Scandinavian-Canadian Studies

Sat down with JT and did the final preparation of vol 17. First, because of changes to the TOC, I had to re-create the cover. For next time, here are the steps:

1. Rebuild the volume PDF.
2. Open it in Acrobat.
3. Choose Document / Extract Pages, and extract the TOC pages as separate files.
4. Open the first of these in Illustrator, save it as anew file, then select the "page", then right-click and choose "Release Clipping Mask". Confirm that you can now select only the text, without the "page" area around it.
5. Open the second TOC page (if there are two), and do the same thing. Then select the text on that page, and copy/paste it into the first document. Line it up correctly with the existing text, then group them.
6. Copy/paste the group into the cover PDF, position it, and size it proportionally so it looks like previous volume covers.
7. Now calculate the required spine width, based on previous volumes. In this case we calculated 0.37 inches, so I had to rejig the document appropriately. First I resized the page to 12.37 inches in width, then I resized the blue band, moved the spine guides, and moved the text on the front cover band appropriately. You may need to do other rejigging to make this work correctly.
8. Save the file as AI and as PDF.
9. Create a postscript file (*.ps) using Print, and choosing Adobe Postscript File as the printer. Make sure you've chosen an 11 x 17 page size so that all the marks and bleeds will show up, and make sure they do show up.
10. Open that PS file in Acrobat Distiller, and run the scancan_2 preset to get colour separations. You should get a 2-page document with black and blue separation.
11. Put everything (AI, PDF, PDF of colour separation, PS) on a CD with the original volume PDF, and take it to the print shop.

We're now waiting for a quote on various options with regard to paper size.

Received a new batch of corrections from JT and entered them. They cover the intro pages to vol 17 and author bios, which needed to be changed in the documents themselves, as well as some XSLT updates to handle French quotes in some new contexts.

Many additional edits to the Helgason paper. That one should be finished now.

JT dropped off more edits for McCreesh and Helgason. I've done the McCreesh, and I'll try to do the Helgason tomorrow.

Did the latest batch of corrections from JT's printouts.

Worked through the edited text of McCreesh entering corrections. Some issues re the bibliography remain outstanding; still waiting for word from JT on those.

Went through the vol 17 cover Illustrator file with PVH, and tweaked the kerning for the volume number which appears in the circles. The only remaining things are:

1. When the PDF is finalized, rebuild the contents section if the page references have changed.
2. When the final page-count is known, and the details of the paper used in volume 16, set the crop marks appropriately for the spine.

Did final tweaks to four documents, uploaded into the db, and then regenerated the master PDF.

Did the first run at a volume 17 cover, which will be tweaked for us by PVH. These are the steps I took:

• Started from the old vol 16 cover.
• Used Acrobat to extract the two pages of the TOC from the vol 17 master, setting it to save them to separate files.
• Combined them into one block of vector text, by removing the clipping regions and copy-pasting the second page into the first page file, then lining up everything on the grid.
• Scaled the new TOC down to match the vol 16 TOC, by putting them side by side, then removed the vol 16 TOC and slid the new one over to replace it.
• Changed all the volume numbers and years on the spine. The years at the bottom have knockouts, so two changes need to be made, by changing the z-order to get at the text beneath.
• Did a test print on the colour laser printer. This didn't work wonderfully -- text on the spine expanded to the edge of the page, for some reason -- but that's not really a worry. We'll see how well it works when PVH has had a look at it.

Finished marking up Helgason, and made some final changes to several of the others, based on feedback from the authors.