Expert: Kevin Stohlmeyer - 6/8/2008

Question
Hi Kevin,

I've been fighting a problem in CS2/PDF printing.  I have a very large file (PDF) that prints gray boxes around some placed images that have various effects (drop shadows, clipping masks, etc.)on them.  I created the file in CS2, exported to a .pdf, and then downsample to 150ppi as the original file is 700+MB - as it contains aerial photography.  The first go around printed fine but I did more edits and the faint gray boxes began appearing -not sure what I did...  It even has a smaller gray box around an image that deleted the drop shadow around that is smaller than the other gray boxes.  I deleted one drop shadow around some text that fixed the problem for that text string.  When I print a small copy on my printer at home, the boxes don't appear, but when I take the same file (an optimized PDF) to plot at Kinkos on a HP5500 plotter and print at 24"x60" the boxes appear!  It seems as though the HP5500 is not understanding the transparencies (?)... or am I not exporting from CS2 with the correct settings for transparencies?  HELP!!!  I'm self-taught CS2 user but have many gaps in knowledge of CS2...  HELP AGAIN!!!

Thanks very much,

Mark

Answer
Hi Mark,

You need to downsize this before you export as a pdf. When you downsample a pdf you are going to experience a lot of problems with printing and unwanted issues.

Also, CS2 does have many (and I mean a lot) of transparency issues with printing. Unfortunately, the solution was to remove or limit the use of external transparency effects (or create them all in Photoshop).

My suggestion is to open the pdf in Photoshop, see if the issues are there on screen, it sounds like they are not there. If not, save the PDF out of Photoshop as a jpg file. This will remove all transparency tags inside the document and will allow Kinkos to print the photo file.

Thanks

Kevin