PDF and Open Type Fonts

[RVNG]

Hello All Font Guru's out there,

We have hired a new prepress person that has brought to my attention that Open Type Fonts are not fully supported in PDF. I personally haven't had any production issues with OTF ever (throughout my history with Apogee and now Prinect 2013) but was wondering if there is a scenario out there that I should be aware of? We export our PDFs from native applications using the PDFx-4 settings.
Admittedly, at closer inspection any PDF exported from Indesign with OTF, Acrobat does report them as either TTF or Type 1. Which is fine for me and our workflow, it all proofs and renders perfectly. However, is there anything to worry about? He says that if a 'real' OTF were to be supplied with a job we would experience a problem in our workflow. What do you think?

thanks,
Christian.

 

[Schnicklefritz]

In what way are they not supported in PDF? We have a pdf workflow here and as long as the Open Type font is embedded in the pdf it should be fine. Anyway, I've never had a problem with them.

 

[RVNG]

Thanks for the reply... I never had issue either, curious though if you were to open the PDF in Acrobat, and then in Document Properties --> Fonts Tab - are they reported as Open Type?

 

[DCurry]

I've never had an issue using Open Type Fonts.

 

[Schnicklefritz]

Thanks for the reply... I never had issue either, curious though if you were to open the PDF in Acrobat, and then in Document Properties --> Fonts Tab - are they reported as Open Type?

Just ran a quick test on OTF Vivaldi font. It displayed in the pdf properties as a True Type embedded subset not as an OTF.

 

[zoran]

Open Type are cross platform and as far as I am aware they are fully supported in PDF.
Both Apogee and Prinect 2013 are modern PDF workflows that should not have any issues with Open Type fonts.

 

[leonardr]

We have hired a new prepress person that has brought to my attention that Open Type Fonts are not fully supported in PDF.

Is it too late to fire them? If they think this seriously incorrect information, who knows what else they believe???

First, PDF has supported native OpenType fonts since PDF 1.6 (Acrobat 7). See ISO 32000-1:2008, Table 126.

However, even before that, PDF production tools (such as Acrobat, InDesign, etc.) would "take apart" the OpenType font and copy out either the TrueType or CFF (Type 1) glyphs and them embed them in that original/old style format. Some tools still do this today as it leads to smaller PDF output (when the OTF extras aren't required).

Second, OpenType support is a key feature of PDF/X-4, the modern version of PDF/X (and hopefully what everyone is using these days).

So bottom line - you (and everyone else here on this forum who posted to support your beliefs) are correct and your new hire is (to put it mildly) clueless - and should beaten severely with a cluestick (<http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=cluestick>).

 

[minch]

Hello Leonardo,
perhaps you can answer my question then: create an InDesign document with several pages that contain several Adobe CC fonts and then export a PDF. Send PDF to customer who can view it on his screen, but when the customer prints this PDF on their desktop printer some of the fonts are not reproduced accurately - it looks as if some other font is being used or some sort of type mangling is going on. We print PDF on colour laser toner printer or inkjet and it is fine. Any ideas? Regards minch.

 

[chevalier]

So bottom line - you (and everyone else here on this forum who posted to support your beliefs) are correct and your new hire is (to put it mildly) clueless - and should beaten severely with a cluestick (<http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=cluestick>).

I very much agree! Let the cluestick beating(s) commence!

There seems to be a misunderstanding of what OpenType Fonts are.
Adobe Fonts | OpenType
An Introduction to OpenType | Hoefler & Co.

Ye fellow prepress people... hear the gospel:
OTF is your friend!
(Comic Sans for emphasis)

 

[mwc]

One of many possibilities...
a. are fonts embedded properly in the PDF? (using a PDF/X-(?) standard)
b. does the font have embedding restrictions? (some fonts used to have wrong 'switches' thrown that cause them not to embed...don't know if they were Adobe fonts, or just some other rouge fonts?
c. what does an acrobat preflight of the file show for the fonts? any warnings?
d. (observation) I have never noticed 'major' issues with OTF fonts in comparison to TT and T1...they seem more stable in my experience.
e. (statement) - IMHO, courier is the only font you'll ever need....'cept maybe for comic sans?

 

[zoran]

I am not Leonardo or Leonard, but I do know that laser printer is probably using some kind of PS driver to describe/print pages.
That means your PDF is being converted to PS or PCL language to be printed on that laser.
During this conversion all kinds of funky things can happen, depending on the PDF content.

Hello Leonardo,
perhaps you can answer my question then: create an InDesign document with several pages that contain several Adobe CC fonts and then export a PDF. Send PDF to customer who can view it on his screen, but when the customer prints this PDF on their desktop printer some of the fonts are not reproduced accurately - it looks as if some other font is being used or some sort of type mangling is going on. We print PDF on colour laser toner printer or inkjet and it is fine. Any ideas? Regards minch.

 

[Stephen Marsh]

Whatever happened to Dom Casual and Brush Script? Back in the day, these were the equivalent of Comic Sans (although they had a better pedigree, they were just as abused).


Stephen Marsh

 

[minch]

One of many possibilities...
a. are fonts embedded properly in the PDF? (using a PDF/X-(?) standard)
b. does the font have embedding restrictions? (some fonts used to have wrong 'switches' thrown that cause them not to embed...don't know if they were Adobe fonts, or just some other rouge fonts?
c. what does an acrobat preflight of the file show for the fonts? any warnings?
d. (observation) I have never noticed 'major' issues with OTF fonts in comparison to TT and T1...they seem more stable in my experience.
e. (statement) - IMHO, courier is the only font you'll ever need....'cept maybe for comic sans?

To answer your questions:
(a) yes
(b) they all come from Adobe Creative Cloud - but we think this maybe the answer
(c) none
(d) thank you
(e) no - only courier!

 

[minch]

I am not Leonardo or Leonard, but I do know that laser printer is probably using some kind of PS driver to describe/print pages.
That means your PDF is being converted to PS or PCL language to be printed on that laser.
During this conversion all kinds of funky things can happen, depending on the PDF content.

There are no problems with either our laser printers or inkjet printers - the problem is with clients' desktop inkjet printers

 

[ajr]

We still get clients who still outline all their fonts

 

[tgilberto]

Our team agrees with the responses. It's also great to have all fonts converted to outlines to avoid
any font related issues as at times there are glitches.

 

[Dov Isaacs]

Our team agrees with the responses. It's also great to have all fonts converted to outlines to avoid
any font related issues as at times there are glitches.

“All fonts converted to outlines” is really a very bad idea! We at Adobe strongly discourage this poor workflow practice.

The fact is that “outlining text” to eliminate rendering with fonts is generally a very bad idea. Why?

Rendering text via fonts, whether in Type 1 or TrueType variants, is done with intelligent scaling, not simple geometric scaling. Fonts contain a feature known as “hinting” which causes improved rendering and readability at lower magnifications (the product of point size and resolution) to avoid overly-emboldened rendering, missing thin stems, filled bowels, missing serifs, etc. at smaller point sizes either on digital print devices and/or on displays. Outlining text results in replacement of the text rendered with fonts with individually-defined filled polygons that are scaled geometrically without any “hints” to preserve particular details.

The fact that each glyph is turned into a separate polygon also causes tremendous bloating of text-intensive content. It also may tremendously increase rendering time at the RIP (or for on-screen display) since this process doesn't take advantage of font glyph caching.

Of course, you also have the problem of a PDF file that cannot be searched and cannot be reasonably “touched-up” in terms of text edits.

Generally speaking, if you can properly display the text of a PDF file in Adobe Reader or Adobe Acrobat, you will not have any problem rendering the text on either a PostScript or direct PDF RIP from any reputable supplier over last decade.

You state that “at times there are glitches.” Based on our feedback both from our OEMs who incorporate the Adobe PDF Print Engine and/or Adobe PostScript in RIPs as well as from actual end users, this doesn't ring true. Furthermore, if there was a problem with rendering with a particular font, you probably have problems actually displaying and then outlining text in InDesign and Illustrator. If there was a problem rendering text via fonts, we would certainly hear about it. I've been at Adobe nearly 25 years and for all the bubbameises from some very few printers about unreliability of using fonts to render text at the RIP, when challenged, they simply have been unable to provide any examples of this!!!

Is this your direct experience or is this an urban legend that you are perpetuating? If your organization is experiencing this problem, we would be very interested in knowing what type of workflow you are using? How old a RIP/DFE are you using? Do you update the software? Do you hack around with submitted PDF files with dodgy PDF workflow software? For example, if you use QuarkXPress 3.32b as a page imposition tool front-ending a RIP from the last century using CloneScript technology, all bets are off!

- Dov

 

[toronar]

If your organization is experiencing this problem, we would be very interested in knowing what type of workflow you are using? How old a RIP/DFE are you using? Do you update the software?

I do have a problem with text/fonts in a PDF. Well, it is more of a problem with EFI and their wannabe RIPs.
We do not hack around with submitted PDF files.
The PDF files are submitted to an EFI Fiery Pro (v9) RIP with all the latest updates.
Random characters are replaced by boxes after rendering.

Same PDF, different RIP (APPE and CPSI): no problem.
Same PDF, Global Graphics Clone RIP: no problem.
Same PDF, preflights in Acrobat Pro: no problem.
Same PDF, really old postscript laser printer: no problem.

EFI's support did reply to that problem: "Other PDFs work fine. You should re-fry the PDFs and convert text to outlines."
Needless to say that I am not happy with that suggestion. I do not want to re-fry PDFs or convert text to outlines - Dov gave enough reasons why you should not do this.

This PDF was exported by InDesign CS6 as PDF/X-4 btw.

 

[Dov Isaacs]

I do have a problem with text/fonts in a PDF. Well, it is more of a problem with EFI and their wannabe RIPs.
We do not hack around with submitted PDF files.
The PDF files are submitted to an EFI Fiery Pro (v9) RIP with all the latest updates.
Random characters are replaced by boxes after rendering.

Same PDF, different RIP (APPE and CPSI): no problem.
Same PDF, Global Graphics Clone RIP: no problem.
Same PDF, preflights in Acrobat Pro: no problem.
Same PDF, really old postscript laser printer: no problem.

EFI's support did reply to that problem: "Other PDFs work fine. You should re-fry the PDFs and convert text to outlines."
Needless to say that I am not happy with that suggestion. I do not want to re-fry PDFs or convert text to outlines - Dov gave enough reasons why you should not do this.

This PDF was exported by InDesign CS6 as PDF/X-4 btw.

Thanks for providing this information.

I'm glad to know that you are not finding any issues with a different RIP that has both APPE and CPSI.

You should really escalate this with EFI! From Adobe's side, we certainly have not heard of any such issues from EFI in terms of their thinking it has anything to do with the APPE or CPSI technology we license to them.

That having been said, I certainly would not take on such a bad workflow practice (i.e., outlining text to eliminate use of fonts) due to a known problem with only one particular RIP. The support person you gave you the advice to “Other PDFs work fine. You should re-fry the PDFs and convert text to outlines” is an embarrassment to both his company and to the industry. You should definitely escalate.

(Contact me off-forum if you still have problems with this!)

- Dov

 

[toronar]

Just a quick follow-up: it turns out that our supplier stuck us with an old RIP version that does not have an APPE yet. We'll exchange that for v2 that has an APPE - and that v2 was originally ordered and acknowledged when we bought the machine. I'll report if that solves the problems we are facing.

BTW, just for kicks: for some PDFs the RIP-time is around 50 minutes on the old RIP. No transparency involved. I wonder if these do any better on the "new" v2 RIP, as our RIP for offset presses processes those in under 5 seconds.