TRAPPER BOOKLET

A) Before you start

In order to build your complete TRAPPER CD Booklet, you will need the following ingredients:
- Acrobat Reader 5 (or later), available for free from www.adobe.com
- A printer capable of two-sided printing
- A proper paper trimmer (cutting board)
- A stapler suitable for (at least) A5 sized booklets

B) PRINTER WARNING

Before you proceed any further, you *must* check your printer for two-sided printing capability!

Laser Printers:

A number of laser printers are not suitable for two-sided printing due to their toner/heat technology or other problems. Printing on the backside of a previous print may result in toner pollution onto both paper and internal components, and may ultimately lead to permanent damage of the printer hardware.

You *must* check your manual if it clearly permits two-sided printing, and you must clearly follow any instructions for the manual paper feed concerning this feature.
- If the manual prohibits two-sided printing, then you *must* not attempt to violate this!
- If the manual doesn't include information about two-sided printing then you *must* contact the printer manufacturer and check for the feature before you try to use it!

If your laser printer prohibits two-sided printing, there are two alternatives:
- You can print the pages one-sided, and then copy it 2-to-1 duplex in a local copy shop
- Some copy shops will even offer direct PDF-to-duplex services for a modest fee

Inkjet Printers:

Although inkjet printers are unlikely to cause problems with two-sided printing, there are a couple of things you need to make sure:
- Always use two-sided coated paper manufactured for inkjet printing
- Make sure that the ink from the front side is perfectly dry before you print to the backside

Two-sided coated paper is available from various manufacturers for a slightly higher price than ordinary inkjet paper, and will seriously improve the booklet quality.

Things you must *never* do:
- Disregard any warning against two-sided printing by your printer manufacturer
- Use coated inkjet paper in a laser printer
- Use (printed) paper with inkjet colour in a laser printer

If you attempt to do any of this, you will almost certainly cause permanent damage to your hardware!

C) Printing the front Cover and Trays

The front cover (TRAP_0708_cover.jpg) is 272.7 mm x 152.7 mm and must be printed unscaled and centered. The crop marks are identical to the PDF booklet.

The back trays are 182.6 mm x 149.7 mm and must be printed unscaled.

D) Printing the Booklet

The PDF document contains complete ready-to-use page spreads (with crop marks) that you need to print centred onto A4 paper (US Letter will require borderless printing). The Acrobat Reader software will ensure this, as long as the printer driver is set up with precise paper sizes.

In the printing dialog you need to set:
- Paper Format to A4 (or larger)
- Page Orientation to "Landscape"
- Option "Fit to Page" (or similar) must be turned off!

Unless your printer supports direct duplex printing you will probably first print all odd pages and then print the even pages to the backside of the previous prints:
- PDF page 1 goes to the front of the first paper sheet
- PDF page 2 goes to the back of the first paper sheet
- PDF page 3 goes to the front of the second paper sheet
- etc. etc.

Take the first finished paper sheet and hold it against a bright light to check that the crop marks will match with as little offset as possible.

E) Crop Marks

There are two sets of crop marks - the "inner" set at the final trim size of 120mm x 240mm, and the "outer" set at 140mm x 260mm (leaving a 10mm border around the booklet content).
Depending on whether you already have the front colour sleeve (cut and folded) you will use the "inner" set (Method A), or if you print the colour sleeve right now (still uncut), you will rather use the "outer" set (Method B, recommended).

If your paper trimmer has a long (right-angled and metric) scale you can simply cut along the crop marks (measuring the desired length for the final cuts), otherwise you may want to first draw guide lines with a ruler.
Always stick to the crop marks on *one* side, never turn the page around and use marks from both sides while cutting.

F) Cutting & Assembling the Prints

Method A - the "inner" crop marks

This is recommended if your colour artwork is already cut and/or your paper trimmer can't handle (up to) 6-10 sheets of paper in a whole.

Booklet:
- Carefully cut the pages to 120mm x 240mm using the "inner" crop marks
- Make sure to keep them sorted, because you will cut off the page numbers
- Assemble the pages in the correct order and place the (existing) front colour page on top of it
- Pin it with the stapler in the middle, 120mm off the border

This method is discouraged, because you need to work with maximum precision and carefully make sure to keep all pages sorted. However, you can hardly avoid that the inner pages "leak" out on the top or bottom, and most likely on the right side (due to the accumulating paper thickness).

Better: Method B - the "outer" crop marks

This is recommended if your colour sleeve is not yet printed/cut and your paper trimmer is capable to cut (up to) 6-10 sheets of paper in a whole.

Colour Sleeve:
- Open the "colour artwork" sleeve JPEG with your imaging software
- Scale it to exactly 120mm x 240mm and print it
- Cut it to 140mm x 260mm, leaving a 10mm border around the entire picture
Booklet:
- Cut the PDF prints to 140mm x 260mm using the "outer" crop marks
- Assemble the colour sleeve and the booklet pages (the page numbers are still visible)
- Pin it with the stapler in the middle, 130mm off the border
- Fold it and press it as flat as possible
- Cut off the remaining 10mm borders on top, bottom and right

G) That's it - Enjoy your TRAPPER Booklet! :-)