Picture from pdf is shown as complete grey but other programs can see and extract the picture correctly

[Doni]

I used the actual 90 days free trial to test if the affinity programs can replace my old Photoshop version. While loading and working on my old psd files is working so far I have problems with an pdf file.
I can open the pdf without problems but affinity shows only a grey layer instead of the actual picture on the first page of the pdf. With Photoshop (CS4) or Inkscape it is no Problem to extract the picture correctly and gimp at least shows the picture correctly (but doesn't separate the different layers).

I added the pdf as attachment.

greets
Doni

sfmanual.pdf

Edited April 5, 2020 by Doni

[Old Bruce]

I didn't know it was possible to save an Lab format as PDF.

Pretty sure that is the source of the problem. Using your old Photoshop try and Convert it to RGB and export as PDF.

[Doni]

OK thank you for you help.
So till Affinity supports the lab format I'm still dependent on Photoshop or other applications (for this particular use case) :(

[Joachim_L]

2 hours ago, Doni said:

So till Affinity supports the lab format I'm still dependent on Photoshop

@Doni Affinity in general supports the lab format, but obviously not here, so you should post a bug report in the appropriate bug forum.

If you want to continue your testing see attached PDF with RGB on first page. 125 pages in the PDF, so I would use APublisher instead of APhoto. Or best, buy all three applications at a more than reasonable price.

sfmanual-kor.pdf

[Old Bruce]

2 hours ago, Doni said:

OK thank you for you help.
So till Affinity supports the lab format I'm still dependent on Photoshop or other applications (for this particular use case)

Affinity supports the Lab format but I don't recall ever seeing PDFs in Lab. I think that is the problem and I don't know how you managed to get a PDF in Lab colourspace.

The information I get for it is that Quarkexpress was the creating application back in 2000. Note also that the modification date is before the creation date.

[MikeW]

35 minutes ago, Old Bruce said:

Affinity supports the Lab format but I don't recall ever seeing PDFs in Lab. I think that is the problem and I don't know how you managed to get a PDF in Lab colourspace.

The information I get for it is that Quarkexpress was the creating application back in 2000. Note also that the modification date is before the creation date.

It's not that the pdf is in the lab color space but rather the QXP file contained lab, cmyk & grayscale elements. As it went to postscript before it became a pdf, there isn't actually a document color space nor are individual elements tagged (everything is in deviceX color), postscript not being a color-managed work-flow. The Distiller settings used simply passed the elements as-is to the pdf. Could have been a risky work-flow in 2000.

fwiw, QXP opens the file for editing properly, retaining the LAB, cmyk & grayscale elements as in the pdf.

[Doni]

1 hour ago, Joachim_L said:

@Doni Affinity in general supports the lab format, but obviously not here, so you should post a bug report in the appropriate bug forum.

If you want to continue your testing see attached PDF with RGB on first page. 125 pages in the PDF, so I would use APublisher instead of APhoto. Or best, buy all three applications at a more than reasonable price.

sfmanual-kor.pdf 5.26 MB · 1 download

Yeah the plan is to purchase all three if the test comes to a positive result ;)
I will post it in the bug forum. If they can fix it - great, but I think it's not the decisive factor for my decision to purchase it or not.

 

27 minutes ago, Old Bruce said:

Affinity supports the Lab format but I don't recall ever seeing PDFs in Lab. I think that is the problem and I don't know how you managed to get a PDF in Lab colourspace.

It's the manual of an old game and is included on the game disc.
The included logo is in vector format and the pictures have a good quality so it's good source material for fan arts, small posters or custom covers.