We recently had the pleasure of producing some really cool yearbooks for the Rural Alaska Honors Institute (RAHI) which we felt really showcased the kind of quality we are capable of outputting. The books were designed by Katelin Delany and show a tremendous amount of attention to detail and a keen design aesthetic.
Katelin used Adobe InDesign to create the document and exported it as a high quality PDF which she provided to us using our online file submission system. After Katelin proofed the content and gave us approval to run, we set to work.
The document included 28 letter-sized (8.5×11″) pages which would be turned into a catalog style booklet printed on 11×17″ paper and folded with staples in the spine. The entire book would be printed in color with 100# cardstock covers and 32# paper weight pages inside.
We split the document into two files, one with the front and back cover pages and the other with the main body pages, using Adobe Acrobat. We then sent each of them to our Xerox DC5000 (soon to be replaced by our new Xerox Color 800 Digital Press which will eliminate the need for split files!) for imposition, which is what we call the process of arranging the pages into the order and layout they will need to be in to print correctly on larger sheets of paper. This sounds exotic, but is handled by software. At this point we printed all of the covers on 12×18″ 100# cardstock, and followed them up by printing all of the body pages in collated sets on 32# paper.
After printing, all of the covers and body pages were collated together and trimmed to 11×17″. This process allowed us to “bleed” the images to the edge of the page. We then used equipment to fold, staple, and apply a finish trim on books before they were boxed and presented to Katelin. In all, the project took about 3.5 hours to print and finish 150 books.
To respect the privacy of those featured in the pages of the yearbook we can’t offer more photos, but we hope this gives you a little insight into the work we are capable of producing and the process involved in making projects like this one successful.