Adobe DC - strange lines appearing through text (plus pixelated text)

Report · Oct 08, 2019

Hi everyone, I'm relatively new to using Adobe DC and had created a form successfully (using a Word document - converted it to a PDF - uploaded to Adobe DC - then used prepare form to add fillable forms). All great.

However, the source Word doc had some changes (text only) and it seemed easier to just upload it again create the form fields from scratch. However, when I go through this process this time two things are happening

1) I'm getting strange horizontal line's through some text. It doesn't appear in Adobe DC, only when I export the end point PDF. And it's got something to do with sizing (I'm reading it on a Mac in Preview) because when you zoom in/out it appears/disappears). But it looks rubbish and some lines are still present at full size, plus people will obviously read at various zoom points.

Plus...

a) it wasn't there on the original form that had much the same source doc and the same table structure and b) it only occurs at a few place, not universally thorugh the PDF. But it looks ugly and I can't work out how to get rid of them. The only thought I have is it may be some of the original Word source formatting, for example I had applied centre vertical alignment for visual. I've recreated this PDF x 3 now and I get the same problem.

2) The text appears to be quite pixalated this time around - particularly at 16 Bold - is this normal? I see a lot of people comment on this when I Google - and if so, is it a problem with creating the PDF, or the reader?

Thanks in advance - particularly if you can stop me going crazy with this!!!! Screen shot attached with examples of the lines 🙂

Report · Oct 08, 2019

The lines disappearing and reappearing at different zoom levels leads me to think it might be 'stitching' or 'screen artefacts'. I would always recommend viewing in Acrobat as its far better than preview. If you go to Acrobat preferences / Page display and in the Rendering section, switch off 'Smooth Line Art' and 'Smooth images' that should help. Unfortunately as it's a preference this only solves the problem on your machine.

Report · Oct 11, 2019

Thank you!!! I really appreciate the response. I've opened it both in Acrobat, and also viewed it on my phone (still Apple OS but different device etc) and no problems; and you're right, this only resolves on my computer (and of course the number of Macs out there, they most likely use Preview as well) but at least I'm not wasting my time trying to resolve it in the creation of the PDF - that was doing my head in. Thanks again