outlined text pdf gets distorted

Jiggy

Member
I've received a pdf which is made by Quark 5 and Distiller 7 for mac (according to Acrobat).

When I place this pdf in an Indesign document (it's an add) and export the new page (with page numbering etc.) as a pdf, this outlined text gets distorted. It becomes a combination of normal outlined objects and hairlines.

Attacthed a screendump, above the original outlined text, below the resulting graphic when exporting the pdf from Indesign. All I know that the pdf is made with Quark/Distiller. Don't know how the outlined text is done (illustrator eps or quark convert to outlined). Can't upload the original pdf because it's too large.

But anyone who can tell me what can cause this effect?
 
Re: outlined text pdf gets distorted

We would need to see the original PDF and the output PDF from InDesign to
understand what it taking place...

Leonard
 
Re: outlined text pdf gets distorted

save the original pdf as an eps and place that into indesign. Just did it and that works.
 
Re: outlined text pdf gets distorted

I saved the pdf in Acrobat as postscript and put it through Distiller to make a new pdf. Then imported that one in Indesign, exported again and the outlined text is now ok.

But I'm curious what setting could cause this distortion in the original pdf? Some setting in Quark/Distiller? The original pdf is made with that combination. All I did is have it go through Distiller again which seems to remove something and makes it ok again. What setting in Quark or Distiller could cause this behaviour somehow?

Anyway, I fixed it, but would like to know what happened
 
Re: outlined text pdf gets distorted

> I saved the pdf in Acrobat as postscript and put it through Distiller to make
> a new pdf.
>
Please don't refry PDF documents - it's NOT a recommended practice and
you should get out of the habit...


> But I'm curious what setting could cause this distortion in the original pdf?
>
It appears that the original PDF has OPI instructions included in it,
which Quark and a specially configured Distiller would be want to read -
instead of InDesign which defaults to ignoring such historical sillyness.


Leonard
 
Re: outlined text pdf gets distorted

Leonard,

I looked at the PDF and saw that the problem area in question were outlined type. No fonts used in this problem area.
So are you saying that the OPI instructions in Quark made the problem. Why would Quark write OPI instructions, unless using an OPI workflow?
BTW, I edited page in Illustrator (launched from Acrobat), and showed no fonts in problem area, but the area was messed up looking just like in the exported PDF. Opened the PDF into Photoshop and the type looked fine (although now 300 dpi CT res and not LW res).
I'm interested in this also, since what was received was the PDF and not the Quark file, so it must be able to be fixed using the PDF alone. So if not refrying, how would you handle it to get the job out right?

Don
 
Re: outlined text pdf gets distorted

Leonard,

Ripped the original PDF in Nexus (via hotfolder) and it ripped looking good.
Placed original PDF into InDesign CS2, printed postscript to rip and it ripped looking good.
Placed original PDF into InDesign CS2, exported EPS, dropped on hotfolder to rip and it errored out.
Placed original PDF into InDesign CS2, exported PDF and no matter what option I chose, it looked bad.

So here is another time that printing PostScript would have resulted in not encountering the error possibly (at least I wouldn't have encountered the error with my rip and it would have looked good because I'm one of the old fogies who still print separated PostScript to rip most of the time).

With the way the type is outlined and no longer fonts, it would almost seem if the problem is akin to Photoshop clipping path flatness or somthing like that, and that Adobe can handle it correctly when printing PostScript, but doesn't handle it correctly at all otherwise. Either way, Adobe needs to fix it so that it works correctly whether outputting via File > Print or Export PDF.

Don
 
Re: outlined text pdf gets distorted

Quark ALWAYS writes OPI instructions for EVERY PDF that it generates -
unless you explicitly turn it off. It's one of the reasons why their PDFs
are larger than necessary.

You can use the PDF Optimizer in Acrobat Professional to clean up your
PDFs...

Leonard
 
Re: outlined text pdf gets distorted

Leonard,

If I remove the OPI XTension (which I have done until Quark 7, which I have but thankfully don't have to use much), Quark wouldn't print OPI instructions then would it?

As far as the Quark PDF size, that's why I duplicate the default PDF/X-1a joboptions in Distiller, uncheck 'Allow PostScript file to override Adobe PDF Settings', then save as my joboptions. This way, the PDF is small as if Adobe would have made the PostScript and PDF (of course I always get Distiller to make the PDF and only let Quark make the PostScript). But even that didn't fix this problem we're talking about here.

So basically you're saying that Adobe doesn't support OPI, yet in their Press Quality joboptions (attached to the original PDF to show that the original PDF was made with these joboptions) they allow OPI comments (joboptions Advanced tab, Preserve OPI comments is checked). If Adobe doesn't work with OPI, knows that it can cause problems, why have it checked for a joboption that is described in Distiller as making a PDF "best suited for high-quality prepress printing"?

Bottom line: Adobe needs to fix this so that prepress doesn't have these things occur (unless Adobe has a good reason for not doing it, which I can't think of. Since Adobe doesn't support OPI, they should allow it in their PDFs they make, so we don't have to have problems like this come up.

Don
 
Re: outlined text pdf gets distorted

So if OPI instructions are the reason why the outlned text (with no fonts in it) get distorted, how can I use Acrobat to remove it? I've already looked at the PDF optimizer but couldn't find anything like "remove opi"
 
Re: outlined text pdf gets distorted

I've used an Enfocus action list to "remove opi" and made a new certified pdf with Acrobat. The new pdf of the original one now doesn't have OPI, but when I use 'export pdf' in Indesign having placed it, the outlined text is still garbled. So I guess it's something else. Any other suggestions what can cause outlined text to be distorted like this?

I've uploaded the new original pdf (using Acrobat, save as certified pdf, Enfocus with action 'remove opi):
[http://www.freewebs.com/colaflash/original.pdf]

Placing it in Indesign and using 'export pdf' or 'save as cpdf' results in the same export.pdf with distorted outlined text

Edited by: Jiggy on Oct 11, 2007 2:53 AM
 
Re: outlined text pdf gets distorted

Hi Jiggy,

Just as a test, see what happens with this file. I just ran it though some OV software.

Regards,
Greg

Systems Engineer
OneVision, Inc.
 
Re: outlined text pdf gets distorted

seems to work, but has the software detected anything strange about my original file

it also works when I save the pdf as postscript in acrobat and let it throug distiller again. after imported the redistilled pdf , no distortion

but what I really want to know is what makes the original pdf behave this way?
 

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