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Richs' experiments remind me of the point I tried to make in an earlier post. Exported pdf's don't always fail, but they do seem to be unpredictable. In a production environment, unpredictable doesn't cut it. In order to maintain some semblance of repeatability we encourage our clients to produce their files in the "tried and true" method of .ps/distilling. This doesn't mean that we will never accept files created by exporting, we have produced several magazines using this method and have had no problems.(fingers crossed of course:). Until we can solve the problem, or at least pinpoint it, it's going to be status quo. On another note... is there another pdf list that deals with prepress/print production, any recommendations? cheers Jason ----- Original Message ----- From: "Rich Sprague" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Sunday, February 29, 2004 7:30 PM Subject: RE: [PDF-Basics] Postscript generation in Mac OS X > > PDF-Basics is a service provided by PDFzone.com | http://www.pdfzone.com/ > __________________________________________________________________ > > Thank you, Leonard, for your extensive explanation. I honestly am not sure > if it answers the question about the difference between the three different > PDFs I tested today, or muddies the water. > > From a printer's point of view, all three PDFs were identical. As you will > recall, one of the PDFs I made was from the print to Adobe PDF feature, and > another I PS'd and distilled. Both of those PDFs indicated that they were > made from Distiller 6.0.1. I don't know how anyone would know which way I > made them, and I ask the question again, as a printer how am I going to know > that one of the PDFs is tainted? > > This is just an incredible can of worms. People make PDFs by PSing and > distilling, by printing to the Adobe printer, by exporting using the PDF > Library, with Ghostscript. and who knows how many other programs? The > biggest issues for printers are enough in themselves to cope with: are the > fonts embedded, is the resolution correct, is the file CMYK, and will it > RIP? > > If, in fact, the only way to correctly make a PDF is to print to Adobe PDF, > then why would Adobe offer an export or save to PDF function in its > programs? Why would third party vendors offer alternative software for > making PDFs? > > And if we're all supposed to put on the brakes and start using one method > only, what happens when something better comes along? I don't think people > are prepared to change their workflows (or habits) that rapidly. > > I respect your knowledge and expertise as an engineer, but 95% of the people > in the trenches (designers and producers) won't have a clue what this all > means. When a magazine calls and says send a PDF, they don't ask how it was > made...they're mainly interested in the fact that one uses the Press Quality > job options. > > I go back to something I said many threads ago. It's best to discuss > production issues between the vendor and the customer, and develop a > workflow that works for both parties. > > Rich > > ------------------- > > P.S. Following additional research, I learned today why my colleague was > making bloated PDFs file Quark files. He was printing to the Distiller PPD, > but using a Laserwriter print driver. By installing the Adobe Virtual > Printer (Mac OS 9.2.2), he knocked down the size of a single-page full-color > PDF from 16 MB to 3.2 MB. The same page exported from Quark was a whopping > 35 MB. > > ------------------- > > -----Original Message----- > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Leonard Rosenthol > Sent: Sunday, February 29, 2004 4:24 PM > To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Subject: [PDF-Basics] Postscript generation in Mac OS X > > > PDF-Basics is a service provided by PDFzone.com | http://www.pdfzone.com/ > __________________________________________________________________ > > At 07:44 AM 2/29/2004, Rich Sprague wrote: > >Could you please explain your rationale, here, so people can understand > >why you are making this claim? > > Postscript generation in Mac OS X takes a strange a indirect path, > unlike generation of PS on Mac OS 9...AND things changed between 10.2 and > 10.3... > > On 9, applications either printed directly in Postscript (in which > case it was written directly to disk) OR they printed in QuickDraw which was > converted in the PS driver to PS and then written/printed. > > In OS X, applications can print either in "PS in PICT" (one PICT > file, PER PAGE, with embedded Postscript), or Quartz. In the latter case, > Quartz is converted to PDF and then PDF is sent to the printing system - and > to get Postscript, the PDF is converted to Postscript and then fed to the PS > "printer driver". In the former case, the PICTs are "unwrapped" and the PS > data is sent to the driver along with job-level instructions and then > printed/saved. Since the apps can't write entire jobs of PS, only > page-level PS, it's not possible to send a "pure PS stream" to the printer > as it was in 9. > > With 10.3, things got even more interesting when Apple made two > more changes to the print system. First, they added the ability to send a > PDF directly from an application to the printer - this is what Acrobat > 6.0.1 does, thus speeding up printing to non-PS printers. Second, the > integrated Adobe Normalizer providing a PS->PDF conversion in the printing > system to allow printing of PS from apps like Quark and Illustrator to > non-PS printers. > > Bottom line - there is NO WAY for an application in OS X to produce > the EXACT STREAM of PS that will be sent to the printer as there was in OS 9 > - and as such, it should be considered "tainted". Even more important is > that the PDF->PS process used for non-PS generating application (ie. > anything that isn't prepress, or that is written in Cocoa) will create PS > that if then fed back into Distiller will generate poor quality PDFs - most > esp. with non-searchable fonts :(. > > So, if you are using Mac OS X, and your goal is high quality PDF - > go DIRECTLY from your authoring application! > > > Leonard > > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- - > Leonard Rosenthol <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Chief Technical Officer <http://www.pdfsages.com> > PDF Sages, Inc. 215-629-3700 (voice) > 215-629-0789 (fax) > > > To change your subscription: > http://www.pdfzone.com/discussions/lists-pdfbasics.html > > > To change your subscription: > http://www.pdfzone.com/discussions/lists-pdfbasics.html > > --- Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free. Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com). 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