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andyj29576424
andyj29576424
Participant
October 25, 2019
Question

Why is my exported cmyk pdf so huge?

  • October 25, 2019
  • 3 replies
  • 1865 views

Hello,

I have designed an 8.5x11 flyer in photoshop, cmyk,  for commercial printing. I have flattened all my art layers, and have a couple of text layers. When I output to press quality pdf, the file size is nearly 100MB, exceeding the file size limit of the printer.

The image size is 2587x3331 at 300dpi. If 100mb is the expected size of a press quality pdf with the above specs, then what should I do to export a high quality cmyk image maintaing text layers, and a file size under 75mb?

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    3 replies

    Stephen Marsh
    Community Expert
    Stephen MarshCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    October 25, 2019

    It could potentially be a metadata bloat issue. Details to detect and remove photoshop:DocumentAncestors metadata here:

     

    https://prepression.blogspot.com/2017/06/metadata-bloat-photoshopdocumentancestors.html

     

    Easiest to diagnose and remove in the source PSD file. Once embedded into a PDF, Acrobat Pro would be required to remove the data.

    andyj29576424
    andyj29576424Author
    Participant
    November 5, 2019

    Thank you!  Removing metata using Acrobat solved the problem. Now, the question is why does this happen all the time? As a test, I took the metadata-stripped pdf (file size went from 95mb to 8 mb for the stripped pdf) and opened it in photoshop, copied the image and pasted it into a new document, saved as pdf, and that new file is 95mb again. Where is that metadata coming from?  How do I stop it?  I really don't want to have to stip metadata in acrobat for every pdf I export for printing.

    Stephen Marsh
    Community Expert
    Stephen MarshCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    November 5, 2019

    There are many types of metadata, is your issue specifically photoshop:DocumentAncestors related? If so my blogpost covers why and offers many methods to remove this data before it ends up in a PDF.

    Derek Cross
    Community Expert
    Derek CrossCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    October 25, 2019

    You shouldn't convert your file to CMYK, I suggest instead you go back to the original RGB images, use them for your flyer and export the document as a PDF/X-4 for your printer, include Crop marks (unless your printer doesn't want them) and tick Use Document Bleed Settings.

    rob day
    Community Expert
    rob dayCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    October 25, 2019

    If you are working in 16-bit make sure to convert to 8 bits in the PDF Compression tab. Also check that the layers don’t exceed the canvas size—do a select all and Crop.

     

    Or, since you have made the conversion to a device dependent CMYK space there shouldn’t be any more color management needed downstream, and you could Save As to PDF/X-1a, which will flatten and crop everything during the save.

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