Help me explain pdf problem

[pabney]

Hello group!
I have a job that had an error and I have been told I need to write why the problem happened. Unfortunately I don't really know what is going on, so I hope all you PDF experts can help.

I have an Indesign CC file supplied from the customer. On one page there is a circle with a fade. On the first set of proofs, everything was fine. The customer made a couple of type changes and sent a new file. On the second go round, the fade disappeared and a hard circle was the result. This was not noticed and was printed that way, so now I need to figure out the problem.

I know that the pdf where created with the same settings from Indesign, from the same computer and the same user. Me. When the problem was found, I recreated the problem page pdf over and over to try and recreate the issue. Out of 25 exported pdf's 1 was bad and 24 where good. So what is going on? If anyone has any clue I would love to hear them.

I have attached a the pdfs of the good pdf, bad pdf. (I deleted all text and pics to keep the customer anonymous). The Indesign file is to large to post, but all three files can be downloaded from HERE.

Thanks for the help
Paul

 

[Fatboysmart]

I had a quick look with pitstop, but i can't figur it out either. Sometimes this just happens. Maybe a glitch in InDesign. Usually when some strange problem occurs making PDF files it helps to just copy all the information to a new page, or make a new document and copy paste everything there. Often the glitch is resolved then.

I don't think writing a report why this happened will be possible... sometimes this stuff happens for no apparent reason.

 

[bean66]

Could we get the Indesign files? It may be more help. Sorry I didn't read the whole post. I found the ID download. I export from ID CC and it looks ok. What export setting are you using?

 

[pabney]

bean66,
The Indesign file is to big to attach but can be picked up from http://files.emprinting.com/_9EHCm11WFWk1sR

 

[Laodamas]

10 MB is pretty large for an .indd file containing fills and a circle with an overlay blending mode and feathering. Opened the file in text edit, looks there is a an icc profile from photoshop attached. Perhaps this or other extraneous info is leading to inconsistent results upon export?

 

[Chasfinch]

Only thing I can see is that the feather effect was dropped for some reason when exported to the PDF. Indesign seems to rasterize the feather effect when exporting to pdf. I think that is the issue somehow. The effect did not stay when it was turned to raster. I cant say why though

 

[nprint]

I get this problem all the time with indesign and drop shadows or gradients, i usually bring it into illustrator and recreate the background and use that as a template

 

[wonderings]

is the feathered circle an embedded file?

 

[pabney]

Not sure where the feathered circle came from. My best GUESS would be a copy and paste from Illy.

 

[wonderings]

maybe there is something wonky going with that copied file that is causing this problem. I never copy and paste between the two, I always place an image in indesign.

 

[Chasfinch]

Feathered is in done in indesign when it output the pdf it rasterized it

 

[leonardr]

Feathered is in done in indesign when it output the pdf it rasterized it

That tells me that you are not exporting with live transparency. Try using a modern version of PDF - such a 1.6 or PDF/X-4.

 

[Gianni_S]

Hi, a pair of questions:
- the circle is an illustrator object inserted into a square box or an object pasted into that box and the feathered?
- have you updated you CC between the creation of both pdfs?
(Sorry can't read the CC 'cause I don't have that version and I don't like to do any debug job for Adobe!)
Feather is normally done via transparency, something affected it. Maybe exporting a pdfX-1A. Usually this should fix any kind of problem due to transparencies.

 

[pabney]

leonardr,
Both pdf's where created with the same Indesign export preset. Both are pdf 1.6. That is the issue. I could understand if they where exported differently, but that is not the case.
Gianni,
I was wrong, this is an Indesign object only. No Illustrator involved. CC was not updated. Both pd's where created by me on the same day.

 

[Lukas Engqvist]

@leonardr Feathering always produces rasters/raster mask (raster image in a clipping group) irrespective of PDF version at least up to and including PDF1.7.

 

[Chasfinch]

That tells me that you are not exporting with live transparency. Try using a modern version of PDF - such a 1.6 or PDF/X-4.

I used different settings all with the same result.

 

[mattbeals]

I was able to rasterize the PDF using a third party tool. I could also redistill it and get it to work. But I couldn't get it to work with the original PDF. Very strange problem.

 

[slush11]

I get this problem all the time with indesign and drop shadows or gradients, i usually bring it into illustrator and recreate the background and use that as a template

I always flatten transparencies when saving the printready file. Either that or select all and rasterize at 100% scale.