Transparency

[charleswhalley@adobeforums.com]

Working on a mac. Using Leopard and CS3, Bang up to date software except Acrobat 8 Not 9 as in CS3.3

We have a certificate with a tinted background produced in Indesign. On that certificate we have signatures of people - .ai files with 100% transparent background.

Produce a pdf/x-1a and all looks ok (although tried it on almost every setting possible to no avail). Prints OK on our inkjet but not on our very old Magicolor laser printer - or more importantly our clients suppliers printer!

We are getting a faded box appear on our background (where the rectangle of the picture box for the signature is). Almost as though the transparency is not quite at 100% - but it is!!

Anybody got any ideas on this would be greatly appreciated.

[Jon Bessant]

If you use the output preview and click around the areas of
discolouration inside the PDF ... are they the same CMYK values?


Jon

[charleswhalley@adobeforums.com]

Exactly the same values on the pdf preview inside and outside the 'faded' (printed) box that appears

[charleswhalley@adobeforums.com]

Bit of incorrect information the .ai files are actually .psd files.

[charleswhalley@adobeforums.com]

Interesting test I have just performed.

If you set the background colour to 100% of its colour the pdf prints fine.

It seems to be when you choose a tint of that colour that the problems occur.

[vincent_rousseau@adobeforums.com]

Probably a problem with overprint setups ! Check white objects (the box) with overprint.

[Laura_M.@adobeforums.com]

If you are saving PDF/X 1a out of InDesign, then transparency is no longer live but flattened on export. As Vincent suggests, I would suspect this has something to do with overprinting objects. With Output Preview open, if you turn on Color Warnings > Show Overprinting Objects does that area highlight?

You can simulate the printing of overprinting objects by turning on the "Simulate Overprint" option in the print dialog. Note that this only simulates overprinting and you will *not* want to have this option on when printing seps.