Odd printing problem...

jigsawman · April 2018

I am printing to Adobe PDF. here are my settings:
Under Adobe PDF Properties
High Quality Print
ANSI C
Everything else is left as default

In the Print Drawing window:
Active Window is selected
All visible sheets is selected
Fit to page
Tiling - Horz 1, Vertical 1, Overlap % 0
Landscape

I click Preview and it looks like my map. I click OK to print my map and all that shows up is the outline of my landmass, the roads, the lakes and rivers. Everything else is missing. What gives?
JSM

Monsen · April 2018

Not really sure here, I can't seem to reproduce this myself.
When you say 'all visible sheets' are selected, you do mean 'all visible sheets as one page' right? (as opposed to 'all visible sheets as separate pages')
Do the same thing happen if you use another pdf printer (If you have Windows 10, I believe it comes with the microsoft pdf printer)

jigsawman · April 2018

Yes, I tried is with Microsoft PDF as well. Same thing. I'll double check the "all visible sheets as one page" but I am pretty sure I have the correct one chosen.
JSM

jigsawman · April 2018

Checked my settings and everything is as it should be. I am at a loss. This really puts a dampener on getting these maps onto paper. Sigh.
JSM

Monsen · April 2018

I am not sure what causes your problem, but as a workaround, have you tried simply exporting it to an image instead? You can always print to pdf from your image viewer instead.

Loopysue · April 2018

GIMP is free and will export any opened bitmap to pdf

jigsawman · April 2018

The problem with exporting as an image is if the map is scaled to fit into an 8.5x11, it will export at 8.5x11. There's no way for me to print this any larger than that without loss of detail because I enlarged it. At least as far as I know.
JSM

jigsawman · April 2018

Yeah there is something funky going on. This happens to every single map I make. Preview is ok, but they just don't export correctly. Really bums me out.
JSM

Monsen · April 2018

Exporting as an image gives you complete control of the output size, much more than printing does. The new export options dialog even lets you specify the image using print size so you don't have to calculate the pixels yourself anymore.

I looked a bit at the adobe settings, and discovered that the high quality print setting you are using actually defaults to 2400 pixels per inch. I think this forces CC3+ to render a larger image than it is capable of. When printing, CC3+ must still render the output. I recommend you try at standard quality print, which is still 600 dpi, which is still high enough that you would struggle to differentiate it from the high quality print in most scenarios. (Most printers use 600 dpi anyway [although you can easily get better ones though])

jigsawman · April 2018

I changed the resolution to 300 and it did not make a difference with printing. I will play with exporting then. Have never used it before. Will see how that goes. I appreciate the assistance

JSM

Wyvern · April 2018

Given that 300 dpi is the resolution used for virtually all professional lithographic colour printing, anything beyond that is mere marketing hype (almost literally - the print quality will not noticeably improve if you use higher settings than this). There is also a limit because of the paper surface quality onto which you'll be printing, not just what your printer can (or claims it can) accomplish, of course.

Be careful when checking what resolution is being offered though - ppi = pixels per inch and dpi = dots per inch are NOT the same things.

Loopysue · April 2018

Aye - that's a really good point. You can have as many dpi as you like, but if your ppi is only 72 or 96 (96 being a common screen resolution) it will never ever look any clearer. There will just be a whole load more ink piled onto each pixel space.

jigsawman · April 2018

Ok thanks : )

ProFantasy Community Forum

Odd printing problem...

Comments