Apologies, I should have provided some more details.
I did some research on the software available for making calendars and found most had predefined templates and limited options for customising, however if someone knows of a good one I am still open to new ideas.
The program I did use was Smartdraw, this is not a calendar software package but more of whole suite of packages for everything from presentations to crime scene documentation! The calendar
module in this is pretty gumby, however it gave me some key features:
1) Export to multiple formats, including pdf and tiff.
2) allow me to add personal dates, moon phases, bdays etc
3) Add pictures
4) Yearly planner
5) Add extra boxes and text areas for quotes and events etc
6) not affiliated with a print business.
The smart draw program basically gives you the month view table in boring BW and if desired, the pre and post month previews. There are few colour templates but they are crap - everything else is gerry built/customised from there, including all the bday graphics, borders, text positions, text boxes, footer, fonts and colours - i like the pastel colour scheme
It does automatically give you aussie public holidays!
The best thing about the program is that it does not lock you into a format or template, you can choose page size, layout positions, add text boxes anywhere, change text fonts, colour, background gradients the list goes on. The program also has lots of predefined little effects like drop shadow and text box
styles.
The things I hated.
1) each month has a separate file, if you change your design it means you have to change 12 months/12 files - a royal pain in teh ass, unless you get it right the first time.
2) can be flakey/inconsistent with teh strange fonts and will print them as raster images rather than true fonts.
3) copy and paste between files is flakey
so, would I use it again? no, purely based on 1) and 2). however I am now familiar with it and could easily do up a 2012 calendar in a matter of hours.
In terms of getting it to the printers - I basically printed to pdf (pdfcreator) at 1200dpi (probably overkill but they were happy with it, I did try hi res tiff format but it looked crap. Printing to pdf means all the fonts are preserved and print as fonts.
For the images I just used hi res jpegs, these printed out fine.
bigsarg7 wrote:fantastic gift for anyone, not just family! I think its a fantastic idea
the only problem being its got a whole bunch of bdays and events relating to me and my family so its a bit limited I guess. As it stands I had to to do two versions for the family if you catch my meaning
gstark wrote:If I'm reading your message correctly, you did the whole thing yourself (save the printing)? design, layout, etc?
correct
gstark wrote:Or did you start with a template of some sort?
the start template was the month view and the pre and post month preview boxes.
rflower wrote:Where did you get them printed (Did they do the coil for hanging too? - or did you do that?)
I got them printed at a local printer in Enmore (A1 printing), not the cheapest option, however I chose them since I could walk into teh store and talk to the very guy who was gonna print it out, they are gave a me a proof (probably charged me for it but..)
The spiral bind is done by them, the only option they have for hanging is the punched hole. I did want the little bit of bent wire on the spiral bind but it was not a show stopper.
rflower wrote:How much did they cost?
There are plenty of online printers who advertise AUD12-15 per calendar (typically for 100) however these ones will probably work out around the AUD18 per calendar mark, pretty pricey but it is a small shipset.
rflower wrote:What did you give the printers? Was it a PDF or similar sheet?
pdf in the correct layout size (A3) printed at 1200 dpi, this worked out to be about 70 mb.
surenj wrote:Please spill ya guts about the whole process (including software used etc etc)... I would like to do this, but it would take me all year....
lol, it took me two years to get off my ass and do it
If you got any questions let me know - this is a learning curve for me too.
hth.
I would also love to know what other software is out there - more so for the professional printers not the gumby sh$te you get from some printing company.
These are sensational!
I would like to do this, but it would take me all year.... 
, why do the Yanks illogically date everything as month/day yet refer to that little date as "4th of July" when, using their vernacular, it should be referred to as "July 4th"? This is important! 
