Quark Forums

Glenn McDowall:

I'm not fit to be Robert Zacherl's padwan. (do you remember the obi wan kenobi post?)

In fact most of what I've picked up on these forums is down to Robert, he is still an occasional poster on the Pitstop forum, but very much missed here. Matthais should head up the road in Hamburg and ply him with beer until he agrees to come back.

As for my knowledge of PDFs I'm afraid its less godlike and more like in the kingdom of the blind the one eyed man is king, head over to Adobe PDF forum there are plenty there who are way advanced of me. In fact when I have to use Acrobat9 Pro and Pitstop8 I'm as baffled by the interfaces as the next man.

I'd love to figure out how to extract a separation, apparently it can be done without re-frying with v9.

Darth Almaink? 

 

OK, Glenn. But you still know more than me about this stuff. I agree that Matthias should track Robert down and bring him back. He's much missed.

As to Darth Almaink, I'm LOL! :)

Glenn:

DO NOT SUBSET FONTS If a font is multiply subsetted in a pdf, when presented to the rip, can produce garbled text

That's what happened to 2 of my books, the printer tried to explain, but wasn't able to as well as you did. What I don't understand is that if I'm using Garamond Light Italic and Helvetica Light do I have to embed all the different weightsof each font? Or, are just the 2 weights that are being used enough? I'm not using any odd characters or accents which may come from one of the other weights. My new bookshas been shipped and in my email from the the printer everything seems to be OK. I'll know for sure when they arrive next week. Will post back. I discovered that when I created my PDF files for this book crop marks were generated. The printer requests that there not be any crop marks. They accommodated me by removing them. With Panther crop marks were not created. Now with Leopard I notice that there is an item for turning off crop marks. Not being around this every day makes it almost impossible to keep up with all the changes. I just upgraded to Quark 8.1 which apparently has updated capabilities for PDF. I'll have to read them again. I appreciate the help you and Eric have given me and will post back with the results. Does Eric wear his brown obi wan kenobi robe to work?

iMac 2GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
OS 10.6 Snow Leopard
3GB Mem
Quark 8.1
Photoshop CS2 & CS4

Frank Abramonte:

Glenn:

...Does Erik wear his brown obi wan kenobi robe to work?

 

Yes, but I have to be careful. Obi-Wan is still looking for it!

Frank, if it were me with a critical piece, I'd embed the whole dang font family just to be safe. But Glenn can answer that last question better than I.

Erik Youngren (Click my name to email me, or the Contact button above.)
Quark Forum member since 2001.
If you have a corrupt file or just need help, contact me. I try to help anyone who asks.
I get a lot of requests, so if I have helped you in the past, my apologies in advance if I
do not remember you straight away.
View my profile, work info and contact details.

Eric, I could embed the entire font family if I knew how. The only font option in the Export Layout as PDF is "font options, select all" and it lists only the weight I'm using. http://i26.tinypic.com/4sz1w7.jpg At any rate, if my books come out ok then the Quark 8 PDF part is working correctly, just have to remember to turn off crop marks. I've noticed that there are a lot of posts about PDF problems.

 Frank, I'm sorry I can't be of more help on this (pertaining to font embedding). My usual PDF method is to print to PS and then use Distiller. Consequently, I've not ever really had to solve any hard issues with direct PDF export from XPress which mean my knowledge on it is limited.

Eric, and Glenn, received my book: Front and Back covers and inside pages PDFs were created the same exact way. The type was black and in the clear, not overprinting any photos. There were no accents or alternate characters used. Front and Back Cover with RGB JPEG photos: Garamond Light Condensed Italic Helvetica Neue Light Condensed Everything printed perfect. Inside Pages. with CMYK JPEG photos: Garamond Light Condensed Italic Helvetica Neue Light Condensed Helvetica Neue Bold outline The Garamond was substituted with what looks like Helvetica Light Condensed. The Bold Outline was substituted with what looks like Helvetica Light. The Helvetica Neue Light Condensed printed Ok throughout the 20 inside pages. The printer insists that it was because I did not embed the entire font. The printer claims the cause of this is that I sub-set the fonts. In OS Tiger there was the option to sub-set fonts, but Leopard no longer gives me the option of sub-setting fonts. The only option is "Select All". These PDFs were created with Leopard. The last book they printed all the type printed garbled and unreadable in what looked like Courier. This time all is legible, the only problem is that 2 of the fonts were substituted on the inside pages. Do you have any ideas and or suggestion? I'm not asking for them to re-run the book or a discount. I would like to know how this can be avoided without buying Acrobat Pro which the printer says would eliminate this problem. Thanks http://i27.tinypic.com/30as2gx.jpg

 Frank. My first thought is did you use font styles? I.e, for italics did you use the font and then apply italics? Or did you use an actual italic font face?

Second, try this. Go here and download gplgs-8.64so-ub.dmg. This is Ghostscript 8.64 for Mac OSX. Don't worry about Foomatic. Next, go here, download and install Retort 1.0.1. Make a PS file with XPress of your document. I believe that if you don't have a PS compatible printer you can still use PDF Export to get a PS file (it's in the settings). Preferably I'd find a way to install a virtual printer and then print to PS using the virual printer. That way you know all your fonts are downloaded.

Drop the PS file on to the open window of Retort. Make sure you tell Retort what you want as far as the PDF. Then tell it to make the PDF. It will do so using Ghostscript. Your fonts will be embedded.

Hope that helps.

PS. Frank, my name is spelled with a K. Erik, not Eric. Just wanted to let you know (we're cool) 

Erik, many thanks for all the help. From what I understand I should have uploaded individual PDF pages for the inside pages. I made one PDF file of it. I recall I did that with the last book and it worked out fine. I don't have the patients to follow your links right now, as most of this is strange to me. I am keeping them for when I feel up to facing the unknown. I'm best at things when I need them, and right now I won't be doing any books for quite a while. I did receive a notice that I could subscribe to Acrobat Professional on a monthly basis. This may be the answer to any future books I may print. I'm at least happy that all the type is readable and that I met my deadline. Again thank you and thank Glenn, you have been very helpful. Hope this finds you both well.

Frank, you are very welcome. If we can help in the future, let us know.

 

Frank Abramonte:

Eric, and Glenn, received my book: Front and Back covers and inside pages PDFs were created the same exact way. The type was black and in the clear, not overprinting any photos. There were no accents or alternate characters used. Front and Back Cover with RGB JPEG photos: Garamond Light Condensed Italic Helvetica Neue Light Condensed Everything printed perfect. Inside Pages. with CMYK JPEG photos: Garamond Light Condensed Italic Helvetica Neue Light Condensed Helvetica Neue Bold outline The Garamond was substituted with what looks like Helvetica Light Condensed. The Bold Outline was substituted with what looks like Helvetica Light. The Helvetica Neue Light Condensed printed Ok throughout the 20 inside pages. The printer insists that it was because I did not embed the entire font. The printer claims the cause of this is that I sub-set the fonts. In OS Tiger there was the option to sub-set fonts, but Leopard no longer gives me the option of sub-setting fonts. The only option is "Select All". These PDFs were created with Leopard. The last book they printed all the type printed garbled and unreadable in what looked like Courier. This time all is legible, the only problem is that 2 of the fonts were substituted on the inside pages. Do you have any ideas and or suggestion? I'm not asking for them to re-run the book or a discount. I would like to know how this can be avoided without buying Acrobat Pro which the printer says would eliminate this problem. Thanks http://i27.tinypic.com/30as2gx.jpg

 

Sorry for not keeping up with this but I've been away.

RGB or CMYK should not in any way influence Font substitution. I'm not sure if your printer is correct, and would seek a second opinion. If you made the 20 inside pages in one Export operation and you havn't placed EPS or PDF with embedded fonts, I'm struggling to see how Quark could multiply embed the same font several times. 

I don't think Tiger or Leopard had anything to do with the options either, the lack of choice to subset or not would be due to the options in quark6 vs7.

If you send me a pm then I'll send you ftp details if you like and see what happens to the fonts through my RIP. 

Glenn, thanks for your interest. I pretty well have gotten over this since the font substitution was just to another font that was readable. Last year the font that was substituted was complete garbled and unreadable. However, I exported individual pages to PDF in Quark 8. I then merged them into one PDF document using PDF Merge software. I then uploaded this to the printer. When I saved the individual pages I chose to embed all fonts on each page. Does that mean only the Helvetica in use on that particular page, or ALL meaning all the Helvetica weights? I still don't understand why a printer needs fonts over and above those actually being used on page. If I had used an accent or special character which was not available in the font weight I was using I could understand. There were no extra characters used, not even Italics, just straight words and page numbers. I don't understand what you mean about me sending you a PM. Do you mean I should send you the book by personal message, please clarify as i''m not well versed on these matters. Also, I thought ftp was a way of sending large files, I've been able to send my entire book (30MB) in less then 2 minutes via Verizon fiber optics without ftp. Please let me know if you wish to pursue this. Thanks

 Hey Frank. I'll let Glenn speak to the fonts again. But, quickly, it would just be my guess that only the fonts used on each page would have been the one's embedded. Usually that's the case when going page by page. Anyway, what Glenn means by PM is to contact him privately on the forums. If you look at anyone of Glenn's posts you will see a big "Contact" button (right next to the "Reply and Favorites" buttons). You'll get a flyout menu with one option being a Private Message (that's what PM stands for). Click that, type in your message and click post and the next time Glenn comes in to the forums he will be alerted that their is a PM for him. The reason he wants to do it this way is because he is offering to take your file through his RIP to see what problems it might have. Glenn has FTP information that he can give to you so that you know where to send the file using that info should you want to do that. But FTP info being a private thing, Glenn is not wanting to post the address, username and password to access the FTP site publicly so that everyone out there on the internet can see it. That's why he's suggesting that you contact him via Private Message. So that info stays solely between you and him.

 The PM is perfectly explained by Erik.

 

Frank Abramonte:

However, I exported individual pages to PDF in Quark 8. I then merged them into one PDF document using PDF Merge software.

This is almost certainly the cause of your problems.

Each individual page gets a subset of your font. When you merge the pages, the software is assuming the subsets are actually the same and not using all of them, or encoding them so that the printers RIP assumes they are the same. If you create individual PDF pages then don't try and merge them back into one file, just name them clearly and let the printer do it.

Frank Abramonte:

When I saved the individual pages I chose to embed all fonts on each page. Does that mean only the Helvetica in use on that particular page, or ALL meaning all the Helvetica weights? I still don't understand why a printer needs fonts over and above those actually being used on page.

ALL in the quark menu means only that you are not choosing to specifically exclude a font.

A Subset of each font on the page only includes the glyphs (letters, numbers) used in the page so if you used a headline in Helvetica Extra Bold that read DOH! and  didn't use Helvetica Extra Bold elsewhere on the page then the Subset only includes 4 glyphs D, O, H, and !

If you used Distiller and avoided subsets then the whole font would be embedded so even though you only require DOH! you get the lot. When two or more of these PDFs are merged then the assumption that the software makes that these are the same font is true so the problem is avoided.

Its not that the Printer needs fonts or glyphs over and above those actually used on the page but the final merged pdf must be created in a way that actually uses those resources correctly. 

 

Glenn, it's becoming clearer. Last year I uploaded individual pages and it finally printed correct.

Each individual page gets a subset of your font. When you merge the pages, the software is assuming the subsets are actually the same and not using all of them, or encoding them so that the printers RIP assumes they are the same. If you create individual PDF pages then don't try and merge them back into one file, just name them clearly and let the printer do it.

This was explained to me last year, unfortunately I forgot about it this year and merged my pages.

A Subset of each font on the page only includes the glyphs (letters, numbers) used in the page so if you used a headline in Helvetica Extra Bold that read DOH! and didn't use Helvetica Extra Bold elsewhere on the page then the Subset only includes 4 glyphs D, O, H, and !

I would have included the entire fonts, but dodn''t know how. I thought of typing the alphabet in the margin outside of the printing area, but decided that it would only screw things up. Is there another way to embed the font family?

If you used Distiller and avoided subsets then the whole font would be embedded so even though you only require DOH!

I don't understand what a Distiller is or does. Doesn't Quark distill when creating the PDF files? Thanks for your interest and clear explanations.

iMac 2GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
OS 10.6 Snow Leopard
3GB Mem
Quark 8.1
Photoshop CS2 & CS4

 Frank. Distiller is short for Acrobat Distiller. When you purchase a copy of Adobe Acrobat you get Distiller included as part of the package. What Distiller does is take a PS or EPS file and based on the settings that you make inside of Distiller it creates a PDF based on those settings.

QuarkXPress on the other hand uses an internal PDF creation engine called JAWS. It's many people's personal preference (including mine and I suspect Glenn's) to use Acrobat Distiller to generate a PDF versus letting QuarkXPress do it using JAWS.

You can only get Acrobat Distiller if you purchase Acrobat Standard or Pro. Adobe does not sell it seperately.