Acrobat security vs Color Management sync

[Mike Witherell]

(I moved this out of the Acrobat over here to InDesign, where this sort of thing is relevant)

It appears that Acrobat > Preferences > Advanced Security (I meant to write "Security Enhanced") conflicts with synchronizing Color Management, or in other words the CSF color settings file coming from Photoshop/Bridge.

What is the trick to getting security but allowing synchronized color management?

[Mike Witherell]

I ended up turning Acrobat advanced security completely off (on Windows 11, btw) so that color management could synchronize across the 4 apps.

[rob day]

Hi Mike FWIW, If you Export to one of the PDF/X  presets, I don’t think AcrobatPro’s Color Management Preference would be used—with PDF/X Standards the Output Intent profile is used for the CMYK soft proof (not AcrobatPro’s CMYK Working Space) and PDF/X-4 requires that all RGB objects have an embedded profile, which would override the RGB Working Space preference.

For Interactive Exports all color gets converted to sRGB with the sRGB profile embedded, so the AcrobatPro Working RGB Space wouldn’t come into play.

If you want to leave Security on, always exporting to a PDF/X standard might work?

[Test Screen Name]

This is not abou document security. It's about protected mode. This is an Acrobat option, on by default. If this option is in, Acrobat is locked out from reading most files. Hence... it can't read the shared colour settings. This is not something a user can easily fix except... hmm... where EXACTLY are these settings stored?

[rob day]

I was just pointing out that with PDF/X the color settings (profiles) are always embedded in the document, so the application CSF Color Settings (the Color Management Preference in Acrobat) are not used.

[Mike Witherell]

You make a good point Rob. But if the software promises to synchronize, and later doesn't because of a new feature in Acrobat (not that new, I realize), I wish to figure out how to make it work again.

I have always been a big fan of color-managed workflow, and the sync of the 4 softwares remains important to how I work.

[rob day]

and the sync of the 4 softwares remains important to how I work.

I’m not sure Acrobat’s Color Management Preference has much affect on an exported PDF.

Unless you are creating documents with the CM Policies set to Off, synchronizing Color Settings would not affect existing documents, existing documents would have their own embedded document profiles.

The AcrobatPro Color Management Preference would only affect the soft proof appearance of a PDF with no output intent or embedded profiles. If you use the old [Press Quality] preset, which exports all CMYK with no profiles or output intent, the current Acrobat CMYK Working Space would soft proof the PDF, which might be misleading. But, any of the PDF/X presets would be a better choice—you can export an all CMYK PDF/X with no profiles, but with an Output Intent Profile, which would override the Acrobat Color Mangement Preference for the soft proof.

[Mike Witherell]

Yes, it includes a desire to soft proof to the screen and have the appearance consistent.

The way I try to work is know my RGB and output CMYK condition straight thru and consistent from Photoshop and Illustrator straight into InDesign and exporting out to PDF/X. If PDF/X is going to be Gracol, for example, I want to synchronize all 4 softwares to know that and default to that and soft proof to that.

[rob day]

If PDF/X is going to be Gracol, for example, I want to synchronize all 4 softwares to know that and default to that and soft proof to that.

Synchronization would matter for the creation of the InDesign document, but shouldn’t affect the export to PDF/X or the default soft proof display of a PDF/X. A PDF/X document with the GRACoL Output intent wouldn’t use the Acrobat RGB or CMYK Color Management settings. They could be anything and the Acrobat soft proof would be to the PDF’s Output Intent, not the synchronized Working spaces.

I can see that if I export a PDF/X with GRACoL as the Destination, open the PDF, and make a change to the Acrobat Color Mangement Settings. They have no affect on the soft proof because the document profiles are being used for the softproof:

If I were to Export with no profiles or output intent (which means the PDF can’t be color managed or soft proofed accurately) then the Acrobat Color Management Settings do matter. If your Export Output tab is this:

Then the Color Management working spaces do handle the soft proof. But, if you sent the PDF to me I might have a different soft proof unless my settings happen to match yours:

[Mike Witherell]

Thanks Rob! So synchronization to Acrobat does not matter, and if the Acrobat extra security is turned ON at default which prevents synchronization; it doesn't matter. (and assuming all content IS color managed) So...

Did it ever matter? Did something technical change across the ~20 years of color management within Adobe software (or Adobe Acrobat) that changed the essential matter? When did that occur? Why does it still now call for synchronization and warn you that things are not synchronized? 

[rob day]

Syncronization can be misunderstood. It is helpful when you are setting up a project and creating assets because the current Color Settings determine what profiles and policies are going to be saved with newly created documents. Once a document is created its assigned profiles color manage the document, not the current Color Settings’ Working Spaces, so synchronizing has no affect on existing documents with assigned profiles.

The exception would be if the Color Settings’ CM Policies are set to Off when the document is created, in that case the new document doesn’t get profile assignments, and color management falls back to the Color Settings Working Spaces. Setting the Policies to Off in general is a bad idea especially for RGB, because there would be no original RGB source profile to make a color managed conversion to the final print CMYK profile.

With Acrobat you are not creating documents, so only PDFs exported without profiles or output intents would fall back to the Acrobat Color Management Preferences for the preview. The old [Press Quality] preset converts all color to document CMYK, but does not include an Output Intent or embed a CMYK profile, so the current Acrobat Color Management Preferences would be used for the CMYK preview. The [High Quality] preset is particularly dangerous because it exports native RGB colors as DeviceRGB (no profile), and only embeds profiles for linked assets with profiles.

The PDF/X presets export document CMYK colors as DeviceCMYK (no profile), but includes an Output Intent Profile for handling the CMYK preview—the Output Intent is used, not the CMYK Working Space. All RGB colors get a profile assigned.

[ZBalling]

There is no Advanced Security in preferences.

[James Gifford—NitroPress]

"...any more," I think. The security options have been rearranged from release to release, especially in the AI Era.

And, of course, security is a bit of a pantomime with PDF anyway.

[Mike Witherell]

 I meant to write "Security Enhanced"

[ZBalling]

Is that still the case that disabling "Security Enhanced" flag in extra security options allows you to see changes when you change monitor profile?