Drop Shadows Changing DPI of Photos?

Actually, assuming that you have the settings described above (Default Resolution and Do not compress images in file) properly set and not changed when you add the drop shadow, the fact that the “resolution” you are seeing in Acrobat differs depending upon whether you are using drop shadows in PowerPoint probably means that the 150dpi imagery you are seeing is really the drop shadow's image mask and not the image itself.

If you know what you are doing, choose the proper settings for Acrobat PDFMaker in PowerPoint, and are careful in your layout, there should be no problem producing print quality PDF from PowerPoint or Word, at least on Windows.

If you want us to further examine your situation, please post a sample PowerPoint file exhibiting the problem and the resultant PDF file.

          - Dov

Hi Chris,

Yeah, do not use an image presentation application for printing.

Here's the deal: PowerPoint's purpose in life is to take your "stuff" and present it on a screen via a digital projector. A digital projector's resolution can be anything (along the x axis) from 640 ppi to several thousand but more typically 1024, 1280, 1920, and then up to 4K (4096).

When you put an image that is 3000 pixels wide and is set to 300 ppi into a PP presentation, PP ignores the resolution setting because that's not relevant to digital images. If you're projecting that at (say) 1280 x 800, PP reduces the size the image out so that it will be 1280 pixels wide. That's in, nothing more.

[Now keep in mind that when you half the width of an image, the storage size goes down to 1/4 of the original (that is, if an image is 4 MB in storage size, if you cut that image in half the width of it's pixels, the image will be 1 MB in storage size).]

When you add the drop shadow, PP knows the limitation of limited returns so it locks everything down to 150 ppi.

If you really really want to print your work, do it in Word or even better, do it in InDesign.

However, if you do do this in Word, be sure to go into your preferences and look for "Image Size and Quality." Set one dropdown menu to "All New Documents," and set the other "Default Resolution" to 330 ppi and check the box that says "Do not compress images in file." [The Mac and PC version of these preferences look completely different so taking a screen shot may not help you but the information is the same.]

Let us know if this makes sense or not.