Apogee & PDF

[Tech]

Hi All,
I'll need some help here to verify a few points to see if I'm losing my mind.

1) Can a PDF file with fonts not embedded crash Apogee RIP/server? If yes, why? Is there a workaround?

2) When prepress dept from a printer insist they can't troubleshoot a PDF with fonts not embedded and dunno how to find a solution(s) to "make" things work, is really making me uncomfortable when they have to come back to me for support. Worst, they are stating this file crashes every app they have (when they have to create postscript file), Apogee doesn't support native PDF?

3) They held file for almost a month and now claim they can't handle it. This to me is suggesting a lack of staff knowledge. Which worries me to send any new work their way.

 

[mtnman]

Non imbedded fonts don't usually cause the Apogee RIP/server to crash, normally just won't process the pdf file. There are a couple of things to attempt, you could load the font to Apogee - PC fonts have to be loaded from PC Client, Mac Fonts have to be loaded from a Mac Client.

Not sure why you wouldn't just resupply the PDF file with the font embedded.

 

[Tech]

I wish it's as easy to resupply fonts. We didn't create the original PDF, it came to us as "press-ready" from another publishers. Their original layouts were from Pagemaker and fonts collected were renamed and incompletely at best. We were left with no other choice but work with this PDF file, thinking if they somehow managed to get this printed previously, it must work right?

Lesson learned here, I definitely do not trust this printer anymore in terms of their abilities at troubleshooting client files. They held our file for almost a month when I resolved the issues in under 3hr.

 

[Lukas Engqvist]

If you take the PDF and export to PS

If you take the PDF and export to PS

Include fonts embedded and referenced and drop the PS file in the Apogee. If you have the fonts on the computer running acrobat that should include the fonts.

 

[Gerhard]

Apogee & PDF

Hi.
If the fonts are not embedded in the PDF and the fonts are not installed on the RIP be sure all RIPs will break off the job. Normally they do not crash. So there must be also another bug in the file.
There is some normalizing software available in the market helping to recognize and to solve some problems. But also these software applications will not embed fonts. Look if you have the fonts available where you do designs and try to embed the fonts creating a new PDF or go back to your customer for supplying an new file with embedded fonts.
Anyhow look for a normalizing software. It will help you to see the problems before the file goes to the RIP.

 

[CHM]

I know this is not a direct solution for your problem at hand. But maybe a good idea to introduce a certified pdf WF, so you can pinpoint the problems with the pdf's in an early stage.

 

[ubergeek]

a certified workflow is a great idea in theory, but in reality, how many shops (aside from the ones that do national advertising work) actually have even a modicum of control over what kind of gargbage they recieve. Our biggest problem is that we print muli-lingual publications, and some fonts just do not embed!! we there fore have to rely on printing from acrobat. sending to a normalizer and then to pdf render is redundant... we just print from acrobat to the old renderer in apx4... the pdf render has a bug or two in it anyway

 

[Lukas Engqvist]

multi language? fonts not embedding are we talking asian characters? think there is licencing stuff on those causing problems.

 

[ubergeek]

Quite right, Lukas.
the problem is due to licensing restrictions, although, it's not just asian fonts, but other languages as well. Many Central European fonts do this as well. We've tried to explain this to our customers, but you know how it is.....:"it looks fine on my screen". some customers will never change.

 

[Lukas Engqvist]

In Acrobat it is possible to use only embeded fonts, that is how it used to be in acrobat 4, one could choose not to use local fonts… what happened to that setting, can't find it now.

Guess the only way is to have a certified flow that flaggs for non embeded fonts.

 

[vijugovind]

Use Enfocu Pitsoft pluging
run the option conver all text to outline.... (before RIP that pdf file)