Different font size with FrameMaker PDF engine; title in Acrobat is file info

Report · Oct 20, 2023

Hi,

Yesterday I switched from FrameMaker's PDF engine to Acrobat Distiller, and promptly a few differences were noticed:

The font size of my figure labels is 7.98 pt with Distiller and 8 pt with FrameMaker. With certain zoom levels in Acrobat the 8 pt font appears bold. This does not bother me much, but the font size is different.

The title of the PDF in Acrobat is the file name in Distiller and the file info content in FrameMaker. I would like to be able to control this myself. I did not find an option for this in FrameMaker. Probably I will create an action in Acrobat.

Best regards, Winfried

Report · Nov 08, 2023

OK. Today I worked on another document with 10 pt font, and I noticed again that the font with the FM PDF engine looks different and has a different size.

My font is Google Open Sans:

PDF created with Distiller: 10 pt is converted to 9.96 pt, looks light, as it should be.

PDF created with the FM PDF engine: 10 pt is still 10 pt, looks more bold than a light font should be.

The font size is not the cause. When I change the font size in Acrobat from 9.96 to 10 pt, the text still looks "light" compared to the slightly bold text with the FM PDF engine.

Also in other zoom levels the text from the FM PDF engine still looks slightly bold.

The other options in the Publish pod (Create Tagged PDF, Convert text and graphic colors to RGB) do not have any effect on this.

The default printer is Adobe PDF.

Best regards, Winfried

Report · Nov 08, 2023

If that's only happening with Google Open Sans and not with any legacy font(s), I wonder if it might be due to GOS being a "variable" font.

If what was installed was the OpenSans-VariableFont_wdth,wght.ttf instance, what's in the ./Static/ dir might be worth a try.

Report · Nov 08, 2023

Hi Bob,

I had not installed the variable font, only the static fonts.

Best regards, Winfried

Report · Nov 08, 2023

I find this rather mysterious. No difference in the font properties, when I edit the PDF in Acrobat. But the text in the PDF definitely looks different. And it's the same monitor.