Switching from Publisher to Photo Persona and back destroys photo in exported PDF file

[Worker]

Sometimes when I switch from Publisher Persona to Photo Persona in order to adjust contrast or brightness of a picture and then switch back to Publisher the picture will appear solarized in an exported PDF file. This only happens intermittendly.

I have posted this problem before and I still can't see what I am doing wrong and would appreciate any help.

In a Publisher document with these document settings for color:

• One of the pictures (embedded) in the document is to dark, it needs some correction.
• I mark this picture and click the "Photo Persona" icon.
• Inside the Photo Persona I adjust shadows and contrast.
• I then click the "Publisher Persona" icon in order to return to Publisher.
• the picture looks perfect in Publisher Persona.
• Now I select "export" to create a PDF file. I use the following settings for the PDF-creation:

The photo which had been adjusted within the Photo Persona looks perfect within Publisher, however if I export the document to a PDF file it now somehow looks solarized in the PDF file:

It seems that the switch to the Photo Persona has made some changes to the picture which take affect during export to PDF. My circumvention is not to use the Photo Persona from inside Publisher but adjust the picture externally. This, however, takes longer and is not as nice as Persona switching.

I have experimented with the color space setting in the export to PDF dialog with  no success.

The ZIP file attached contains two afpackages, one before the switch to the Photo Persona had been done and the other after this switch. It further contains the resulting PDF files. Using these packages it is possible to reproduce the problem.

My environment ist the following:
Windows 11, Version 21H2 (Build 22000.675),
Version of Affinity Publisher and Photo:  1.10.5.1342

Thank you for looking into this, I would be grateful for any help or hints.

With kind Regards,

Worker

 

Test_files.zip

[Old Bruce]

Curious as to why you have 32bit colour depth for a Publisher document that has a few JPEG images in it. 32bits is for rather specialized Photography work.

[walt.farrell]

Also curious about the rest of the PDF export settings, and what's being done with the color of the images.

Also, the JPG images will only have 8-bits per channel, not 32, even if they're not converted to CMYK.

[Worker]

Thanks for commenting my post.
The test document provided ist only an excerpt of a larger document. 
I really didn't think of the fact that jpg files only use 8 bits per channel but I thought RGB 32 uses three 8 bit channels. However, do you think the fact that the document's color format is RGB/32 HDR could be the reason of the picture being corrupted in the exported PDF file? Also I am using these PDF export setting parameters since a long time. I would be very grateful if you  could advice me what PDF parameter could cause this strange behaviour. I have tried to use the color setting "RGB" for the PDF export but that also gives bad result. By the way, if I replace this picture using the "Replace picture" function, the resulting PDF file is perfect.
Thank you and good night,
Worker

[walt.farrell]

41 minutes ago, Worker said:

but I thought RGB 32 uses three 8 bit channels. However,

No, it uses three 32-bit channels. It's not what you want. Just use RGB-8, which is three 8-bit channels. 

[Worker]

I did some experimenting and I'm not sure if this is the correct way to test it:

• open Publisher with my test file "GG_2022-06_Rohbau_75_bevor.afpackage"
• go to "Document settings" → "Color format"
• set "RGB/8"
• select the picture I like to correct
• switch to Photo Persona
• do some adjustments to "shadow/light";
  the "shadow" adjustment behaves different to what is does if I leave the document setting as "RGD/32 HDR"; depending from the degree I lift the shadows it somehow seems to damage the image
• switch back to Publisher Persona
• use "Export" to PDF
• the result is still a more or less solarized image.

I understand that I do not need to use "RGD/32 HDR" and that RGB/8 ist the right document setting for my environment. However, can using "RGD/32 HDR" really be the reason for this solarization effect?

Thank you for your attention,
Worker

[Old Bruce]

12 minutes ago, Worker said:

do some adjustments to "shadow/light";

I can get some bad results if I set the highlights to -200 and the shadows to +200, so what are your adjustments and what is the blend mode you use? Is it Normal because some other blend mode will be able to give weird results with very little adjustments made.

Finally, you don't need to enter or use the Photo persona to use an adjustment layer, you can add one from the default/main Publisher persona.

[Worker]

Thank you very much, Old Bruce, this was the crucial hint. I missed this way to do adjustments to pictures within Publisher. I tried it and it does everything I wanted. Obviously I should read the documentation more carefully.

I still feel pictures shouldn't be messed up if the user switches to the Photo Persona from Publisher and back, but since I don't need it anymore I am very happy with things as they are.

Thanks again to you Old Bruce and to walt.farrell for helping,
Regards, Worker

 

[walt.farrell]

1 hour ago, Worker said:

I still feel pictures shouldn't be messed up if the user switches to the Photo Persona from Publisher and back,

They're not messed up by doing that, in general, or others would have mentioned it. It's it more likely something you have done, though we haven't identified what.

[Worker]

Yes, I've thought about that, too. However, I am happy now.

Thanks again,
Worker