efi smartcanvas indesign plugin installation & user guide

© 2020 Electronics for Imaging, Inc. All rights reserved.

EFI SmartCanvas InDesign Plugin Installation & User Guide

The purpose of this document is to provide instructions for how to install the plugin, use it within Adobe InDesign, and import design files into SmartCanvas.

Requirements

Adobe InDesign 2020 or higher

EFI MarketDirect 11.4 or higher

EFI SmartCanvas 9.0 or higher

Purpose

The purpose of the SmartCanvas InDesign Plugin is to enable a user to export designs created in InDesign and import them into SmartCanvas.

The primary concept of the SmartCanvas InDesign Plugin is to mark items which should be editable in SmartCanvas as “variable” and all other items are “static”.

The items users can mark as “variable” are image boxes and text boxes.

Because EFI SmartCanvas does not support all Adobe InDesign features such as caps or splines, these “static” items will be exported as a PDF, which will then be placed in SmartCanvas and look the same as in InDesign.

Installation (Windows)

To install the SmartCanvas InDesign Plugin in Adobe InDesign on a Windows PC, you must first download the installer.

The installer link can be found here: https://www.efi.com/marketing/productivity-software/downloads/mdxm-installers/.

From the SmartCanvas tab, download the installer (SmartCanvas InDesign Plugin).

Execute the installer and then start Adobe InDesign. If the program was open during the installation, please restart Adobe InDesign.

Users should see the new “EFI SmartCanvas” option in the top menu pane.

https://www.efi.com/marketing/productivity-software/downloads/mdxm-installers/


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Installation (Mac OS)

To install the SmartCanvas InDesign Plugin in Adobe InDesign on Mac OS, you must first download a zip package.

The Mac OS zip package can be found here: https://www.efi.com/marketing/productivity-software/downloads/mdxm-installers/.

Unpack the file and open the folder “Scripts Panel”; then, copy the folder “EFI” and paste it into “Applications\Adobe InDesign 2020\Scripts\Scripts Panel”.

Return to the folder where you unpacked the zip file and open the folder “startup scripts”; then, copy the folder “EFI” and past it into “Applications\Adobe InDesign 2020\Scripts\startup scripts”.

If Adobe InDesign was open during this process, please close it and reopen it again.

Users should see the new “EFI SmartCanvas” option in the top menu pane.



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©2020 Electronics for Imaging, Inc. All rights reserved.

Export your document from Adobe InDesign

To perform the export, select an image box and right click. Then, click on “Variable Image” in the context menu.



Perform the same actions for text boxes.

Select a text box and the right click. Then, click on “Variable Text” in the context menu:



Users can also select more than one item and set each of them to “static” or “variable” with one click. In the following screenshot, all text and image boxes were selected. For the image boxes you can see that “static” and “variable” are selected. This is because one image is “static” and the other is “variable”:



When you are finished editing your document, you can export it to a zip package.

To export your document, click on the main menu “EFI SmartCanvas” -> ”Export”.

You will then be prompted to enter a file name for your export package:

The plugin will then export all variable images, fonts, and the document itself as an EFI DocML file.

Before the export starts it does a preflight check to ensure:

• all used fonts are available • all used images are available



Import your document into EFI SmartCanvas

To import your exported InDesign file into SmartCanvas, click on “File”->”Import EFI InDesign file…” on the SmartCanvas main menu.

Click “Import EFI InDesign file” from the pop-up window and select the zip package which was exported from Adobe InDesign.

After the import has finished, you will see your imported document with all layers. You can now edit your “variable” image and text boxes. All other static items are now in a PDF which is locked.



Supported Properties

The following is a list of all properties which will get exported from Adobe InDesign using the plugin.

Document

The following document properties are exported:

• page width and height • unit of measurement • number of pages • facing pages • bleed • margin • layer

o name o color o lock state

• respects custom zero point o X and Y values are converted

• fonts o all used font files get exported

• color swatches • paragraph styles

Variable Images and Text Boxes

EFI SmartCanvas does not support all InDesign features; therefore, only the properties supported by EFI SmartCanvas are exported for “variable” image and text boxes.

The following InDesign features are supported by SmartCanvas:

• X and Y position • rotation • width and height • border

o width, color, corner radius • drop shadow

o color, offset, blur, blend mode • opacity • background color

Variable Images

• embedded and linked images • aspect ratio • paddings • image name

Variable Text

• text color • font • font size • line height • used paragraph style



• vertical alignment • horizontal alignment

Paragraph (Text) Styles

• name • based on (paragraph) • font • font size • text color • line height • horizontal text alignment • bullet list • indentation

efi smartcanvas indesign plugin installation & user guide

Documents