Color issues in Mountain Lion with Acrobat Pro

[twsphoto]

I'm not sure I'm in the right forum, but here it goes.

Since upgrading my OS to Mountain Lion, I've noticed  when viewing PDFs output from InDesign 5.5 that once in Acrobat Pro the colors look muted and inaccurate.  I never saw this in Snow Leopard, hence my posting.  Color in InDesign, Illustrator and Photoshop CS5.5 seem just fine, it's only when a PDF is viewed in Acrobat that I see this muted color issue. 

What I'm concerned with is are these problems when viewing only, or is the PDF color range itself screwed up?  I do prepress work and am using an Eizo CG241 display, CS5.5 and Acrobat Pro 10.1.4.

Thanks!

[Ian_C_Dav]

Hi Sandeep.

I just installed Acrobat 10.1.7 here. Unfortunately in early testing we have not seen the problem fixed here in Mac OS X 10.8.2. The 10.1.7 release notes also make no mention of the issue and fix.

Ian

[Ian_C_Dav]

Hi again Sandeep,

I see in the XI 11.0.3 notes there is a fix but there doesn't appear to be a fix for 10.1.7.

The 10.1.7 don't mention any of the fixes.  Please could you clarify if this fix has made it into the 10.1.7 update or if the release notes are in error?

Thanks

Ian

[Sandeep_V_]

I tried the pre-build of 10.1.7 update and couldn't reproduce the issue. I have Acrobat XI installed on my laptop where I can't see this issue occurring anymore. Let me check with AX again.

[ivan.stora]

Dear Sandeep, we all really appreciate your work here. But you don't have to check AX. Like others already said, unfortunately, this bug, we are all waiting for months to be solved, which is so important for color critical work, is still there in Adobe Acrobat 10.1.7. Please tell us all that this is only a horrible mistake, that this is not another dirty trick to force us, paying customers, to upgrade to AXI or join Creative Cloud earlier than we want or (in worse case) can. Please tell us, that in a few days we will get a 10.1.7.1 upgrade that will solve this unpleasant situation and that we will not have to wait another few months (or forever). Please.

[twsphoto]

Agreed.  But I doubt this is a ploy to get us to upgrade to XI.  Though I'd like to, I just don't have the $200 to do it, nor should we have to.  Somehow, the Adobe team shoulb be able to fix this mess.  I hope.

[Ian_C_Dav]

I don't think this is a ploy by Adobe. Remember until last week, Creative Suite 6 had Acrobat 10 and many print professionals are still on that track and will be for years.  To me, this looks like a mistake by the Acrobat release team. Sandeep had a pre-release version of 10.1.7 with the fixes.  The full 10.1.7 release doesn't have the fixes nor information in the release notes (conspicuously).  I just hope Adobe fix and re-release immediately or else I will be asking for a copy of the pre-release updater. Look forward to hearing from Sandeep on this.

[Guest]

I'm happy with ColorFaker

Open source rulez

[Sandeep_V_]

First thing I want to tell you that its not a ploy or trap to force the users to upgrade to the next version. Its been a regular process in Adobe to provide new features and stay ahead of the curve. Cloud has its own advantages and it ensures that everybody gets the latest updates. So users do not need to worry about the fixes in the versions that they own because every single update on cloud is applicable to every single user of it. Same goes for the new features and product enhancements. Cloud users can sit back and relax for they know that Adobe is always working for them. Also, this has never been a part of discussion on this forum thread, so, we shouldn't be discussing this here.

About 11.0.3 update, its working great for I have it on my MacBook Pro. Thank you everyone for confiming us the same. I'm glad that you are back on rails.

About 10.1.7 update, I think I have badly damaged my iMac's color profile which I kept aside to test this bug with every new build. That's the reason why I can't see the difference now. I'm gonna have to get it reimaged by my IT team. I'm sorry about that. There must have been a reason why this fix wasn't applied to Acrobat X (critical for the older code, too many changes and risk to break other functionalities etc.). I'm going to discuss that with my Product Engineering team once again and check for more options. If there is any possibility to apply this in Acrobat 10, no one will be happier than us to do that.

Thank you Ian, Rick, twsphoto and others for your co-operation so far. I am not going to leave any stone unturned. Will postback soon. Be well.

[twsphoto]

Agreed, there's enough Cloud discussion everywhere else.

Thanks to you and your team for tackling this issue.  I'm sure you'll come up with a solution, it's not an easy thing to do this.  Upgrading to 11 woule be nice, but I just can't do it right now so I'm stuck with X.  All good things come to those who wait, we will be patient!

[Guest]

I'm only jumping in this discussion right now and haven't read through the whole thread, so excuse me if I reiterate things that have already been said. Anyway, here's my problem:

I'm creating a PDF out of Quark XPress (with XPress's "export" menu). The document is one single page which contains a couple of TIFFs, which all are the same picture, but all have, for the purpose of this test, different ICC profiles attached (some RGB, some CMYK). (The profile conversion was done in Photoshop, I didn't touch the TFFs in XPress.) If colour managent works as it should, all those TIFFs must be displayed with identical colours (as far as the gamut allows, of course).

Now what I get is: In XPress, colour management works as expected, all TIFFs are displayed identically. But in the PDF PDF, all TIFFs have different colours. This happens with Acrobat 9, 10 and also 11.3. But it also happens with Apple's Preview app! So it might be Apple's bug.

My system: OSX 10.8.3, two monitors (different monitors with different ICC profile).

[aktivomat]

hey john smith for example 🙂

this special case is neither a bug of adobe or apple, it's a "bug" (or more a non-functionality) of quark, because quark doesn't support the cmyk to cmyk conversion. so if you use cmyk pictures in quark they always have to have the fincal output icc profile to handle a correct colormanagment... too bad, but that's fact.

[Test Screen Name]

It's tempting to say that, so long as colours are within the gamut, that the choice of profiles isn't a big deal; it just tags the colours so they get displayed accurately. But that's not how it is.

The gamut is potentially scaled to fit, not just cut off. All the colours may change to keep a smooth transition.

This choice is controlled by the rendering intent, which applies to each colour transition, and may be explicit or implicit, fixed or variable, or just ignored.

[Guest]

I've set the rendering intent to "relative colorimetric", but I will take a second look at that.

[Guest]

I don't think that's the problem, as I tell XPress not to change colour space, and Preflight tells me that this was honoured.

[Guest]

I answer my own question: It's indeed XPress's fault. A more thorough examination of the PDF has revield that XPress does not include the ICC profile into the PDF! It leaves the values of the pictures unchanged as instructed, but throws away the ICC profiles! So this time, Adobe is definitely not the culprit.

[JGoahead]

There must have been a reason why this fix wasn't applied to Acrobat X (critical for the older code, too many changes and risk to break other functionalities etc.).

In this case, it's simple ... Acrobat Acrobat IX and XI are OK! Acrobat X is... big mistake.

[Thomas Geist]

Hmm ... very irritating:

When I try to update Acrobat XI on my MacBook Pro I get the following error:

"An error occurred. Please check for updates again later.

Error: 1521"

I tried uninstalling and downloading anew from Creative Cloud. However, the version supplied there is still 11.0.0

Update for Adobe Reader XI worked BTW.

[Was DYP]

I tried uninstalling and downloading anew from Creative Cloud. However, the version supplied there is still 11.0.0

Update for Adobe Reader XI worked BTW.

So much for having access to the latest… with the Creative Cloud.

I was wondering what Adobe's track record would be with Creative Cloud.

Your captive now what do they care.

I guess we have to start looking for a Acrobat alternative now too.

Is this Adobe's Kodak moment? And, I am not talking about photos.

[alexdauchez]

Sandeep V. wrote:

About 11.0.3 update, its working great for I have it on my MacBook Pro. Thank you everyone for confiming us the same. I'm glad that you are back on rails.

Hi,

I'm sorry to inform you the last updates didn't work for everybody.

I have to check colors in Reader 9.5…

Please, let us know when a new update is available.

And… sorry but your workflow to check if a bug has been resolved is somewhat worrying… You look at your MacBook Pro and that's it ?

This color thing is a major issue I mean. Is there a developper team somewhere ? It first has been noticed in september…

Thank you.

[Paul Sherfield]

Hi Sandeep  Need to eat a little humble pie. I thought the colour bug in v11 had been fixed. But on re-profiling my Eizo 243W I noticed I had left it in sRGB mode, not the wide gamut monitor profile. So I tested Acrobat Pro v11, with the latest 'patch' again, using the correct monitor profile. There is no change to the colour issue. It does not match PS, ID or Acrobat Pro v9.   Displaying Adobe RGB 1998 images in PS 6, ID 6 and Acrobat Pro 9, these are identical on screen. In Acrobat Pro v111, still desaturated. Looks like it is using sRGB? There is a change of appearance if other profiles are selected in 'Output Preview' but none are accurate.  So what have Adobe been testing this 'fix' on? If as Sandeep wrote, a MacBookPro, then I think they would have seen the same result as I did when using SRGB as the monitor profile.  This now needs to be sorted ASAP.

[Was DYP]

Since it is obvious that Adobe has no interest or is not capability (You look at your MacBook Pro and that's it) of fixing this bug, I was wondering if anyone has tried Neo from Esko as an alternative to Acrobat.

[Paul Sherfield]

Yes, I have tested Neo, but it is much more then Acrobat, it is a full PDF editor with a price to match.

[Was DYP]

missinghorse wrote:

Yes, I have tested Neo, but it is much more then Acrobat, it is a full PDF editor with a price to match.

I was wondering about price. Can't seem to find that anywhere.

I am so fed up with Adobe's incompetence that there is no way I am going to be sucked into the cloud. What gives them any incentive to fix anything going forward when their track record is such that they seem to be incapable of fixing the current product.

[twsphoto]

I think some people are being rather harsh with these Acrobat/Adobe comments.  I'm just as anxious as anyone to have it fixed, but it's not an easy task to do this.  I'm sure Sandeep and his crew are still on the game, and that this is NOT a ploy by Adobe to get us to buy anything, and is NOT just being forgotten by Adobe.  More time for them to work on this issue is not going to kill anyone as it's not affectig your actual PDFs or codes within.  I see no difference in files I have re-printed now that were printed before this anamoly began.  The colors match perfectly over several years of output from these same files.  Were this not the case, we'd be in deep trouble, but it is the case so why not keep our comments down to reporting what we see, what we're using and what our workflows are to help Adobe and Sandeep get to the root of this problem.

[Was DYP]

The current culture of apparent incompetence exits with other Adobe products as well.

Look at PS. The bugs in PSCS6 that PSCS5 does not have have still not been fixed. And this is on the exact same computer.

And Acrobat 9 displays correctly but yet 10 an 11 can't be fixed. And this is on the exact same computer.