annotations appear below the image in an image field

[Wardenburg]

Hey Everyone,

For purposes that don't require getting into I have a form with image fields that will get filled from the tablet pdf expert 6 app.

Within the pdf expert 6 app, the user can also annotate with lines stamps and other squiggly lines and such.  However, the lines and squiggly bits appear behind the entered images. Now I found some mentions of locking the annotations or images, but I find myself unable to form a clear image on the workings of how images and annotation view orders are sorted.

Could someone help/explain how to solve this (&optionally how this image field image annotation priority business works?)

Just to be clear; currently, the images show on top of the annotations, I want the annotations above the images.

Thank you in advance for any trouble to be taken.

[Karl Heinz Kremer · Accepted solution]

You will always have the static PDF content on the lowest level, followed by annotations (comments), followed by form fields. Your image field is actually a form field button, so it will always be on top and therefore potentially hide any annotations in the same area. There is nothing you can do about that as long as you are dealing with annotations and form fields. You could add your image and then flatten the document. This will convert the image field to static PDF content, and then in a second step add your annotations.

[Test Screen Name]

Acually there is no guarantee that firm field will appear on top of annotations, it’s just an accident. Could change any time. May differ between products. The only prudent course is to ensure they never overlap.

[Wardenburg]

That's a real shame, annotations over an image would have been perfect for the account managers' visitor 's report I had in mind. (you could encircle and point out important parts of an image)

So there's absolutely no way to change up the layers? This seems like a useful and intuitive utility for the image fields (to point things out in an image), is there anyplace I can suggest it to adobe?

[Test Screen Name]

You'd have to suggest it to ISO, the body that standardizes PDF. PDF 2.0 has just been released but in another decade we might see PDF 3.0... Adobe could choose to make their own extension and publicise it, but there wouldn't be much point I suspect.

Is it practical for the background image to be on the page itself? Only in that case are the layers well defined.

[Joel_Geraci]

This is actually quite a bit easier than it would seem at first.

The trick is to create a button where you want the image to appear. The script in the button then creates a new button field in the exact location as the button and then import the image into the new button rather than the original button that was clicked. Then the script can set all annotations and fields to be non-printing, flatten the document with the nNonPrint parameter set to 1, and then restore the print property on all fields and annotations.

What you end up with is the image "burned" down onto the page and an easy way to replace the image when needed.

[Wardenburg]

Hey There Joel,

Consider me highly intrigued - being able to annotate over the image fields will turn these forms from great into legendary (especially in combination with the new apple pencil!)

And while I understand the steps you describe I'm not entirely sure how to get this done scripting wise (creating buttons from scripts is a new one for me, as well as the nprint commands).

Could you perhaps grace me with a working example pdf or examples of script?

I'd be ever so gratefull!

Thank you in advance for your time.

[Joel_Geraci]

I should have read higher in the thread. PDF Expert doesn't have the buttonSetIcon field method required to programmatically set an image for the button face.

[Wardenburg]

Ah I'm sorry to hear that Joel,

I'll contact Readdle (creators of PDF expert) to see what/if they can do anything about the method.

Could I bother you for an example of this setup Joel? Either through a script example or a pdf example?

I'd really appreciate it (and thanks again for the already great help!)