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salbertysalberty
Participating Frequently
November 19, 2018
Question

Maximum Anchor Points on a Path

  • November 19, 2018
  • 5 replies
  • 3126 views

I am attempting to open PDFs in Illustrator CS6 which were created in outside GIS (mapping/cartography) applications.

In Illustrator CS6, the maximum number of points on a path is 32,000.   When opening PDFs that exceed this limit, the paths are simply cut/truncated at 32,000 points, resulting in part of the path to be "missing".  There is no way to simplify the path during the opening of the file.

I have two questions about how Illustrator CC 19 handles large paths:

1.  Is the point per path limit still 32,000 points, or has it been increased?

2.  Once this limit is reached, is there any option to simplify the path during file opening to avoid chunks of the path being completely cut?

Thanks in advance!

This topic has been closed for replies.

5 replies

S
salbertysalbertyAuthor
Participating Frequently
November 21, 2018

Hi and thanks to all for the suggestions.

Unfortunately, these map files have many layers (roads, rivers, boundaries, text, etc.) which are all on top of each other, so once the PDF is rasterized (as it would be if opened in Photoshop), it will not be possible to easily turn any paths back into paths.

One thing that got me thinking was that when I open the PDFs in Adobe Reader, it properly displays the paths, even if they are >32,000 points.  This has me wondering if Adobe Acrobat might be able to help resolve the issue.  I don't currently use Acrobat, so I have two questions:

1.  Does Adobe Acrobat allow for opening and reading paths which have >32,000 points?

2.  Does Adobe Acrobat have the ability to "break" a large path into smaller segments?

The thinking is I could break up any paths in Acrobat, then in Illustrator I could first simplify the segments and then rejoin as necessary.

Any thoughts?

Kurt Gold
Community Expert
Kurt GoldCommunity Expert
Community Expert
November 21, 2018

There are a couple of things one could do in Acrobat that may or may not help (e.g. custom corrections/preflight profiles).

In order to offer some further advice it would be helpful to provide a sample .pdf file.

S
salbertysalbertyAuthor
Participating Frequently
November 28, 2018

Here is a sample PDF of Lake Powell created from Open Street Map:  https://wetransfer.com/downloads/57f27ec6cf61a2821de0b2027b3ad4d220181128170413/4f09be084ad5da4d61daf9b2336e207e20181128170413/da9261​

Here is how the file looks when opened by Adobe Acrobat Reader:

Here is how the file looks when opened by Adobe Illustrator.  You can clearly see that a big chunk of the lake (circled red) is missing because the original path is greater than 32,000 points, and Illustrator simply cut the path at 32,000 points.

I'm looking for any suggestion of how I can ultimately get this type of PDF into Illustrator without having big chunks of paths simply removed.  I'm willing to use an intermediate PDF editor that can break up those paths into smaller segments.

Any suggestion would be very helpful!

    Srishti Bali
    Community Manager
    Srishti BaliCommunity Manager
    Community Manager
    November 21, 2018

    Hi there,

    I would like to know if the steps suggested above worked for you, or the issue still persists.

    Kindly update the discussion if you need further assistance with it.

    Thanks,

    Srishti

    John Mensinger
    Community Expert
    John MensingerCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    November 19, 2018

    Perhaps you could copy part of the paths in the pdf before bringing them in to Illustrator

    That's an interesting angle. It might also be possible to open the PDF in Photoshop, which will rasterize it, then make a strategic selection following a problematic path, convert the selection to a path and export to Illustrator.

    John Mensinger
    Community Expert
    John MensingerCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    November 19, 2018

    No, Illustrator only reliably reads PDF's of its own making, and even then, they have to be saved with a particular setting. Foreign PDF's can be a crap shoot, and Adobe is not really in a position to improve Illustrator in this area.

    barbara_a7746676
    Community Expert
    barbara_a7746676Community Expert
    Community Expert
    November 19, 2018

    I'm sorry. There's not been a change to the number of points, nor is there a way to simplify during file opening. Perhaps you could copy part of the paths in the pdf before bringing them in to Illustrator so that you'd be dealing with fewer points.

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