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M
MTPmedia
Inspiring
September 1, 2023
Question

Has the method of encoding PDFs changed recently? It's broken

  • September 1, 2023
  • 4 replies
  • 3013 views

For the last month or two the printers where I work have been having endless problems with PDFs exported out of InDesign using version PDF/X-1a:2001. Whenever we try to render CMYK plate separatios for litho printing using these PDFs, our rip sofware always throws an error and refuses to render. The rip software has not been updated in this time, whereas InDesign has, so it has to be the cause. Resaving these PDFs as postscript files from Acrobat and then distilling them back into PDF/X-1a:2001 always fixes the problem, so the change has not been universally applied across all Adobe products.

 

I have not seen specific mention of this problem elsewhere (although I haven't looked particularly hard) but it is wasting a lot of time. Adobe, please fix it!

This topic has been closed for replies.

4 replies

M
MTPmediaAuthor
Inspiring
September 5, 2023

Having gone back through different versions of InDesign, it appears that v18.4 was the update that introduced this bug.

    L
    Laubender
    Brainiac
    September 5, 2023

    Hi @MTPmedia ,

    that's good to know!

    So InDesign 18.3 is the one that is not showing the error in your Apogee workflow.

     

    Did you talk to Agfa? The error message you see in the imposition module is a bit strange.

    Perhaps we see two things here: a change in 18.4 with, my assumption, special comments in the exported PDF plus something in the imposition module that cannot cope with the comments? This is just a guess, of course.

     

    Regards,
    Uwe Laubender
    ( Adobe Community Expert )

    M
    MTPmediaAuthor
    Inspiring
    September 5, 2023

    Yes, files generated from version 18.3 work without any problems.

     

    I'm waiting for a response from Agfa at the moment, hopefully it won't take them too long to get back to me. Most of the error message in the screenshot I posted is standard language, it's just telling us where the problem is (everywhere, in this case). The actual error description is blank, it only shows a full stop at the end of a non-existent sentence, which I've never seen in any other error message.

    Distilling postscripted files from the initial PDF in Acrobat Distiller using exactly the same settings fixes the problem, which is a little strange since I'd always assumed the rendering engine is shared across the suite of applications.

    leo.r
    leo.r
    Brainiac
    September 1, 2023

    are you using the latest InDesign version?

    M
    MTPmediaAuthor
    Inspiring
    September 1, 2023

    I think so, version 18.5.

    Bevi Chagnon - PubCom.com
    Bevi Chagnon - PubCom.com
    Brainiac
    September 1, 2023

    Hi @MTPmedia, I've requested support from an Adobe engineer. Unfortunately, experts that we are <grin>, we don't have the capability of delving deeper into this issue.

     

    It does appear that something changed in the PDF/X export utility that's affecting your RIP. I hope you get a response soon.

     

    |&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Bevi Chagnon &nbsp;&nbsp;|&nbsp;&nbsp;Designer, Trainer, &amp; Technologist for Accessible Documents ||&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;PubCom |&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Classes &amp; Books for Accessible InDesign, PDFs &amp; MS Office |
      L
      Laubender
      Brainiac
      September 1, 2023

      Hi @MTPmedia ,

      what's the specific error you are seeing?

      What's the RIP software? If Adobe APPE (Adobe PDF Print Engine), what version?

       

      Did you do a preflight in Acrobat Pro?

       

      Regards,
      Uwe Laubender
      ( Adobe Community Expert )

      M
      MTPmediaAuthor
      Inspiring
      September 1, 2023

      Hi, we use AFGA Apogee for everything once we have a PDF. This: https://www.agfa.com/printing/products/apogee/

       

      Unfortunately the error is about as useless as it can be, it's literally a full stop: "." Apogee does normally provide a more useful error message than that, but with this it doesn't seem to understand what the problem is, just that there is one. I've attached a screenshot.

       

      I haven't tried preflighting in Acrobat to see if it can identify a problem, is there a particular item I should use for this? Not super familiar with preflighting this way.

       

       

       

       

       

      L
      Laubender
      Brainiac
      September 1, 2023

      As far as I can see the Apogee workflow is using the Adobe PDF Print Engine.

      So discuss this with your Agfa representatives…

       

      But how could we test what's the difference now with InDesign 2023 version 18.5.0?

       

      I would go like that:

      Go back to InDesign version 18.4 or maybe better, version 18.3.

       

      Export the same document with that version with the same PDF Export Preset as the 18.5 document. Run it through the Apogee workflow. If that does not fail, do a byte-by byte comparison and see what's the difference. Currently I have no idea what has changed. Maybe some annotations inside the PDF that are aimed at the PDF Review function (just a wild guess) ?

       

      Regarding doing a preflight with Acrobat Pro.

      I would not be surprised if both versions of the PDF, the one that was exported from a previous version of InDesign and the one that was exported with InDesign 18.5 would pass a basic preflight check that is looking for the PDF/X standard. But anyways, do that check.

       

      Maybe it would help to do a bug report at InDesign User Voice:

      https://indesign.uservoice.com/forums/601180-adobe-indesign-bugs

       

      But you have to give the developers something substantial to work with. Best two PDFs from the same InDesign page where the one from 18.5.0 fails and the other one from e.g. 18.3 passes…

       

      Regards,
      Uwe Laubender
      ( Adobe Community Expert )

        Robert at ID-Tasker
        Robert at ID-Tasker
        Brainiac
        September 1, 2023

        How often are you doing SAVE AS with a new name ?

         

        If not very often / not at all - try it first - do Save As with a new name - do not overwrite your orignal INDD file.

         

        If it still won't help - try IDMLing - export as IDML, open and save - again - with a new name.

         

        If it still won't help - try to trash your preferences or even reinstall whole CC using CC Cleaner tool for deep cleaning - sometimes, during update, prefs get corrupted:

         

        https://community.adobe.com/t5/indesign-discussions/reset-indesign-preferences-and-other-troubleshooting/m-p/11990234?search-action-id=440415347292&search-result-uid=11990234

         

          M
          MTPmediaAuthor
          Inspiring
          September 1, 2023

          Never, the InDesign file doesn't appear to be a problem because it happens with PDFs exported from brand new files. I'll try clearing the preferences, thanks. Might end up reinstalling as a last resort, but I'd have to do it across multiple computers, so I'd rather avoid that.

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