Decide which size of book you want.

Given that, check, on the Lulu website, how Lulu will want the pages set up (margins and so on). The quickest way to do this is to proceed as though you were actually creating the project and, at some point, it'll tell you how to set up the pages.

Use a desktop publishing program: I've heard InDesign is good.

Do the layout thing. Avoid using transparencies.

Save to PDF 1.3, not 1.4. There have been problems with 1.4, I gather. Not sure if the problem's still current, but it doesn't cost you much.

Upload it.

Do a PDF for the cover, too. Lulu will tell you the exact dimensions once you know the page count. On this, be careful about colour matching: don't assume that the black you use as a background to a graphic will be the same as the black rectangle you've used as a general background.

Leave time to order two proofs. You might only need one, but best to be sure.

Of course, I'm not a layout artist, so they'll have more stuff to say, I'm sure.

Graham

PDF/X-1a is an ISO standard and you can export to this compatibility from InDesign. (See here.)

I have used it on two LULU projects -- a book for John Wilson's mum and Solipsist -- and all PDFs (covers, alternate covers, textblocks) went through LULU fine without fuss or error. Colour matching was exact and so on.

I've also used it as the standard for my last three Best Friends printings and (touch wood) it's been perfect. Basically, it will make a PDF that is robust and compatible as it can be.

Downsides are the limitations that PDF/X-1a enforces, but these mesh with LULU, so when printing through LULU you aren't losing anything if you use this standard.

If you export a file to a PDF/X-1a compatible PDF file then I would be 99.9% confident that LULU will print it fine.

You know one of these days I'm going to have to get more software ... and I still can't afford InDesign.

http://www.solipsist-rpg.com/

For cover files with LULU I had to be careful about how much of a bleed they wanted around the edges. (And the info wasn't immediately and easily available, but they do advise you when you upload a file if it has the correct dimensions or not.)

This also meant I had to be supercareful about where I put my spine and its width. I think a book with stuff on the spine is more useful and elegant, but if you get it wrong you look like an arse.

This was slightly more problematic for hardbacks as there are considerable flaps on the dustjacket covers. I wasn't brave enough to put things on the dustjacket flaps, but I think I would try it in future if I had time for a test print. (John's mum's book didn't have that luxury!)

Does X-1a include compression and embedding settings, then? I've never checked it out. (I have Distiller profiles of my own for e-pubs and POD, based on settings from - I think - RPGnow and Lulu, or maybe it was actually Lightning Source.)

Graham suggested doing the cover as a PDF - you can do a one-piece this way, with a precise spine width, but you might find it easier to do it by creating front and back cover images as PNGs and setting the spine up with a background colour and text specs. The key to the cover is to get the bleed right - and if you use images, select "stretch to fit" to avoid an awkward white stripe by the spine.

Tim Gray
Silver Branch Games
www.silverbranch.co.uk

I've always done fine with Quark-printed PDFs myself. Incidentally,they don't mention anything about using full bleed for interior pages but I recently used them to produce a full-bleed interior book and it came out just fine.

Ash

That can be a lottery depending on which printer they use for your book though. Sometimes the trimming can be way off...

-Matt

Realms Publishing

Oh, the "PDF/X-1a" option from the default list in InDesign has really robust standard for all the options, so that's what I go with.

But, for those tinkering with settings manually...

Grey-scale/Colour art: at least 300 ppi
Monochrome art: at least 600 ppi (the "PDF/X-1a" option chooses 1200 ppi)
Embed ALL fonts
CMYK
No Transparencies (InDesign will "flatten" them on the fly when making the PDF).

...and finally CHECK THE PDF when it's generated.

I think it was skipping this last point that got some copies of Reign mis-printed when it was launched last year. At first they thought LULU misprinted but I think the PDF had the pages in the wrong order.

There is a document on getting a robust PDF/X-1a PDF using JAWS linked to in my post above (it's on the right-hand side of the page I linked to).