JPG to CMYK PDF/X-1a:2001 without Adobe

When you go to publish your book on IngramSpark, you’ll learn that they want your cover image to be in a specific PDF format known as PDF/X-1a:2001.  And that the colors in your PDF must use CMYK instead of RGB.

That’s apparently easy to do in Adobe if you already use Adobe tools.  If you don’t, however, it is difficult to find a way to perform the conversion without paying hundreds of dollars for software.  I’d happily make a one time payment of $15 for one month of access to Adobe Photoshop in order to update my cover.  But Adobe does not offer month-to-month that inexpensively.

It turns out that the necessary conversion can also be done using an open source desktop publishing tool called Scribus, which works on all the major operating systems. I used Linux in VirtualBox but you should be able to adapt my steps to Scribus on your OS.

First go to the IngramSpark cover template generator and put in your ISBN (so they can populate the selections for you) and your price for the bar code (if you use that option). They will email a PDF to you.

1. convert the PDF to a JPG (I used an online tool – pick one)
2. make necessary changes (I use a tool called Paint.Net)
3. make sure your image is 300 dpi (dots per inch)
4. save as a maximum quality JPG

Now your JPG needs to be converted to a PDF of the correct type.

Download and install Scribus (I used v1.4.8 – the latest stable version).

Configure it to export PDF/X-1a and CMYK:

• File > Preferences > Color Management –> check Activate color management
• File > Preferences > PDF Export > File options > Compatibility –> set PDF/X-1a
• File > Preferences > PDF Export > Color > Output Intended For –> set Printer
• File > Preferences > PDF Export > General > Compression –> set to Lossless – Zip
• File > Preferences > Preflight Verification –> Output profile to PDF/X-1a

Create a new document:

1. File > New
2. single page > Custom (bottom of list)
3. note: set the size to the exact same width and height as your JPG in inches (because they don’t support pixels)

Insert an Image Frame:

1. Insert > Image Frame
2. set it to be the same size as your JPG in inches
3. drag top left corner to 0,0 (exactly!) – you may need to zoom in

Insert your JPG into the Image Frame:

1. double click the Image Frame to open the file system browser
2. pick your JPG > OK
3. it should fill the screen. If the image is small, it probably isn’t 300 dpi or the dimensions are wrong. Fix it.
4. File > Save

Export the PDF:

1. File > Export > Save as PDF
2. select PDF/X-1a
3. make sure Pre-Press says the color profile is Artifex CMYK SWOP Profile
4. Save

Check it – this is why I run Scribus on Linux.  There’s a Linux command line tool that will give you info about the PDF, and most importantly, the colorspace.

1. open a console window
2. run: pdfimages – list [your pdf file name]
3. it should show the correct dimensions and dpi, and the colorspace as cmyk

Then in Windows you can check the PDF format using FoxIt Reader:

1. open the PDF
2. File > Properties > Description
3. it should show the correct dimensions in inches
4. click “Custom”
5. it should show: Conformance as PDF/X-1a:2001 and Version as PDF/X-1:2001

Assuming there are no other issues in the JPG you created, you should now be able to upload your cover PDF to IngramSpark.

Finally, if you too would happily have paid some amount for one-time access to a tool in order to perform this task, then donate that amount to one of the tools you use. I’d suggest Scribus but they don’t take money.

Good luck!

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