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Hi all,

Thanks for taking a moment to read. Sincere apologies if I have posted in the wrong area - I'm entirely new here! 

I had been working on the 1.8.0.55-something beta and migrated over to 1.8.0 yesterday (and 1.8.1 this morning) and since the change, my PDF export file sizes have increased dramatically. 

Before the switch, my PDF was exported as "PDF for export" at 144 DPI and it was around 30 MB. It's a 116 page document. 

Now, even if I use PDF small size at 72 DPI, it's 120 MB. Not to mention the export takes minutes instead of seconds. The PDF is 10% larger than the AFPUB. Colour me confused! 

 

I have experimented with different settings and I can't seem to get the file size back down to something manageable. I think it might be an issue of my lack of understanding but I'm just not sure. I've done my best to resolve it on my own through forums and tutorials but I'm coming up empty.

Any guidance that could be offered would be most appreciated. 

March_Catalog_Working_File.afpub

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Welcome to the forums.

A lot of the images are missing from your attached file. I assume they are linked rather than embedded.

Even so, I’ve just exported at 144DPI on Windows 10 with Publisher 1.8.0.584 and got a PDF that is 30.5MB (export took a couple of minutes or so but I wasn’t timing it).
It looks like I may not be seeing the problem on Windows that you are seeing on OS X. (However, I don’t know how large the images that I am missing are.)
Maybe someone else on OS X, or with 1.8.1, can give you more feedback.

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Hi @GarryP,

Thank you for your help. May I please ask that you upload the PDF in question for me? 

I intend to review it to see which linked images are missing - maybe it's not a problem, only that I've bulked up the file too much with graphics. 

I have indeed been linking rather than embedding files - I didn't consider that before sharing the AFPUB file. That being said, some of my resources are missing on my end too - long story haha. 

Thanks again!

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Quality 85 is not very appropriate for digital distribution. It is though the old Affinity default.

I tried with press quality settings (Affinity offers in version 1.8 quality 98 which has changed from earlier version), file size 115 MB (which feels quite ok though many images were missing).

I also tried DIGITAL setting but changed quality 85 to 25 and got 3,1 MB PDF file. Probably 25 is too low but as I do not use yet Affinity for production I am not sure what setting would be good enough.

Thus, I think there has not happened anything drastic in export engine, just export settings defaults have changed. It is a good idea to experiment and choose settings according that. Generally I tend to use higher DPI and compress more in digital/net distribution.

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Hi all,

@GarryP thanks for the file. It brought the font issue to my attention as well. Will need to sort that out. 

@Lagarto thank you for all of your work and testing. 

I spent all of my working time yesterday trying to solve this and I am no closer to a solution. I think I may just have to live with the large file size for this month's release and continue to work on it in for the next one. I will report back if I come up with anything groundbreaking. 

Just can't wrap my head around it. A competitor has a similar document that's a little less image-heavy, but it's 5 MB and it looks less compressed to the naked eye. 

 

Not giving up, just moving forward! Thanks all! 

 

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Hi again @Lagarto

Can't thank you enough for your continued support on this issue. 

In my experimentation I have tried using the PDF (digital - small size) setting and 72 DPI and the file size remained high at ~120 MB. I also tried exporting at 144 DPI, because I was unhappy with the image quality, and it was ~125 MB. I've played with the Downsample images and Allow JPG compression but I haven't been able to get anything smaller than ~120 MB.

I will freely admit that I don't know what I am doing with most of this stuff, and some of your response - particularly in the edits - went a little over my head. For what it's worth, I am confident I have downsampling on. 

It's looking like we may release with the large file size - now about 150 MB with the final ad artwork and things included - but I would love to continue to work on this to get that down to something more reasonable. I've been made aware that a competitors document, similar in page length but without the logos - the stamp sized images - is only 5 MB. Not sure if that's relevant. 

I've also encountered a situation where (I believe) my text is being converted to curves, when I haven't instructed Publisher to do so. But that's an issue for a different topic. 

Thanks again! 

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  • Staff

IMPORTANT Anyone who is exporting documents containing text to PDFs from the Mac App Store version of Affinity applications, we have just discovered that the text is failing to export with embedded fonts but instead all text is converted to curves, bloating filesize. This has been caused by the special nature of sandboxing, so we can sort this out by providing a new Publisher Beta build instead.

We will address this as quickly as we can.

Problems with a image exporting will not be helped by this alternative beta software, but many customers are finding their big files are caused by the export of text using Mac app store builds. (All apps are affected)

If you are using the Affinity store Mac release builds, then this is not the problem, and my workaround of using the next beta should be ignored.

Patrick Connor
Serif Europe Ltd

"There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow man. True nobility lies in being superior to your previous self."  W. L. Sheldon

 

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@Patrick Connor you may have solved both my problems at once. 

I am indeed using the Mac App Store version, so I don't have a product key - I don't believe? It states I need to have the Mac App Store version installed, which I do, same directory even (\Applications), but it won't open. My Googling did not present a solution, are you able to direct further? 

Thanks so much! 

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  • Staff

Sigh, I forgot that our Mac beta doesn't recognize any MAS version released after the beta only earlier ones. So it is not a valid workaround on mac, sorry. I have edited the post above so it doesn't disappoint anyone else.

You may have to wait for us to get a new beta uploaded to the beta forums (that will recognize your MAS release build and not prompt for a product key).

I will get this done early next week.

Patrick Connor
Serif Europe Ltd

"There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow man. True nobility lies in being superior to your previous self."  W. L. Sheldon

 

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  • Staff

Sorry

My only suggestion is someone kind here exporting it for you using the Affinity Store version or a Windows 1.8 build.

Or buy the Affinity store version for yourself and return it within the 14 day trial period....

Patrick Connor
Serif Europe Ltd

"There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow man. True nobility lies in being superior to your previous self."  W. L. Sheldon

 

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  • Staff

No, then it is not a suitable suggestion for your problem. I am not at work at the moment and had not download that file so was suggesting that PDF filesize increases may be text specific and Mac app store specific based on incorrect guesswork, sorry. Hopefully my post will be useful to others. 

Patrick Connor
Serif Europe Ltd

"There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow man. True nobility lies in being superior to your previous self."  W. L. Sheldon

 

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Hi everyone,

Just wanted to report back. @Patrick Connor I was able to restore the 1.7.3 release from my Time Machine backup and therefore get the 1.8.0 Beta you provided to launch. 

I exported at 144 DPI and I am instantly down to 20 MB from ~150 MB. I still have some work to do around image compression but this brings things back into the realm of possibility for me.

If there is further information I can provide anyone to assist in squashing the bug just tell me what to do! 

Cheers!

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  • Staff

In 1.8.0 the developers have changed the default jpg compression but that is a number you can put back to a lower figure. I believe that the PDF export quality improvement may need some formal explanation to see where these version difference are coming from.

@Dave Harris, can you advise please?

Patrick Connor
Serif Europe Ltd

"There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow man. True nobility lies in being superior to your previous self."  W. L. Sheldon

 

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  • 3 weeks later...
  • Staff

The 1.8.2 Mac app store builds will likely be released this week

Patrick Connor
Serif Europe Ltd

"There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow man. True nobility lies in being superior to your previous self."  W. L. Sheldon

 

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