Print Interiors

The Print interior format typesets your book for print-on-demand. You get a 5.5 × 8.5 in PDF with mirrored margins, running heads, and chapters that open on a right-hand page.

Print preflight

After typesetting, Five Rooms checks every page as a book designer would. Each finding gives the printed page number and the passage, and Page shows it in the preview.

  • Page layout: widows and orphans, very short last lines, three or more hyphenated lines in a row, rivers of white space, facing pages of different lengths, hyphenated names, words split across a page turn, and chapters that open on a left-hand page.
  • Printer's specifications: trim size, margins and gutter for the page count, embedded fonts, and the page count, checked against Amazon KDP or IngramSpark, whichever the interior is for.

IngramSpark

In Publish ▸ Print interior, choose the version IngramSpark (PDF/X-1a). The file is PDF/X-1a:2001, the standard IngramSpark asks for: black text is 100% black ink, fonts are embedded, and there are no colour profiles, links or transparency. Preflight checks the file meets the standard, and checks the margins against IngramSpark's recommended 0.5 in. IngramSpark stores an even number of pages and adds a blank page to an odd count.

IngramSpark checks every file you upload; if it reports a problem, check the book for pictures or colour you've added.

Automatic fixes

Some problems are fixed during typesetting, without changing your text:

  • A blank scene break at the top or bottom of a page is invisible to the reader, so it's printed as ⁂.
  • When one page of a spread is a line shorter than the other, a paragraph near it is spaced very slightly looser (at most 0.03 em) so the pages line up.

Each fix is listed in the results.

Copyfitting

Some problems can only be fixed by rewording, such as trimming a few words to pull up a widow. Choose Add Copyfitting Notes to put each suggestion in the margin at the passage concerned, as a comment from "Print preflight". When you compile again and add new notes, the previous ones are resolved.

Spine and cover template

A paperback's cover is one sheet: back, spine and front. The spine's width depends on the page count and the paper, so work it out after the interior is built.

In Publish ▸ Print interior, the Spine row gives the width for the chosen paper. Choose Cover template… to:

  • Choose the Printer (Amazon KDP or IngramSpark) and the Paper. The choice is saved with the project.
  • Check Pages. The count comes from the last build of the interior; until then it's estimated from the word count.
  • See the full cover size, the spine, the area for spine text and the barcode's place.
  • Save PDF Template… or Save PNG Template (300 dpi)… for your cover designer. It marks the bleed (artwork runs past the trim), the safe area (keep words inside it), the spine folds, and the barcode box.

KDP's spine widths are the ones KDP publishes. KDP allows spine text only on books of 80 pages or more, and IngramSpark on books of 48 pages or more. IngramSpark's spine widths are estimates, so check them with IngramSpark's own cover template generator before you finish the cover.