Expert: Amy - 4/30/2009

Question
Hi Amy,
Before sending my illustrator file to a commercial printer I'm told I need to
"Flatten Transparency" and "Outline Type & Strokes". I also am required to
save as a PDF. I've done this. However, when I view the art, the type appears
bolder, and the outlined strokes are much heavier! I have researched and
found that a desktop printer (which apparently has a much lower resolution)
will make outlined items appear thicker.
I was told by the printer, that if I 'view' the PDF at 400% and everything looks
fines at that point, things will print correctly (i.e., the weight I 'see' them in
the PDF at 400% size).
Is this the very best way to 'view' my art to determine how it will actually print
at an offset commercial printer?
I will ask for a hard-copy proof before going ahead with the final print job.
but right now, I'm not satisfied enough to go the next step.
Thanks so much!
Kathryn

Answer
Hi Kathryn,

Everything you said is correct.

Adobe Acrobat does some weird things to the display... You sort of learn through experience what things will look like when you print. Personally, I am a zoomer... like your print rep said.

If you outlined fonts, you'll see that lower case sans serif L's and similar shapes are distorted. "Fat L Syndrome."

Fonts will be generally heavier looking.

As far as I'm concerned, the print rep is correct... zoom in as far as you can go. If vector art looks perfect, it will be perfect on paper. If raster images look great at 100%, slightly bitmapped at 200%, and still fairly decent at 300%, they'll print just fine.

You mentioned you were required to flatten transparency. Sometimes this can be trickier. If little white lines due to image tiling appear in your flattened art on an inkjet print and are visible on screen, they may or may not appear in a postscript print job on paper. Someone told me they never appear in the finished print but I did indeed have them show up on a job once. Because of my experiences, I try to avoid situations where I have this image tiling as a result of flattening by using PhotoShop whenver I can and selectively flattening the elements of every job. Again, zooming in helps. If the lines disappear when you've zoomed in, you're probably safe.

If you would like a second opinion on the quality, you can send me a PDF and I will see what I think. Your files are, of course, kept private.

-AmyLynPace@yahoo.com