2 Replies Latest reply: Jul 20, 2013 8:50 PM by dkwonsk100 RSS

    Why do things look better in PDF before converting to JPEG/PNG/TIFF

    dkwonsk100 Community Member
    dkwonsk100 Jul 20, 2013 11:21 AM

      It always puzzles my why it looks better in a pdf preview and then when I choose to convert it off Indesign or Adobe Acrobat it immediately loses quality/hues turn grey.

      I've had more succes screenshotting some things and turning them manually and pasting them into a fireworks document and then saving as an image format.

       

      Is there a better way to convert without using this method? Any plugins perhaps or explanations on how to stop this?

       

      Thank you,

      Daniel K.

        • 1. Re: Why do things look better in PDF before converting to JPEG/PNG/TIFF
          MichaelKazlow CommunityMVP
          MichaelKazlow Jul 20, 2013 7:52 PM (in response to dkwonsk100)

          This isn't the appropriate forum, but let us see if we can see what you are doing and why. A pdf preview should not look better than exporting from InDesign to PDF. This may depend upon your settings file that determines the quality of your export to pdf.

           

          Anytime you convert from Acrobat or InDesign to JPEG, PNG or TIFF you are likely to loose quality. This is especially true for JPEG since this is a lossy format (it is designed to lose quality to ensure a smaller file size). Converting from InDesign or Acrobat to JPEG, PNG, or TIFF involves a change from a format that includes real fonts and possibly other vector-based information (whose quality doesn't depend on resolution since it is derived from mathematical formulas describing its content) to a raster-based form (jpg, png, tiff) that is solely based upon upon the creation of dots at a certain resolution to create an image. When the resolution of the image file is different than the resolution of the viewing medium compromises are made. That is the loss you are seeing.

           

          Why do you need to convert InDesign documents to raster images?

          • 2. Re: Why do things look better in PDF before converting to JPEG/PNG/TIFF
            dkwonsk100 Community Member
            dkwonsk100 Jul 20, 2013 8:50 PM (in response to MichaelKazlow)

            Thanks for taking the time to answer me!

            Your answer was pretty spot on and descriptive.

             

            I was trying to take some PDF files I had made and convert them to JPEG/PNG so I could upload them.

            Flattened PNG definitely changed some of the Vectors and JPEG's did seem to change the colors on some things.

             

            Do you know which forum would be best for questions like this/how to delete this post?

             

            Thanks Again