It doesn’t convert colors to CMYK and spot colors like PDF/X-1a does, but supports a color managed workflow.
If you look at its settings in InDesign CS3, you’ll see that it is similar to PDF/X-3 in respect to color handling. So where does PDF/X-4 come in? It’s a draft standard which is about to be approved as an ISO PDF/X standard.
These partners will be bringing out the first of these RIPs this year. It’s software that Adobe licenses to its printing partners like Agfa, Screen, Heidelberg, Fuji, and so on to build into their next generation PDF RIPs and print workflow systems. The Adobe PDF Print Engine isn’t something you can go out and buy off the shelf. This is now changing! In 2006, Adobe announced a new printing technology for natively processing PDF files through a RIP that doesn’t involve conversion to PostScript. The PostScript language that controls printers was developed before transparency existed. However, having to do flattening is a workaround necessary because the RIPs most print service providers now use must convert everything in a PDF file to PostScript. For high quality printing, a print service provider would usually choose the High Resolution setting when printing or creating a PDF file. InDesign controls the process by using transparency flattener presets.
Flattening converts layered or stacked objects with transparency into a single, flat opaque layer that the RIP can understand, but it tries to maintain the quality of vector objects and type as much as possible. Both of these PDF/X standards require that any InDesign transparency be flattened.īecause many RIPs (raster image processors?the processor that controls a printer) can’t handle live transparency, InDesign CS3 uses a technology called flattening. PDF/X-3 also supports those color spaces, but also supports color management and embedded color profiles for images. In my previous blogs, I wrote about the two that are built into InDesign and the Creative Suite applications: PDF/X-1a supports CMYK and spot colors only. There are several different PDF/X standards. The PDF/X standards were first developed in the mid 1990s to eliminate errors in a print workflow by defining some minimum standards for PDF files intended for print production?for example, ensuring that fonts are always embedded and also excluding certain kinds of objects that can derail a print workflow (multimedia content, for example). I’ve written about exporting PDF before in blogs about Choosing the Right PDF Preset, Exporting or Using Distiller, and Customizing PDF Presets. To explain what it is and why it’s there, I need to give you a little background.
When you start using InDesign CS3 (and the other CS3 applications) and export your first PDF file, you may notice an addition to the Adobe PDF Preset menu: You’ll see a new entry called PDF/X-4.
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