Colored text converting to black in PDF

waltsj19 · External Since: Jul 11, 2007 Posts: 1

I'm in a position where I have end-users who create their publications
in Publisher and convert to PDF for us to print. I'm getting a
sporadic problem with the Save as PDF add-in changing the color of any
colored text (and only text) to black in a few cases (3 out of 30 in
the test group). Converting the exact same Publisher file on our
machines produces the correct colors. Using Acrobat to distill is no
longer an option as customers have not been happy using Acrobat to
distill due to the long process and the glitches that take place in
conversion. Manually altering the PDF in any way (using PitStop or
whatever) is also out of the question (3 people just can't do it for
1000 files each week). If we can get this one last problem figured
out, we'll be in the clear.

Does anyone have any ideas?

Matt Beals · External Since: Aug 27, 2006 Posts: 108

I assume that you are talking about Publisher 2007. I haven't run across
this particular issue. What settings are being used? I always use high
quality settings and leave everything RGB. I Callas pdfColorConvert,
Apago PDF Enhancer or PitStop to convert Publisher files. You should try
pdfColorConvert or PDF Enhancer. Maybe there's something in that
conversion process. I don't think that anyone really knows what CMYK
Publisher is converting to. It might be something like SWOP, but I have
no idea. Even when I use automation to convert Publisher files to PDF
through Acrobat I haven't had this problem. Using the PDF Maker option
can sometimes have some interesting effects on transparency (if you tell
it to *not* preserve Publisher transparency, but again I haven't seen
anything like you are describing.

If you'd like to send me some of the sample files where you have this
problem I'd be happy to try it out on my end.

Matt Beals
Consultant
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waltsj19 wrote:
> I'm in a position where I have end-users who create their publications
> in Publisher and convert to PDF for us to print. I'm getting a
> sporadic problem with the Save as PDF add-in changing the color of any
> colored text (and only text) to black in a few cases (3 out of 30 in
> the test group). Converting the exact same Publisher file on our
> machines produces the correct colors. Using Acrobat to distill is no
> longer an option as customers have not been happy using Acrobat to
> distill due to the long process and the glitches that take place in
> conversion. Manually altering the PDF in any way (using PitStop or
> whatever) is also out of the question (3 people just can't do it for
> 1000 files each week). If we can get this one last problem figured
> out, we'll be in the clear.
>
> Does anyone have any ideas?
>

SueN111 · Joined: Nov 29, 2007 Posts: 1

I was having just this same problem, when my husband installed Publisher 2007 and the PDF converter onto my new lap top. After head scratching (and looking on the Internet- hence finding your question) I had a hunch that it might be linked to the printers that were installed on my laptop, as I only had a black printer installed. Once I installed a colour printer and changed the default printer in both Publisher and Adobe to the colour one, the colour in my texts came back! Hooray!