Distilling EPS resource files

Greetings all,

When eps files are used as resources and FP Server needs to distill them during composition, if the eps file contains any fonts that are not already loaded on FPS's system will it also use the Assets.dat fonts within Acrobat Distiller as well? This is assuming that FPS will use the external distiller program instead of some internal plug-in within Acrobat itself.

Thanks.

Dave,

I believe the .eps files should have the fonts "embedded" in the file or at least saved that way. I wouldn't think there would be an issue with .eps files as long the font is embedded. If there was an issue with a font, I would probably load onto the server to see if it helps or onto the RIP.

Thanks for responding. If we were the only people uploading images to be used we can certainly make sure everything is either embedded or even turned to paths before uploading.

I was actually wondering how FusionPro performs the distillation process of the eps files - as in internal feature within Acrobat or an external call to Acrobat Distiller? I was also hoping that someone from the Printable Think-Tank would have chimed in by now? I guess most of them are at Print'09 in Chicago and can't get away yet.

I was wondering this because when a series of eps file are used as a resource I notice that the first distillation process seems to take quite a while and then the rest fly along quite rapidly. Does this happen every time this eps-to-pdf process takes place? Is there a certain amount of "lag-time" where the loaded program/sub-routine is still active for the next eps file to process? If the same resources are used over and over again are they re-distilled and re-written over and over again as well? If so, why use eps files at all - distill them to pdf files and use those to begin with.

I've pretty much have turned everything to a .pdf because of the converting .eps to .pdf log message. Yes, that would be nice to know about the efficiency end of it.

I have converted some of the .eps files to .pdf just to get the file size down a bit more on jobs as well.

rpaterick is right - any EPS or PDF graphics you're using as resources had better have any fonts they're using embedded. How else would you expect any program to be able to render or convert them accurately without the fonts? So, no, FusionPro neither collects up fonts references in EPS files into Assets.dat nor uses Assets.dat when converting them to PDF.

And technically, FusionPro (at least all versions from the last few years) uses the embedded Normalizer utility for EPS to PDF conversions, not Distiller, but that's an implementation detail.

Continuing on with the eps to pdf conversion in FP, does this process happen each and every time the template is run. Or does FP "see" the pdf file is already composed and use that file instead.

I understand that FP does not really use the eps file but "internally distills" a pdf file from it and uses that file instead. I guess what my questions really boils down to is does this process happen each and every time a composition takes place and the same pdf file is re-written each and every time? Or does FP know that it created a pdf file already and then uses that in future runs?

Thanks.

Continuing on with the eps to pdf conversion in FP, does this process happen each and every time the template is run.

Or does FP "see" the pdf file is already composed and use that file instead.