Adobe PDF print driver converting my text to bitmaps

[DaveRado]

I'm using Acrobat Pro 2020, Windows 10 and Photoshop CS6.

I have saved a copy of a Photoshop PDF without layers and without preserving the Photoshop editing capability, and the text is still text when I open it in Acrobat, i.e. I can select the text in Acrobat and it's pin-sharp.

But the resulting file size is too large (I need to create a screen res version for the web). So I opened the PDF in Acrobat and printed it using the Adobe PDF print driver - and it got the file size down to the right sort of level, but it converted the text to bitmaps. I don't understand why. The font in question is Sofia Pro, which is installed on my computer. It's clearly embedded in the Photoshop PDF, because if I view that on a device that doesn't have Sofia Pro installed, it displays correctly.

But it isn't being embedded in the PDF created using the Adobe Print driver, even though "Rely on system fonts" is turned off, and "embed all fonts" is turned on. The graphics in the resulting PDF look great but the text looks bitmappy.

What could be causing this and is there any way of printing the Photoshop PDF using the Adobe PDF Print driver so that the fonts are embedded and the text remains text?

Many thanks for your help.

Dave

[Tariq Ahmad Dar]

Hi @DaveRado, 

Thank you for reaching out with your question. 

PDF Printed Using “Adobe PDF Printer”

• Created by “printing” to the virtual Adobe PDF Printer, which converts the document into a PostScript-based PDF.

• Flattens the content, meaning it treats everything (text, images, etc.) as a graphic, often making it non-editable and non-searchable unless OCR is applied.

• May increase file size and reduce text clarity, especially if fonts are not embedded. Which in your case is reversed. 

• Useful when preserving exact visual appearance is more important than keeping text or interactive elements editable. 

I hope this answers your question, if not let us know. 

~Tariq

[DaveRado]

Hi @Tariq Ahmad Dar 

That's not true. If I print a Word document using the Adobe PDF print driver, the text is preserved as text, as shown in the attached PDF which I created in this way.

As for preserving the appearance, PDFs  containing text always preserve the exact appearance of the original document provided the fonts are embedded.  I've been creating PDFs for many years and have never noticed this problem before.

Dave

[JR Boulay]

Printing a PDF as a PDF to reduce its weight is not good practice.
You should use Acrobat Pro: Save as Other: Optimize PDF

https://helpx.adobe.com/acrobat/using/optimizing-pdfs-acrobat-pro.html#save_using_pdf_optimizer_acro...

[DaveRado]

Hi @JR Boulay 

Just tried that and it didn't reduce the file size at all.

[DaveRado]

Hi @JR Boulay 

Okay here's proof that I used to be able to create a PDF from another PDF using the Adobe PDF print driver, without the text being converted to bitmaps - resulting in a huge reduction in file size but without discernable loss of quality to the naked eye. 

Whether you consider it good practice or not, as far as I'm concerned it worked brilliantly (whereas "Optimize PDF" doesn't reduce the file size at all when I try it) - and I don't understand why it worked in the past and doesn't work now. That's all I'm trying to get to the bottom of - and to find out whether there's a workaround.

• In July 2020 I created a PDF from a Word document. The Word document was 27.2 MB and I've just uploaded it to here.
  
  

• I created the PDF from that Word document using the pre-defined "Standard" quality settings in the Adobe print driver. The text in the resulting PDF was still text and the file size of the PDF was 22.5 MB. I've just uploaded the resulting PDF to here.
  
  
• I then printed that PDF to another PDF from within Acrobat Pro, using the pre-defined "Standard" quality settings in the Adobe PDF print driver. The text in the resulting PDF was still text and the file size of the second PDF was 8.21 MB, with no discernable loss of quality to the naked eye. I've just uploaded the resulting PDF to here.
  
  

So why was I able to print a PDF to  another PDF in July 2020, with the text in the new PDF still being text and not being converted to a bitmap, but am unable to do so now? I was able to do so much more recently than 2020 but haven't kept "before" and "after" PDF files that prove it since 2020.  I don't remember when I last did this successfully but I'm pretty sure it was within the last year.

Has the PDF driver been changed by Adobe so that it no longer supports this? If so, was it an accidental change (i.e. a bug) or was it changed on purpose - and if on purpose, why? And if so, why does the PDF driver still print Word documents without converting the text to bitmaps - as this would seem to indicate that the problem is with Acrobat Pro rather than with the Adobe PDF print driver as such?

And finally and most importantly, is there some setting I can change in the PDF print driver's properties when printing from Acrobat in order to get this to work, so that it creates PDFs without converting the text to bitmaps, as it used to do?

Thanks for your help.

Dave

[DaveRado]

I've got to the bottom of this now. Nothing has changed in the Adobe print driver - or in Acrobat - after all.

For some weird reason I had "Print as Image" switched on in the Advanced print settings in Acrobat. (Select File + Print, click on the Advanced button, and the checkbox for "Print as Image" was switched on).

I've no idea how or when that happened but the setting seems to be "sticky" and I imagine I must have selected it quite a while ago for a single print job and then forgotten about it, and it stuck.

Now that I've turned that setting off, if I create a PDF from a Word document using the PDF print driver, and then create another PDF from the first PDF using the PDF print driver, the text remains as text - it doesn't get converted to bitmaps.

And if I select the "Standard-Classic" print quality setting in the PDF print driver's Properties (which seems to be the driver's present day equivalent to the "Standard" print quality setting in 2020), then doing this reduces the file size of the first PDF I linked to in my previous post from 22.5 MB to 8.21 MB - just as it did in 2020, and with no discernable loss of screen quality to the naked eye, on my screen anyway.

So I'm not sure why no one in this thread was aware that you can create PDFs from other PDFs without the text being converted to bitmaps, but you certainly can, as long as you don't have "Print as Image" switched on in the Advanced print settings in Acrobat.

And it's not only Word documents - if I create a PDF from an Illustrator file (AI or EPS) and then create another PDF from the first PDF using the PDF print driver, the text is retained as text - it doesn't get converted to bitmaps either.

But I still can't get this to work with Photoshop PDFs.

If I open a Photoshop PDF in Acrobat the text is still text (I can select and copy it and paste it into Word or anywhere else), but if I then print the PDF to another PDF using Acrobat, the text gets converted to a bitmap, even though I no longer have "Print as Image" switched on. So why can't the Adobe PDF print driver print text in a Photoshop PDF as text from within Acrobat, even though Acrobat displays the text as text, and even though the driver can print the text in PDFs created in Word or Illustrator as text?

I realise the text in Photoshop docs isn't recognised as text by most applications, but it is recognised as text by Acrobat, so I don't understand why the PDF driver can't print it as text from within Acrobat, when it can print text in PDFs created from Word or Illustrator as text.

Any ideas?

Dave

[DaveRado]

PS - I've just discovered that if, instead of using Save as Other: Optimize PDF, you use Save as Other: Reduce File Size, that works quite well. It doesn't reduce it as much as the PDF print driver but at least the text remains text and it does reduce the file size significantly. 

[JR Boulay]

Save as Other: Reduce File Size = Save as Other: Optimize PDF: Standard

They both uses the same settings.

[DaveRado]

When I try it one reduces the file size significantly and the other doesn't.

[JR Boulay]

Obviously, if you use a process that deletes the text (and other elements), the weight of the final file is inevitably lighter than if you keep it.

[DaveRado]

Hi @JR Boulay 

The opposite is true. Bitmaps files are much larger than text files.

If I create a PDF from a Word document containing nothing but text, using the Adobe PDF print driver, the text is still text in the resulting PDF file - and for an A4 page of Lorem Ipsum text the file size of the PDF file is typically around 40k (even if I use an unusual font so that the PDF contains the embedded font). If I then print that PDF from within Acrobat, using the Adobe PDF print driver, it converts the text to bitmaps and the file size of the resulting PDF is typically around 470k (or larger, depending on the settings) - a more than 10-fold increase.

But I've printed PDFs using the Adobe PDF print driver from within Acrobat for many years and it didn't start converting text to bitmaps until very recently. And it still doesn't convert text to bitmaps if I print from Word using the PDF driver. So how can I get the PDF driver work like it used to from within Acrobat?

Dave

[JR Boulay]

"The opposite is true. Bitmaps files are much larger than text files.

If I create a PDF from a Word document containing nothing but text"

Your first post referred to a Photoshop-PDF, not a Word document.
By its very nature, a Photoshop-PDF contains pixels and possibly text, which is what I was referring to in my reply.

[DaveRado]

My point was that converting text (or vector) to a bitmap doesn't reduce the file size - it increases it. 

[DaveRado]

Ignore this post - I thought I'd solved it but I hadn't.