Publisher (also Designer and Photo) is changing the applied colors of eps files

[losgelaufen]

Hello everyone,

i noticed it at first in publisher that´s why i am writing it here. But actually it happens in all three macOS apps ( i am on Catalina).
Since the last update on the V1 suite and also on the new V2 suite i have the problem, that spot colors in some (not all) eps files are changed to 4c when opening them. And also 4c color eps files change their color. 100% black to 50% black for example.

All these eps files are linked in an publisher file. They also change when opening them directly in Publisher, Designer or Photo). The apple preview app shows the files correct. That´s why i tried for fun to export the eps from the apple preview app as an pdf and opened that pdf in the affinity apps. And there we go... all colors are correct.

I assume all eps files were made in Illustrator since they are from customers and were made before Designer even existed.

Has someone noticed the same issue?

[loukash]

42 minutes ago, losgelaufen said:

Has someone noticed the same issue?

Now that you've posted this, yes!
I've checked a couple of my own Pantone EPS from the late 1990s and early 2000s in Affinity v1.10.6.
All are being opened or placed and exported as CMYK, despite being clearly defined as Pantone in the EPS header.

Big bug!

42 minutes ago, losgelaufen said:

I assume all eps files were made in Illustrator

My old EPS are from Freehand. 
EPS export was the only way to get accurate data out of Freehand as of v9 because its PDF export was still very flaky.

42 minutes ago, losgelaufen said:

export the eps from the apple preview app as an pdf

Yep, this has been my "EPS conversion workflow" since many years. Simple and very reliable. Also the only way to safely crack open Illustrator EPS files created by versions newer than my AI CS5.

[Pauls]

I've added your reports to the issue

[loukash]

Ignoring Pantone spot colors in EPS affects even v1.8.4 which still lives on my Mountain Lion partition.

[Hangman]

20 hours ago, losgelaufen said:

Since the last update on the V1 suite and also on the new V2 suite i have the problem, that spot colors in some (not all) eps files are changed to 4c when opening them. And also 4c color eps files change their color. 100% black to 50% black for example.

Spot colours in EPS files have never been supported in the Affinity Suite. There have been many feature requests to add spot colour support for EPS files over the years but to date this hasn't been implemented and I don't know if it will be moving forward.

The colour shift you are seeing is unfortunately a regression, basically any 4c colour eps file where either the C, M, Y or K value is specified as 100% appears as 50% in V2 when the file is opened and it also affects a second colour in the CMYK group as well, i.e.,

• Y100 results in Y50 and C50
• C100 results in C50 and M50
• M100 results in M50 and Y50

This has been reported previously but I've been unable to locate the original bug report. Edit: I see @Pauls has already linked to the bug report above.

CMYK Representation for EPS files opened in Designer V1 Left | Designer V2 Right

[losgelaufen]

Is there any update on this? The solutions with the preview app works of course. But it would be much more convenient if the affinity suite could handle eps files correctly.