Expert: Amy - 9/26/2006

Question
Hello!

I'm currently using Adobe Illustrator CS on a PC and cannot get over the huge file sizes. I noticed the problem when I placed three photographs of 6MB each onto an A3 template with a singal line of text. The file turned out to be 286MB! How is this possible? I managed to slightly reduce the file by changing the colour mode from CMYK to RGB but it is still really big (212MB). Someone said that Illustrator may un-compress JPEG's into TIFF's when you 'place' them. Is this true and if so how can i stop it from happening to reduce the file sizes?

Any help is much appreciated.
George (needing help from the UK)

Answer
Hi George.

Yes, that's true.

To reduce the file size, place the images as LINKED instead of embedded.  

You will have to keep the image file with the AI file (I mean you'll never be able to delete the image file but presumably you wouldn't want to delete your image files) but this way you'll have a large image file and a small AI file that links to it.

If it's going to print, be sure to give them the image files and the AI file.

Hope this helped!
Amy