systems.
