A lot would depend on the image, as well as how you save the PDF to be placed.

If you have weird transparencies to contend with (alpha channels, etc), I'd recommend a .psd file. If its just a flat PDF with no crazy spot channels or transparencies, a properly saved PDF should work just fine.

There's really a lot of variables to contend with when deciding what image format: CMYK color, spot inks, alpha channels, clipping paths, etc.

Make the image a tif if its cmyk.

My printers say they would like all images/scans at 300ppi cmyk colour, I take it I just file>save as>.tiff>no compression??

Cheers

TIFF is what I do for 99% of my raster based images. CMYK, 300dpi at intended printed size, no compression.

If your printing digital the resolution needs to be at least 150dpi. If your printing offset then it must be at least 300dpi. Thats another way you can conserve space.

Cheers ears! I have asked another probably stupid question in a new thread if you wana have a look.

PSD's are great in that they give you access to layers. PDFs don't. Also, a greyscale PSD can be reassigned (recoloured) in ID, not so with greyscale PDF.

However, PDFs retain type and vector edges, PSD's do not.

Your choice is more limited by your workflow. If you hand off source files, yeah-- the printer will need those linked files. If you allow ID to create the PDFs for handoff-- which requires a fair bit of understanding and preflighting--then you can really control the file size more directly through the PDF export options in ID, and eleminate the need for shipping giant linked files.

I give the printers the source file and I have had no problems with doing this thus far, I am probably best getting in contact with them to see what they would prefer from me.

Thanks.

Couldn't have said it any better myself.

No, don't make a PDF out of a bitmapped image from Photoshop, please!

Place a layered PSD file only if you need alpha transparency in the image you're placing (if you have soft-edged transparencies, like for instance, shadows). Otherwise, flatten your image onto one layer, and save as a TIFF with no layers. If you need a hard-edged clipping path, then create your path in PS, save it, and turn it into a clipping path (under the palette options menu), before you save your unlayered tiff.

Text and other vector graphics should be placed or created in InDesign after you have placed your raster image. Don't do your type in Photoshop, please.

You know - and I'll admit that I don't do this - placing images as photoshop pdfs into Indesign is actually Adobe's recommended workflow these days. And, depending on exactly what you're doing, and what your printer's running, it's not necessarily a bad idea (with the usual proviso that Adobe would like to sell you and your printer some new software).

Personally, I do place psd files into Indesign a lot. Why? Well, there's a couple of reasons. Obviously the psd format supports a bunch of stuff that neither tiff nor eps do properly, like transparency, which is handy, but also because life's a lot simpler if your edittable image file and the one you've placed into the document are the same file.

Of course, I have a workflow that means that I almost never hand off anything other than pdfs. Exporting as a pdf means that, whatever image format you originally placed as, the image will be embedded as a stream in one of the pdf format's supported type.

In other words, pdf can hide a myriad sins

Exactly what you can get away with depends very much on you and your printer's workflow, but there's certainly a lot more to it than a simple "use tiff or eps" these days.

Very much agreed, Hewligan. Having newly discovered the flexibility of InDesign's ability to handle one PSD file with different layers turned on and off, rest assured (once I ascertain that my printer's okay with it) that I will be using PSD's more often. But there are still justifications for all the different file import methods.

Another reason to not use PSD's is that InDesign (at least the CS2 version, not sure if they improved this in CS3) doesn't respect blending modes from PSD's, for example, a drop shadow from a PSD doesn't multiply. Very often, I just exclude those from the PSD or TIFF and do it in InDesign.

In my opinion, the best choice in any scenario is to call your printer and see what they prefer. I opt for not asking my printer to do extra work just because I sent them something they despise, it's a point of pride for me, so if I'm not sure, I call and find out what's wanted.

Yeah, that'd be one of the reasons why Adobe recommend placing pdfs - suport for that kinda thing. But mostly it's because vector data in a photoshop pdf is placed as vector data.

In terms of your printer - as I said, at my job I only ever hand off pdfs. That gives me a fair bit of room to experiment with this sort of thing, because however I place the image, it'll be transformed to pdf data on export, so my printer will never know what crazy shennanigans I got up to

If you need to hand off open files, you need to be much, much more careful. But the right settings on a pdf export will work wonders.

(And roll on pdf RIPs being more common, I say. Then I can get away with some really crazy stuff )

sorry im new to all of this and cant quite figure out how to create a new post.. basically im producing a small maagzine and having issues with pixelation... when trasferring images form photoshop cs2 to indesign it seems to reduce the quality and find them pixelated.. how do i go about resizing tiff images that have been sent to me and then placing them into indesing without this happening....i have tried saving them as tiffs again.. as jpegs.. as psd docs and it seems to be doing the ame thing

HEEEEELLLLLLPPPP