Export to PDF replaces "ff" and "ss" in the entire document with a blank square box

[RandyM]

I am evaluating the 3 Affinity products to replace Adobe. When exporting a document to PDF, every word in the document with "ff" and "ss" are all replaced with a square box. See attachments to view the problem.

I have tried every PDF type. The only one that doesn't do this is when I rasterize the file but then it's pages that look like photos and is 30mb in size. This defeats the purpose of PDF.

Please advise.

[walt.farrell]

Welcome to the Serif Affinity forums.

How are you viewing the exported PDF files? If you are opening them with an Affinity application, you may need to ensure that you turn off the "Subset Fonts" option in the More... part of the Export dialog. That should enable Affinity to properly interpret the ligatures that it is currently missing.

Alternatively, you could use Affinity's typography settings in the Character panel to disable the ligatures.

[Sean P]

Hi RandyM,

In addition to what Walt has said would you be able to attach a copy of the afdesign file that you're exporting please? What font is it that you're using on the text?

 

[RandyM]

Thank you Walt and Sean. I have a 20+ page PDF with a Georgia font. If I change the font to anything else it messes up the entire formatting of the document. I need to edit the file, and that seems to work just fine. When I save it as PDF the problem occurs as shown throughout the document.

I am able to view the original PDF with Adobe PDF (any version), but the saved edited file from Affinity Designer has the problem described in my original post.

When I save the PDF file "Text as Curves" it works fine but cannot later edit the new file.

I tried turning off "Subset fonts" with no change to the problem. I cannot find a "Character panel" - only a "Text" drop down menu.

I am attaching the afdesign file you asked for Sean.

I am using version 1.8.3

 

FontTest.afdesign

Edited June 12, 2020 by RandyM
Adding version

[RandyM]

Hi Walt,

I found how to turn off ligatures - when doing so it made no difference to the resulting PDF.

Text | Ligatures | None

[markw]

I hope this doesn’t just muddy the waters further for you but I just tried your attached design file and all PDF exports worked as expected, no mystery boxes replacing letters when viewed in Preview or Adobe Reader.

[Sister Irini]

Was there ever a solution to this issue please? We have just spent a considerable sum on printing a magazine that has all the ff, i and single f letters replaced by a small square box. Yes, it ought to have been picked up in the print proof, but wasn't and now very disappointing. It was exported from Affinity Publisher to PDF and has exported this way, before going to print. Any help much appreciated.

[Komatös]

Hello @Sister Irini

Have you tried the suggestions in the previous postings? So switch off ligatures in the character settings or / and subsets in the advanced export settings for PDF export.