Uploading manuscripts onto CreateSpace

Can a spoonful of sugar cure the hiccups?

Although uploading manuscripts onto CreateSpace (CS) are major steps in the process of publishing paperbacks, the process is relatively simple. Convert the manuscript to PDF and then just upload it.

In the last blog, I described my battle with poltergeists, and while I was eventually able to banish them, I was left with a couple of hiccups.

Two minor issues remained – the hiccups – embedded fonts and image resolution. After uploading my manuscript, I launched the CS Interior Reviewer to view the results. The font that I had embedded was registering as not embedded, and the resolutions of images I had adjusted were showing up as not adjusted.

Here is the process I followed in attempts to solve these problems.

I had chosen to use a non-standard font for the title of my work. This font needed to be embedded in order to display correctly; otherwise, IR would replace it with a standard font. So, I embedded the font using these relatively simple procedures:

• Click on the multicolored Office Button (top left).
• Open “Word Options.”
• Click on “Save” to open the customize documents pane. At the bottom, there is a section for embedding fonts.
• Select “Embed fonts in file” and ensure that the two sub-boxes are NOT checked.
• Click OK.

Simple as that.

The hiccup appeared after I embedded the font and uploaded the manuscript. The CS Interior Reviewer told me that it was not embedded. Huh? It shows up correctly on the Interior Reviewer (IR) display. What’s going on?

Using trial and error, I then uploaded a version of my manuscript in which I used the foreign font, but did not embed it, IR replaced the foreign font with a standard font as expected. Even though IR indicates that a properly embedded font is not embedded, it really is.

Therefore, I have decided to ignore the IR message.

The other hiccup is that images used in CS need to have a resolution of at least 300 dpi (dots per inch) not ppi (pixels per inch). Here is a link to an excellent website that explains the difference between dots and pixels. I was under the mistaken assumption that they are the same. They are not.

GIMP is a valuable image manipulation tool similar to Photo Shop, and it’s FREE! It does take some getting used to and the manual could use a search option, but it has a ton of useful tools, one of which enables changes to image resolution.

• Open GIMP
• Import the image. A simple method to do this is do copy the image. This places it on the clipboard.
• In the GIMP menu, select “File-Create-From Clipboard.” This will open the image in GIMP.
• Click on “Image” and then “Print Size.” This will bring up the “Set Image Print Resolution” dialogue box.
• The X and Y resolutions can be changed independently or together. If you intend to keep the image aspect the same, make sure that the two chain links shown are linked together.
• Set the resolution to the desired numbers, 300 ppi.
• Click OK.

The image is now ready to export.

• File
• Export
• Title the image
• Select File Type (This is a small option in the lower left, just above the Help box.) JPEG saves the image as a picture.
• Under the “Save in Folder,” save the image and it is saved in DPI and not PPI.

I stumbled on this wrinkle, and it was a fortuitous stumble. I read somewhere that, in some instances, there were four dots per pixel. Therefore, I increased the resolution in GIMP to 1200 ppi (4 x 300). This time, after changing the resolution as I had done many times before, I right clicked on the image properties and discovered that it was now displayed as 1200 dpi instead of ppi. Eureka! I then set the resolution of the images to the required 300 dpi.

That good ole trial and error, while terribly time-consuming, does occasionally find a way.

However, the IR tells me that the images are not 300 dpi even though they are. I choose to deal with this hiccup the same way I did with the embedded fonts problem – ignore it.

One purported cure for hiccups is a spoonful of sugar. Alas, if only that could be so easily applied here!