Poor Printing Quality - PDF Designed On InDesign

[Jenny12358615]

I am having the same re-occuring issues with printing PDF's that are designed in InDesign. I have looked at other communities that describe random bolded text, which is the main issue. I have tried everything to try and fix it myself but cannot seem to get it right. 

These are techincal datasheets that feature small text that needs to be high quality as they are likely to be printed for customers. Is anyone able to help? 

I have attached a photo of the PDF rather than a scan because it shows the issue more clearly. It's subtle but it's enough to make the document look lower quality. 

[rob day]

Looks like the text is printing off register. Can you share the InDesign file?

[Jenny12358615]

Sure. See attatched. 

[Peter Spier]

First thing is to get rid of the Text Black color. Use the default Black swatch.

[James Gifford—NitroPress]

I think this has more to do with the poor small-text quality than any other factor; all the PDF and layering issues are stemming from its trying to manage four-color rich black. Change all text to plain Black, and I'd bet the PDF is good to go.

(By the way, @Jenny12358615 — forgive my snarks at the designer, here. It was not clear that you were the designer; your posts seemed to be downstream as a client or user. I would have directed more polite help your way on that level had I understood the context. We can get pretty hard on third-party designers, printers, etc. when someone is having trouble with their work or process demands, but there's never an intention to criticize someone directly.)

[Jenny12358615]

@James Gifford—NitroPressFirstly, no offense taken. I totally get it. I also understand that I am an amateur and don't know the technical ins and outs of this software. I'm likely to not use it enough to ever have to honestly.

Secondly, I have changed all text to plain black and I must say there is a massive improvement. Can't say it's perfect but that may not be possible as I am not using the highest quality printer.

I appreciate the help so far as this has got it to an acceptable level 🙂

[Peter Spier]

And it looks like the only spot color really in use is the Process Cyan table borders, which needn't be a spot. The 282C shows as in use, but doesn't generate a plate in separation preview, so probably in a style defintion.

[rob day]

Also, you have a single object on the page with a Transparency Effect that isn’t actually doing anything—if you remove the Effect there will be no transparency on the page to flatten:

As Peter suggests set your text to black only:

And set the Spot swatches to Process:

[Peter Spier]

The 282 C is reported as in use incorrectly. Exporting to .idml fixed that, so only the cyan is still in use.

[Jenny12358615]

Thank you @rob day . I have implemented everything suggested and it's made a big difference. It's not perfect but I think that will be hard to get. One thing I am confused about is the transparency layer. The only thing that is transparent in this document is the background, however, this is created on Illustrator - exported as PDF, and then copied onto the datasheet. Could this be affecting everything? I have tried a version without this layer with little improvement to the printout.

Unless I am missing something. That should be the only layer that is transparent.

[rob day]

The Flattener Preview is showing the frame with the Gradient Feather applied as the only transparent object on the page:

The backgound PDF doesn’t appear to have any transparency—can you share it?

Also, it seems like there might be a hardware problem with your printer—the CMY seems to be out-of-register with Black.

[Jenny12358615]

Strange. When I use the same preview is shows the entire background. See attached the background PDF. It has a gradient overlay on it which I would assume has transparency. As mentioned, this is create in Illustrator and then exported. 

[rob day]

The 2.PDF you shared is a different PDF. I don’t think tere’s any benefit in keeping the background transparency live you could try flattening the PDF—save it as PDF/X-1a. But it does look like something is causing your printer to print off register—Peter didn’t have any problem printing the text, and it prints fine for me.

[Jenny12358615]

Hi All. I appreciate of all your replies and suggestions. I will try a few of these this morning and see what happens. Just for some more insight on this project. I am the designer of these documents and have created them in-house via InDesign. These datasheets are for a website. We need these PDF's to print easily for customers and only a few are planned to be professional printeted externally. The main objective is to have these PDF's printed by our customers on their own printers but we may occasionaly print them at the office for handouts. 

Something worth mentioning. I didnt have this issue a few weeks ago when I originally designed them. This seems to be a new issue which I cannot identify. 

I will try suggestions that are below and post any updates. 

Thanks again for the help. 

[Peter Spier]

I think Brad's suggestion to put the text on a new layer above everything else is probably the most important thing you can do.

I would also suggest redefining  the document as destined for web, if it isn't already, and make sure your colors are defined as RGB.

[Brad @ Roaring Mouse]

Okay everybody. Deep Dive coming:

I figured out what's CAUSING it.

It's not the Transparency items after all. Nor is it the colour of the text (although, YES, change that to 100K immediately.)

It's LIGATURES.

I was testing the file and deleted all the background items so all that was left was text; made a new PDF.

SAME result... some of the text, but NOT ALL was force-outlined when printed, causing the difference in "boldness" due to some text being hinted and the outlined text not being hinted. It should be noted, this "effect" only occurs on lower resolution output. It does not affect high-resolution output.

So, looking at the embedded fonts, there are two listings for each font: one with normal ANSI (in this case TrueType) encoding and another for CID Identity-H Custom (Composite TrueType). Checking the font inventory in the PDF under Preflight, sure enough, the text that got outlined was this second instance and not the un-outlined text.

Why CID for some of the text and not others? ... in this case it turns out to be the Ligatures, although Contextual Alternate glyphs also triggered it. PDF format treats text as individual lines, so any line using a ligature uses the Custom encoding, which apparently needs to be converted to outline when printing, and any line NOT using a ligature uses standard encoding, in which case the embedded TrueType font is sent to the printer driver to be rendered, hinting intact.

So I turned the Ligatures off and Contextual Alternates off on all the text and made a new PDF. This seemed to cure the issue.

Of course if you WANTED ligatures and alternates, there may be no way around this. I don't think this is a bug per se, nor a flaw, but maybe an unfortunate side effect of a necessary evil in how a PDF with Composite TT is printed.

Attached is a revised INDD file. See if this changes things for you.

 

[Peter Spier]

That's a very interesting analysis. Odd, though, that there don't actually seem to be any ligatures in those lines, or am I missing something?

[Brad @ Roaring Mouse]

I thought that at first, but I did notice that there were some, like "fi" that are VERRRY subtle. That font doesn't have the typical shapes like a joined f+i. Instead just a combo where the "i" is kerned closer than normal.

Contextual Alternates were even harder to spot.

[Jenny12358615]

Brad @ Roaring Mouse That has worked! Perfect. I don't know how you figured that out but you have fixed it. Thank you very much. Can I just ask how I replicate this on other datasheets. I have designed them all and they are ready to print, so just need to see which settings I need to change to make sure they all print correctly. 

Thanks again for the help. I really do appreciate it! 

[Jenny12358615]

Not to worry. I have Googled how to do this and it's work. Now to rework all 50+ datasheets! The price I pay for not sorting this out sooner. 

Thank you everybody for your help. I very much appreciated 🙂 What a lovely community. 

[Peter Spier]

IF you used styles and theyare the same throughout the sheets, this is actually much easier to do than you might think (and a good reason to really get into the habit of strict use of styles).

Make backup copies of the datasheets for safety (things do go wrong on occasion), then create a Book file and add the data sheets to the book. Repair one sheet by fixing the styles to elimnate the use of ligatures and contextual alternates, set that sheet as the source for sychronization, and synch the styles from the Book Panel menu. Done.

[Brad @ Roaring Mouse]

Anytime!

[Rickvictor1122]

I'm sorry to hear that you're experiencing issues with printing PDFs designed in InDesign. Based on your description, it sounds like there may be a problem with the font rendering or embedding in the PDF file. Here are some suggestions that might help you troubleshoot the issue:

1. Check the font embedding settings in InDesign: Make sure that all fonts used in your document are embedded in the PDF file. To do this, go to "File" > "Export" > "Adobe PDF (Print)" > "Advanced" > "Font" and select "Embed All Fonts."

2. Check the font licensing: It's possible that the font you are using is not properly licensed, which can cause rendering issues. Make sure that you have the proper licensing for all fonts used in your document.

3. Try using a different PDF viewer: Sometimes, the issue with font rendering may be caused by the PDF viewer rather than the PDF file itself. Try using a different PDF viewer, such as Adobe Acrobat or Foxit Reader, to see if the issue persists.

4. Try exporting to a different PDF format: Sometimes, exporting to a different PDF format, such as PDF/X-1a or PDF/X-4, can resolve font rendering issues.

5. Check for overlapping objects: If there are overlapping objects in your InDesign document, it can cause font rendering issues. Make sure that there are no overlapping objects in your document, and that all text boxes are properly aligned.

I hope these suggestions help you resolve the issue with printing your PDFs i was also facing this issue in my website casinofindr poster and it will helpd me and my work is donw. If you continue to experience issues, it may be helpful to consult with a professional printer or a graphic designer who is familiar with InDesign.