Changing PDF logo colours

[paulm96714185]

Hello all,

I was wondering if someone could help me with a change a need to make to my logo. I use Adobe InDesign and Photoshop, and can edit on Adobe reader as well. I have a logo which consists of wording and is blue and red, i have this as a PDF file. I'm wanting to change the colour of the entire logo to grey and also white, but i am not sure how to do this without ratserising it by using Photoshop. I can't see how i can do it on Indesign or Adobe reader either. It needs to remain as a vector file as it's going to be printed on large bags. 

If anyone ciuld shed some light and offer a suggestion, that would be amazing!

Thank you. 

[Jongware]

Are you 100% absolutely positively sure that you cannot get hold of the original file? I don't mean "check your computer" ('yeah I did and I don't have an original'); I mean "call its designer" and/or "call your client".

Editing a PDF is ... something that the file format just was not designed for. The larger your change, the greater the chance something goes horribly wrong.

Editing the original file, however, should be a piece of cake. Even if you personally don't have the software, its original designer will have that and will be able to change color at a whim.

[paulm96714185]

Hello, I've just found that he sent me an eps file of the logo, but i'm not sure how i can edit with Photoshop? As when i try and open it with Photoshop it imediately tries to rasterize it. Maybe the best bet is to go back to the original designer, like you said and get them to do it their end. Thank you for your help!

[Geоrge]

This is task for Adobe Illustrator, not for Acrobat or ID.

[Jongware]

EPS sounds about right -- although it is, anno 2019, a rather old file format. But you are correct: at least it's vector!

You can check this file (it should be readable with something like Notepad or TextEdit) and see if there is anything identifying the software it was made with. (You might also be able to see this in the PDF, under "Document properties".) I'm betting it's something like Illustrator, or CorelDraw if you're really unlucky 🙂

Photoshop can save as EPS and also read its own, but as you already noticed, Photoshop is for editing bitmaps, not vector files.

Illustrator can also read its own EPS, but things may have gotten lost in translation; so the designer hopefully still has the original AI file. If you can contact the designer, that would still be best.

[rob day]

Have you tried opening the EPS via Illustrator’s File>Open?

It may be your OS is simply defaulting to Photoshop when you try to open a .EPS from the finder. 

[Laubender]

Hi Paul,

what you can try with the PDF if it does not contain fonts:

Open the PDF with Acrobat Pro, go to: Edit PDF, select all parts of the logo you want to convert.

Then use the context menu and do:

Edit Using > Adobe Illustrator

When in Illustrator do Select All and use menu Convert To Grayscale .

Close the opened file and save, quit Illustrator and go back to Acrobat Pro.

This could work, but inspect the result carefully:

Acrobat's Print Production > Output Preview

If all is well save the PDF of the logo with a new name.

Regards,
Uwe Laubender

( ACP )

[Luke Jennings]

You won't be able to do any editing with Adobe Reader.

As mentioned above, Illustrator might be your best option, assuming you have any needed fonts, and the PDF and .eps were created from Illustrator*. If you want to use InDesign only, you can place the PDF or .eps into InDesign and export to a black & white PDF (see attached screen shot).

If you need a spot White color (check with your printer), place the new (BW) PDF into InDesign and add the spot White, then export to a new PDF (not BW).

*If you have missing fonts when you try to open the PDF or .eps in Illustrator, and you can't find them in Adobe Fonts, you can use Acrobat (not Reader) to convert the fonts in the PDF to outlines, then open the PDF in Illustrator.