Question for those who buy PDFs.

[Darrin Drader]

I like a version that's black and white without fancy borders (cheap to print). I also like artwork, and in a PDF, I prefer more lines, less shading, again, to save on ink.

The ideal page count is probably right around 40 pags.

Hope that helps,

 

[Guillaume]

Personnaly, I have bought four or five PDF products. I have not printed any of them... well not completely. I tend to only print the sections I need. Since I mostly look at and read my PDFs on screen, I would rather have a nice finished product, in colour if desired, with large enough fonts to be read on screen. Layout should be in two columns well spaced.

Just my 0,02 $ worth.

 

[HellHound]

Our next PDF products are being bundled as two versions, one LOW graphic (no background graphics, little interior art) and one higher-graphic (background graphic, more art). Both will be included in the same zip file.

 

[Heathen Oracle]

We are running with mostly B/W illos. The only color is the cover, and we are debating on having a couple different versions as well. One designed for screen use and one designed for Print use of at least 150 dpi & like above, included . And then a version in just text without any illos or maps or anything, but that was a bad idea, 40 pages of SOLID text LOL!

Well it was funny at the time

 

[Cergorach]

One designed for screen use and one designed for Print use of at least 150 dpi & like above, included .

Erm i use 150dpi for screen use and 300dpi for print.

Also a aimple way to make live easy for both A4 users and Letter users is to use the with of an A4 and the height of Letter.

I also saw something from 2WS (or something, book of templates i believe) that had two butons, one to show art and one to hide art. I don't exactly know how he did it, but i suspect some scripting...

Oh i like GOOD art, either B&W or Color, so long as it's GOOD! I also have this strange taste that products without any art are some how 'less' in my eyes than products with art...

 

[Heathen Oracle]

Whew! 300 dpi for every page in a PDF? Hello cable connection

Actually I double checked with the PDF Maestro, the b/w sections (art) are 200 dpi. The cover is at 1200dpi

not really, just kidding. He told me the other day (and showed me) you can actually put music in a PDF!

Could you imagine a whole adventure with music playing while you read it, of course to be downloadable if would be a very short adventure.

What size do your modules average at 300dpi?

 

[Cergorach]

What size do your modules average at 300dpi?

I don't really do modules per-se, but i do some layout work so now and then ;-)

It really depends how big a pdf is, depends on complexity of the image, wheter it's repeated, whether is B&W, color or grey-scale, etc.

For a test bed for ESDs i did the Plane Scape players book (36 pages), i think it was something like 3.5MB at 150dpi and 13MB at 300dpi, but i'm not sure (i'll check for you)...

Personally i think pdfs should not contain scripts or music, something to do with file purity...

I'll turn in now, i have the mother of all headaches...

 

[Buttercup]

I prefer pdfs to come in both color and b&w, as others have said. The black & white one, I'd like to be very plain, with wider columns as opposed to art. If I have to choose only one, then I'll take plain old b&w. The one exception: maps. If your PDF includes maps, I want 'em in living color, regardless of what you do with the rest of the product.

 

[Heathen Oracle]

What if they are interiors maps of dungeons (mostly grey stone) whould you still want them to be in color or are you talking about world/land maps?

 

[Buttercup]

Interior maps of dungeons can be black & white. I was thinking of city/village/town/country maps.