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Illustrator - Export PDF Color Problem

Forum|Forum|3 years ago
January 4, 2023
7 replies
9132 views

Hi everyone. I am trying to prepare a design. I add a grain effect to the rectangle in the background of my design. Then when I try to export it as PDF, I get a terrible result. I took a screenshot from both Illustrator and the PDF file to make sure the problem was in my eyes. But as you can see in the attachment, my design in the PDF file looks awful. I've looked at solved threads and videos related to this.

I tried Adding All Profiles when exporting, I tried selecting High Quality from the top. It exported the PDF image horribly every time, even though I tried it many times in different variations. How can I fix this problem?

Can you please help with this problem?

Draw and design

Correct answer Ton Frederiks

Sorry for my late reply. What I wanted to do was a vector drawing. But as you said, it can be done in Photoshop as well. After all, I was trying to design a Business Card. I think it would be best for me to make vector elements with AI and combine the rest in PS. (Do you think doing it this way will cause the image quality to decrease in printing? Do you have information about this issue?)

I was actually trying to get the slightly jagged effect with the Grain effect. But as far as I think, the printing house needs to provide this with the paper it uses. (I'm not so sure about this.)

I was trying to give a similar effect as you can see in the photos below. Do I have to design the effects of the business cards in these photos, or will the printing house take care of it?

There is nothing wrong with combining vectors and images. Applying the grain effect would result in an image anyway. Photoshop gives more control over these textures, but choosing the right paper can give you something similar. Talk to your printer, he can show you some samples.

V

Vanessa334327561rm2

Participant

rasterize it

Brad @ Roaring Mouse

Community Expert

As someone who works in the print world, what you are attempting is not printable. There is so little difference in the values of the "grain" and the pattern is so fine that no matter how it appears to you now that they will never show on paper, especially after they are halftoned for print, whether by traditional haftone or stochastic dot printing. You are fighting a losing battle here.

Ton Frederiks

Community Expert

Yes, I already mentioned that earlier "I don't think you will notice the grain effect at that very small size size in print. "

Ton Frederiks

Community Expert

If you set your Preferences > Appearance of Black to Display all Blacks Accurately, you will get what you see in Acrobat.

joshuatrAuthor

Participating Frequently

@Ton Frederiks @Monika Gause I hope linking to an external download site is not prohibited by forum rules. Unfortunately, Adobe does not allow sharing of its own files on its forum. That's why I'm sharing the file with you so you can see it. As I understand it, I am doing everything apparently right. But I still get a grayed out output as a result. Illustrator PDF Export Problem

Monika Gause

Community Expert

How is the file set up? RGB? CMYK?

As Ton said: even with a CMYK file, when Black is displayed as pitch dark black, then you view even 100K as pitch dark black.

And how do you export? This is CMYK color mode and therefore the black might just not get too dark.

joshuatrAuthor

Participating Frequently

@Monika Gause @Ton Frederiks Hi. I tried to share the AI File via a different file cloud. But I think my comment was deleted twice. Now, on Monika's recommendation, I uploaded my file to Creative Cloud. You can look at the link. Illustrator PDF Export Proble - Creative Cloud

Additionally, my black values in Illustrator are as shown in the picture. @Ton Frederiks But unfortunately I couldn't find the black settings you mentioned in Acrobat.

Ton Frederiks

Community Expert

Again, If you set your Illustrator Preferences > Appearance of Black > On Screen to Display all Blacks Accurately, you will get what you see in Acrobat.

That said, I don't think you will notice the grain effect at that very small size size in print.

Ton Frederiks

Community Expert

The black appearance could be caused by a setting in the Illustrator Preferences.

The display in Acrobat could be caused by Smooth images in Preferences > Page Display > Rendering > Smooth Images.

joshuatrAuthor

Participating Frequently

Hi @Ton Frederiks. Thanks for your reply.

But unfortunately the method you suggested did not provide any solution.
As you can see below, there is only a problem with the PDF output. But I can't figure out the cause. There is no problem when I output even as SVG. But only in the PDF file the colors fade. This is also the case with two different PDF viewers.

Ton Frederiks

Community Expert

Please share an example file of your background saved as pdf with Illustrators editing capabilities checked.

Monika Gause

Community Expert

Can you please tell us the details of what is so awful?

Please do check the resolution in Effect > Document Raster Effect Settings.

And then the resolution in the Imges part of the PDF export options.

joshuatrAuthor

Participating Frequently

Hi @Monika Gause. Thanks for your reply.

My design has a grain effect and is in black. But the PDF output is in gray tones and the grain effect is not visible.

The color model of my design has CMYK 300 ppi as you can see in the picture below. However, unfortunately, the output is not what I want.

Are there any solutions I missed?

Monika Gause

Community Expert

One of your screenshots is black and the other one is not so black, but as for the grain: I can't see the difference. Can you please show that more clearly?

joshuatrAuthor

Participating Frequently

I accidentally added the pictures in attachments. I have attached the images correctly.

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