Provide an appropriately sized source document.
Your source document page size must match the project's format size.* For example, if you upload an 8.5 x 11 document and select 6 x 9 as the book size, Lulu scales your document to approximately 75% of the original size. The printed book will have unexpectedly small fonts and images. For more information about available book sizes, please see "What paper will my book have for the cover and interior?".
* Please note that there are different specifications for books with full bleed. See here for more information.
Set document pages to Portrait orientation, not Landscape.
POD printers tend to print landscape pages sideways, so even if you are creating a wide format book (9 x 7), the uploaded source document page orientation must be set to Portrait, with page dimensions defined with the wider width than height.
Use standard or common fonts.
If your uploaded source document contains unusual fonts, it is possible that your printed book won't turn out as expected. Use fonts that are readily available (almost anything provided by default in Microsoft® Windows® works). If you have unique or hard-to-find fonts in your document, provide a print-ready PDF of your work instead, making sure it meets our requirements — in particular, that the PDF includes the embedded fonts. For more information about PDFs and fonts, see "How do I embed fonts in a PDF?"
Embed your graphics.
Always embed any images or other graphics that you use rather than linking (or referring) to them. When you save the document, an embedded graphic is part of the document file. When you save a document with a linked graphic, the document file only contains a pointer to the graphic file, and the document file and graphic file remain separate. When you upload the document to Lulu, linked graphics do not upload.
Odd Numbered Pages are on the Right
Printing is not available on the inside of front and back covers. This means your first page starts on the right hand side.
When providing several files for a book, check page numbering.
You can upload more than one file for a book. If you do so, Lulu will assemble the files in the order you specify to build the final PDF. Drag and drop your uploaded files to arrange them into the order you want. Conversion does not change or update page numbering. Here are tips for using multiple source files for your project.
- Assuming each document begins a new section or chapter, each file should have an even number of pages. This ensures that the chapter starts on an odd-numbered (right side) page when the book is printed. If you have an odd number of pages in a particular file, insert a blank page at the end of it.
- Make sure the page numbering is correct within each file and across the files if you are numbering it sequentially. For example, if File1 is pages 1 through 10, then File2 should begin with page 11.
- You can use chapter numbers in your page numbering (page 1-1, page 2-1, and so on) instead of sequential numbering. If you do this, make sure the order in which the documents are listed in the Content section of Project Details matches your chapter order.
- When we get multiple files for the interior pages of a book, our software opens them up and converts them into a single document (without bleed) of the size you chose in the previous step. This process sometimes causes issues with fonts. If creating a book with a bunch of photos, you might prefer to use our Photo Book Studio; it provides better support when using multiple images in your book.
See also: What types of files can I upload?
