Skip to main content
P
ptc-48572151-Visitor
1-Visitor
January 14, 2014
Question

Printing PDF vs. TIFF

  • January 14, 2014
  • 1 reply
  • 5613 views

Hello,

My company is just starting to investigate creating our prints in PDF format rather than TIFF. In doing so, i've come across something i cannot explain. When i create a TIFF and a PDF using the same pen table file, the resulting print is not identical. As you can see below the dimensions and text in the TIFF file are much darker than the PDF file. Can anyone explain this phenomenon?

PDF+vs.+TIFF.jpg

Below is the text from the pen table file we are using.

pen 4 thickness 0.08 cm;

pen 1 thickness 0.025 cm;

pen 3 pattern 0.2 , 0.1 , cm;thickness 0.025 cm


This thread is inactive and closed by the PTC Community Management Team. If you would like to provide a reply and re-open this thread, please notify the moderator and reference the thread. You may also use "Start a topic" button to ask a new question. Please be sure to include what version of the PTC product you are using so another community member knowledgeable about your version may be able to assist.

1 reply

T
TomD.inPDX17-Peridot
17-Peridot
January 14, 2014

Are you printing the PDF at 1:1?

PDF has some intelligence about line weights and this is what the printing code sends to the file. I have noticed even on the screen that once you size the print to 125% in Acrobat reader, things finally look good.

I have resorted to giving my fonts line weight (.012) and stroke all fonts to avoid some other issues with TTF's.

Feel free to pose this question to the customer service group. Just create a support case and see what PTC has to say about this. it certainly isn't the 1st time we discussed this.

D
dschenken1-Visitor
1-Visitor
January 14, 2014

TIFF is a bitmap, and has a minimum width line based on the DPI you allowed when the file was created.

Given a PDF, Adobe Reader or Acrobat will attempt to produce the actual width of the line subject to the minimum width based on the DPI of the printer or display.

So, if the TIFF is created at 100 DPI the smallest line is .010 wide, regardless of the pen table setting. If the pen table is set to .001 the result will still be .010.

On the PDF a .001 width being sent to a 300 dpi printer will result in a line that is .00333 wide. If it is sent to a 600 dpi printer it will be .001666 wide.

To make them look the same, the DPI at which they are created needs to match.

The reason zooming up in Reader looks better is that the width of the lines needs to be noticeably larger than the size of the pixels to avoid aliasing. By default, Reader trys anti-aliasing for very fine lines, unless the line weights option is used. (In ReaderX it is Preferences/Page Display/Enhance thin lines)

For a decent comparison, import the PDF into GIMP or Adobe Photoshop and change the DPI to which the image is coverted. You'll see the effect of pixel size vs minimum line width.

    P
    ptc-48572151-VisitorAuthor
    1-Visitor
    January 14, 2014

    I understand what you are saying, and i turns out my DPIs were different but making them the same didn't change anything. I am saving the TIFF/PDF at 400 DPI which would give me a minimum line thickness on the TIFF of 0.00635 cm. The lowest line thickness value in my pen table is .025 cm which is well above the minimum.

    Terms & ConditionsCookie settingsAccessibility statement