Color OTF font changing color on printer's proofs

[DKingDesigner]

I created an icon font with colors (OTF) using Fontself for Illustrator so I could easily apply colored bullets to a book I was working on. Everything looks great in InDesign, Acrobat, and printed on our color printers, but when I sent the books off for printing, the proofs came back with all the icons in different colors than they appear in my files. The printer said they are different CMYK values after running them through their prepress. I can't figure out how to fix it short of finding each and every one of them in the six books and converting them to outlines manually.

I'm open to suggestions on how to quickly fix this problem so that these books can be printed. Maybe a specific color preset when I make the PDFs? We are currently converting to US Web Coated SWOP V2 on export.  Is there a way to force InDesign to convert graphic fonts to outlines when exported to PDF?

[Roger Breton]

According to my testing, so far, I could not conclude to a bug.

As a designer, I would not shy away from this feature but, having learned from your experience, I would make sure to spend the time ahead of production that these fairly new types of fonts can be color managed the same as any RGB element in the document. I'm still not sold on the technical merit of using a "standard" to create PDFs from InDesign... Your mileage can vary.

[Laubender]

Well, Roger, there is a whole world of preprint that is standardized on PDF/X since 2001.

More on this e.g. here:

https://www.pdfx-ready.ch/en/

Regards,
Uwe Laubender

( ACP )

[Roger Breton]

2001 and even before were the "time" that such "innovation" was introduced.

It does not mean that everyone in the industry instantly jumped on the bandwagon.

I can't talk for the prevalence of the X Standards these days.

Wish I had some kind of "survey" of current practices aber I can tell you, I won't use it in my practice. 

Especially when sending files to the Orient!

I'll gladly take a look at your suggested link, Uwe.

MfG / Roger

[DKingDesigner]

I could be wrong, but I believe universal standards were created for a reason. I know I rely on them for sending one file to a variety of printers around the world without worrying that my it will be rejected over a RIP technicality. This is really the first time I've had any issues with color returning wrong on a proof, and I really do believe the font is at fault and not the standard, even though you can get it to process correctly without the standard. The standard makes sure that a PDF meets the universal requirements for prepress and sure saves a lot of time with back and forthing with a printer (especially when you lose a day both ways when dealing with printers on the other side of the world). I strike this up in the column of "live and learn." I will avoid SVG fonts for now, at least until the standards catch up and Adobe advertises full support for them. As Rob pointed out fairly early in this thread, for simple color on a font, it's just as easy to apply the color using styles in InDesign. Colored fonts are really an unnecessary shortcut at this point. Whether it's a bug or not that these fonts don't process consistently on press is moot. The issue is documentation. Designers who might resort to using them do need to know that there may be issues with certain PDFs processing correctly when color SVG fonts are used. My 2 cents. 😉 

[Roger Breton]

Judging from my humble testing, I see little reasons to avoid OpenType SVG fonts all together. My experience so far would not suggest they're not fully supported by Adobe? Keep in mind Adobe was first to the gate with SVG, long before it became a WWW "standard".
I agree "for simple color on a font, it's just as easy to apply color in the host application".
Which was the case of your six documents.
But, it's interesting to note that the breadth of SVG fonts can be quite extensive (Color Fonts - Get ready for the revolution!).

As a designer, I'd certainly want to take advantage of them.

[abailescollins]

Opentype SVG fonts are not supported by PDF. Not even the latest PDF 2.0 (ISO 32000-2).

Therefore they are not handled correctly and may not print as expected as discussed.

When you export from Indesign, the result you get depends on the PDF/X version you specify.

They can be raster Type 3, outlined Type 3 or a combination of Type 3 and Type 1.

Bottom line, for print avoid Opentype SVG fonts, if you can't do that have a discussion with your print service provider about how they are able to handle them, and get proofs before printing, and not on-screen proofs.

[DKingDesigner]

Thanks for the information. This is pretty much what I have discovered. I took the time to redo the project with the SVG font converted to a normal OT font and the color applied in InDesign via GREP styles. However, I think Adobe's documentation needs to be more informative about this shortcoming of SVG fonts. When I first started looking for info on this (when my proofs came back with the wrong color), I could find very little on the topic. I'm hoping this Forum discussion will help some future designer. 🙂 

[abailescollins]

You and the rest of the printing industry...

🙂

As normal we all learn the hard way...

[rob day]

Seems like the least painful solution is to let InDesign flatten the SVG transparency by exporting to PDF/X-1a, which removes the font and outputs CMYK values that match InDesign’s color managed Separation Preview readings. Another reason why online printers with automated systems continue to request PDF/X-1a—there would be little evidence of the problem in a PDF/X-4 with live transparency.

[abailescollins]

the least painful solution is not to use Opentype SVG!

[Laubender]

Hi together,

found the following articles; all from 2019 I assume:

Warning about OpenType SVG fonts in Adobe InDesign CC2019
3. March 2019 by Stephan Jaeggi
https://pdf-aktuell.ch/pa/language/en/warning-about-opentype-svg-fonts-in-adobe-indesign-cc2019/

OpenType SVG & PDF : the new printer’s nightmare
https://www.agilestreams.io/en/opentype-svg-pdf-the-new-printers-nightmare/

OpenType SVG & PDF Print: why it is better to wait…
https://www.agilestreams.io/en/opentype-svg-pdf-print-why-it-is-better-to-wait/

Now, more than two years later, the issues are still there, I think.

Regards,
Uwe Laubender

( ACP )

[abailescollins]

Indeed, those gentlemen are all my colleagues at the Ghent Workgroup. We talked about and researched this topic.

www.gwg.org

Until something changes on the PDF specification side, I don't expect much to change.

PDF tools like PitStop the one I look after can help with this problem, but they will not help you if you just want to export a reliable PDF from Indesign!