Convert 4c type in PDF with Acrobat?

[FullPro]

I am having problems with camera-ready ads that have been made into PDFs and have 4-color black text. Is there a way to convert the text to 100% black only and keep it as text (PS fonts).

I think I can do it with a fixup setting in a custom prepress check for text on more than one plate (and total ink of > 250 or something), but i'm not positive it will work.

I can also see opening in Illustrator and changing text objects to 100K, but this would have to be done object by object, no?

We have a fairly ad-hoc workflow and have to deal with files created with all kinds of nutty settings and processes. I don't have any add-on tools like PitStop, just the usual CS3 and Quark 5&6, and Acrobat 8. on PC.

[MacDaddy]

Not for sure how to do it using Acrobat Pro, really never looked. But you can open a pdf in Adobe Illustrator.
And then fix it their.

[mattbeals]

Callas pdfToolbox has a button that fixes four color blacks. Not all of them mind you, but many of them. If you have a copy of PitStop Pro then you can also do this pretty easily with an action list or global change. Both tools work well for building a running list of colors that you want to map/change. There aren't any "fixups" in Acrobat that I remember seeing that will let you map/change/fix specific colors.

[rich apollo]

PitStop (or Callas) will pay for itself very rapidly in just such situations.

[steesh]

You could open in Illustrator, select one of the objects, select menu, same fill colour then adjust using the CMYK slider? Opening in Illustrator may cause another set of problems tho..

[Dov Isaacs]

Not for sure how to do it using Acrobat Pro, really never looked. But you can open a pdf in Adobe Illustrator.
And then fix it their.

Very BAD idea!

On behalf of Adobe Systems Incorporated ...

Adobe Illustrator is not, repeat not, repeat yet again absolutely not a general purpose PDF file editor. The only PDF files that can be safely and fully edited in Adobe Illustrator are PDF files created by Adobe Illustrator via the save as PDF function and for which the retain editability option is specified. In such files, private data is added to allow such safe editing. You also must have all the fonts used in the PDF also installed on your system - Illustrator does not use the fonts embedded in the PDF (if any). For all other PDF files, editing in Adobe Illustrator may result in font changes, color changes, and content loss. Adobe Illustrator only supports a subset of the PDF file format and doesn't support mixed color spaces.

In the example given, the rich black likely came from a PDF file generated from an RGB application and fixing it in Illustrator may yield even more problems!

- Dov

[Lukas Engqvist]

Color converter works fine, there is a preserve blacks option. You can also use it to just convert text objects. Pitstop has more control over the selected colour range that you convert.

[Stephen Marsh]

I think I can do it with a fixup setting in a custom prepress check for text on more than one plate (and total ink of > 250 or something), but i'm not positive it will work.

I found a "text uses rich black" check... but where is the similar out of the box fix-up for this check? I am still looking into the settings for a custom preflight or fix-up.

BTW, this may sound like a strange question - but are you *sure* that the black text is really 4C and not K only? Have you used the object inspector, or just the separations preview? (there is a good reason why I ask this question) Why is text 4C, why would a document creator do this? What program is the PDF creator? (found in document properties) Is it some weird PDF conversion tool? Is somebody using the wrong settings to convert an RGB PDF to CMYK?

What rich black values do you have? Are they consistent? Is black 100% or lesser?


Best,

Stephen Marsh

[MacDaddy]

I understand Illustrator is not a all purpose pdf editor. But if you need to fix this issue with rich black text I have found it to be a reliable fix. To avoid font issues open a new Illustrator file place the pdf in. have it selected click object, flatten transparencies, select High quality and check outline fonts. Then you can select the troubled text and make it 100K. Hope this helps.

[Dov Isaacs]

I understand Illustrator is not a all purpose pdf editor. But if you need to fix this issue with rich black text I have found it to be a reliable fix. To avoid font issues open a new Illustrator file place the pdf in. have it selected click object, flatten transparencies, select High quality and check outline fonts. Then you can select the troubled text and make it 100K. Hope this helps.

You are very lucky that you haven't ruined your jobs. Your workflow is strongly not recommended by Adobe.

- Dov