PDF handling

[Juan]

Hi all,
I´m having some problems with the pdf documents, if you open it in acrobat you can see the text and the gradients properly, but when is opened in PL the text is missing and the gradients are a group of banding lines. I been trying playing with the PDF options in PL with no luck.

I´m sharing a pdf example, maybe someone can give light on this.

Thanks in advance,
Juan

[greenmorpher]

When I open your test document in Acrobat I can see the gradient as smooth but no text.

When I open it in PL, Canvas, and Preview, I get exactly the same banding and no text.

Cheers, geoff

Geoffrey Heard
The Ad-Doctor-Online
http://www.ad-doctor-online.com

[OldRadioGuy]

I´m having some problems with the pdf documents, if you open it in acrobat you can see the text and the gradients properly, but when is opened in PL the text is missing and the gradients are a group of banding lines. I been trying playing with the PDF options in PL with no luck.

Juan, I opened your PDF in Adobe Reader 10.1.2 and then opened in PL 17.01, getting the same results as you reported and Geoff confirmed in his tests. I also tested in some other editors, including XaraDesigner 7 pro, which is a vector/bitmap editor with extensive PDF import-export capabilities. The only other editor that rendered your test file correctly was Adobe Photoshop Elements 10.

I'm including some quick screen caps to help others who may be reading this thread to follow along and perhaps one of the Huebers will comment on this problem. The PL and PSP caps include the layers dialog. Elements appears to render as one layers.


Bob

PL17.01.jpg

PSPX4.jpg

Elements10.jpg

[Sus]

The used font SPPJAY+ArialMT is not embedded correctly.
As a result Adobe Reader will substitue it with a build-in font.
Other programs apparently don't do that, which is correct I think.
ref: http://www.prepressure.com/pdf/basics/fonts

[bkh]

Hi all,
I´m having some problems with the pdf documents, if you open it in acrobat you can see the text and the gradients properly, but when is opened in PL the text is missing and the gradients are a group of banding lines. I been trying playing with the PDF options in PL with no luck.

The gradient looks ok in PL if you view it in at 100 % or multiples of it, or if you switch off anti-aliasing (in the "General Toolbar). Probably the behaviour has to do with the fact that the "gradient" in the pdf consists of a long series of long narrow rectangles, which don't fit together perfectly when scaled down. Imo, this is harmless, but maybe it can still be improved.

When I open it in PL, Canvas, and Preview, I get exactly the same banding and no text.

Preview (v. 5.0.3) shows the text on my Mac, but the banding effect is worse than PL's (doesn't go away even at large magnifications). Also tried Inkscape which shows that similar banding and doesn't show the text (and imports garbage text when I switch on font replacement).

The used font SPPJAY+ArialMT is not embedded correctly.

Are you saying that there is a problem in the PDF file? If there is an embedded font which isn't available on the computer, PL normally asks for a replacement font (PL doesn't use embedded fonts, even if the entire font is embedded – for copyright reasons, I believe) if it's not already listed under Preferences -> Extended -> Font replacement.

Cheers

Burkhard.

[Juan]

When I open your test document in Acrobat I can see the gradient as smooth but no text.

When I open it in PL, Canvas, and Preview, I get exactly the same banding and no text.

Is interesting see how each software open the file in a different way (supposedly PDF is an universal format :S)
I open my file in irfanview and you can see the banding (except at 100%) and the text shows correctly, on Draftsight (cad program) it import correctly text visible and no banding on the gradient.

Juan, I opened your PDF in Adobe Reader 10.1.2 and then opened in PL 17.01, getting the same results as you reported and Geoff confirmed in his tests. I also tested in some other editors, including XaraDesigner 7 pro, which is a vector/bitmap editor with extensive PDF import-export capabilities. The only other editor that rendered your test file correctly was Adobe Photoshop Elements 10.

I confirm too that photoshop elements open the file as it should be (maybe because acrobat belong to Adobe family? they don´t kick their own family hehe)

The used font SPPJAY+ArialMT is not embedded correctly.
As a result Adobe Reader will substitue it with a build-in font.
Other programs apparently don't do that, which is correct I think.
ref: http://www.prepressure.com/pdf/basics/fonts

Interesting

The gradient looks ok in PL if you view it in at 100 % or multiples of it, or if you switch off anti-aliasing (in the "General Toolbar). Probably the behaviour has to do with the fact that the "gradient" in the pdf consists of a long series of long narrow rectangles, which don't fit together perfectly when scaled down. Imo, this is harmless, but maybe it can still be improved.

At 100% looks ok, I guess the main problem is the amount of layers that a gradient can create in PL, imagine if you work with a file with so many different gradients, the performance of PL will drop to the floor, if this could be somehow like you say improve would be awesome, for example a dialog before importing to convert gradients into a single layer or so.


I made another test making a vector layer with gradient in PL and a text, then exported as PDF and then re-imported and I can see that the gradient is intact (is a vector layer with it´s own gradient apply) and for the text is imported as a separated letters.

Cheers
Juan

[bkh]

At 100% looks ok, I guess the main problem is the amount of layers that a gradient can create in PL, imagine if you work with a file with so many different gradients, the performance of PL will drop to the floor, if this could be somehow like you say improve would be awesome, for example a dialog before importing to convert gradients into a single layer or so.

I am sure that PL imports the "gradient" part of the PDF correctly, that is, in the way it is contained in the PDF file (otherwise other problems wouldn't show the same remdering problem). Seems that the program which created the pdf cannot handle PDF gradients properly. PL can import real PDF gradients in a single layer.

Of course, there are lots of things that could be improved during PDF import, such as reassembling text and split images. But analysing all the cases would be extremely difficult, and probably doesn't always work. But frankly, I don't think that PL is responsible for correcting the mess that other programs write to their PDFs.

Cheers

Burkhard.

[Juan]

I am sure that PL imports the "gradient" part of the PDF correctly, that is, in the way it is contained in the PDF file (otherwise other problems wouldn't show the same remdering problem). Seems that the program which created the pdf cannot handle PDF gradients properly.

Maybe you are right, is so hard to know if the source software can handle correctly gradients correctly, but what about the text?, Honestly I have absolutely no idea the behind the scene of softwares

PL can import real PDF gradients in a single layer.

Could you elaborate more please?.

Of course, there are lots of things that could be improved during PDF import, such as reassembling text and split images. But analysing all the cases would be extremely difficult, and probably doesn't always work. But frankly, I don't think that PL is responsible for correcting the mess that other programs write to their PDFs.

Of course is not and I agree with you, there can be so many different scenarios for each file that is virtually impossible to analyse each one.

Cheers
Juan

[bkh]

Maybe you are right, is so hard to know if the source software can handle correctly gradients correctly, but what about the text?

Well, you can actually look into the PDF file and see all these coloured rectangles there, so it's clear that the source software creates them.

I have no idea why the text is removed without a warning, and without substitution. Imo, this is a bug in PL. (I'd love an option to convert embedded fonts which cannot be substituted by vector layers.)

PL can import real PDF gradients in a single layer.

Could you elaborate more please?.

Sorry, I should have been a bit more careful – the current beta version of PL can – version 17.01 still converts gradients to bitmaps and ignores gradients during import.

PDFs (since at least v. 1.3) can store descriptions of gradients (start colour, direction, intermediate colours), in much the way gradients are stored in PL. So the best way of handling a vector layre filled with a gradient in PL is to store it as a vector layer in PDF with the same gradient, because if you re-open the PDF document, PL can re-translate the PDF vector layer and gradient into a PL vector layer and gradient.

The current release version of PL renders the vector layer and gradient into a bitmap image, and the program which produced your test image rendered the gradient as a series of narrow single-coloured rectangles, each with a slightly different colour. I guess that this is because some programs (including PL 17.01 ) cannot render real PDF gradients.

Cheers

Burkhard.

[Martin Huber]

I have no idea why the text is removed without a warning, and without substitution.

Well, if text can't be decoded, PhotoLine doesn't show a warning for 2 reason:
- Often PhotoLine can't recognize, whether it was able to decode the text.
- Usually you can see the problem without a warning.

Imo, this is a bug in PL.

I don't think so. PDF text is only importable (and searchable), if the creator supports this. The creator of this PDF file didn't support it.

Martin

[greenmorpher]

Hi Juan

What was the source of this PDF document that we are all having trouble with?

Cheers, geoff

[Juan]

What was the source of this PDF document that we are all having trouble with?

My clients send me the blueprints made in Vectorworks, that´s why the fonts missing are the biggest problem.
I downloaded the demo to try it out just in case.

Cheers
Juan