How to automate overlaying two PDFs in SWITCH/PitStop/CallasToolbox

MartynNitschmann · Post by **MartynNitschmann** » Wed Feb 19, 2014 5:35 pm

Hi out there!

We have:

several ad-layouts (single-page PDFs in colour, serving as a frame) and several article-compositions (single-page PDFs in grayscale).

We need to overlay the basic frame-layouts with the article-compositions.

In numbers: if we have 3 frame-layouts and 10 article-compositions, we expect to get 30 resulting PDFs out of SWITCH.

our equipment:

SWITCH 11

PitStopServer 11

Callas pdftoolbox 6

(I know, not the most recent stuff, but even with the 12 and 7-versions we can’t find a feature for our need).

As far as I can see, there is no feature in Pitstop to overlay files (without copy/paste).

In Callas pdftoolbox I found a predefined overlay-action.

But I didn’t get it to point the action to pick up a file from a folder and not using a specific file (which is working perfectly). I would like to avoid to always change the overlay-file manually.

Any clues?

Any hints about using variables/scripting with this action?

Any ideas for other functionalities possible with our equipment?

Should the SWITCH-client be involved, and if so, how?

Any help is appreciated

Martyn

dkelly · Post by **dkelly** » Wed Feb 19, 2014 5:56 pm

search the posts for "Callas PDFtoolbox action - overlay?" thread.

MartynNitschmann · Post by **MartynNitschmann** » Fri Feb 21, 2014 11:13 am

Did so, Dwight.

But this thread didn’t answer my question.

I’ve tried the Overlay-action with my toolbox.

And it works as expected for specific files.

If I would like to change the overlay-file, I have to go to

SWITCH-->stopping overlay workflow-->pdftoolbox-element (i.e. the overlay-action)-->change the overlay-PDF manually-->restarting overlay workflow

That is not an option to do this manually.

What I ask for is, how to tell the action to look into a specific folder for a file to overlay.

If I change the pdf-file (always different names!) in there, I get new composites whenever I have a new incoming job.

I can’t get the variable in the action to use a pdf from a folder, only a specific file.

It seems to be my inability to put a usable path-declaration in there.

Thanks

Martyn

dkelly · Post by **dkelly** » Fri Feb 21, 2014 3:27 pm

The "Overlay-PDF" properties has 4 types. Instead of selecting "choose file" select "define single-line text with variables" and then select a switch or metadata variable to change which PDF is overlaid.