Publisher 2.5.3 MacOS fonts lighter weight than in Word

[HannaGoodbar]

I'm a new user to Publisher and hoping this is an "obvious" issue on my part. I'm using the Adobe font Richler Pro PE from Creative Cloud as a body font. It is listed "in Adobe & other local apps." In Word, the regular weight at 10 pt is very black. The same Richler Pro PE, regular, 10 pt font in Publisher is extremely light in comparison. I thought is was an on-screen performance optimization, but the text output from Publisher is extremely light even printing to PDF or to paper (Brother L3290CDW) with black-and-white output selected. Here is a screenshot of Word and Publisher pages scaled to the same size (please ignore the line spacing, etc.). I've also tried the built-in MacOS font Hiragino Mincho ProN, and the Cormorant font from the "free commercial use fonts" forum page. All exhibit the same issue. I hope I am overlooking something simple. macOS Sonoma 14.5, Publisher 2.5.3, Word for Mac 16.88. Advice appreciated!!! --Hanna

[firstdefence]

Is the font colour set to black and check the colours opacity setting as well because from the look of it it's set to about 50% opacity? 

Is the text layer opacity set to 100%

Does it have a style attached to it?

 

[Hangman]

Hi @HannaGoodbar and welcome to the forums,

I ran a quick test with both the Hiragino Mincho ProN and the Cormorant fonts and I'm seeing no difference between the Word and Publisher versions either onscreen or when exported to PDF...

It would be helpful to see screenshots of the Word Font Panel and the Publisher Character Panel for a side-by-side comparison...

[GarryP]

In addition to checking the Colour and Colour Opacity of the text, and the Layer Opacity, as mentioned above, also make sure that no Stroke has been applied.

[thomaso]

1 hour ago, Hangman said:

and the Publisher Character Panel for a side-by-side comparison...

… and, @HannaGoodbar, with some text selected with the Text Tool to report the actual font and colour in the interface (Character Panel and Context Toolbar).

(Just showing the Character Panel without selected text may show either any previously used style, or, if just the text frame is selected with Move Tool, the style of the text cursor at the beginning of the text frame (left of the first visible character.)

2 minutes ago, GarryP said:

In addition to checking the Colour and Colour Opacity of the text, and the Layer Opacity,

… accordingly it is useful to include the Layers Panel in the screenshot to possibly point to another object affecting the text appearance.

[Hangman]

Hi @HannaGoodbar,

Or better still, could you upload both your Word and Publisher files then we can see exactly how both are set up and what may be causing the difference in visual appearance you're seeing between the two...

[HannaGoodbar]

Thank you everyone for your suggestions - problem solved! Here's what I found out.

• I am exclusively using styles, with very limited local styling.
• All the Layer opacities were at 100% and set to Normal, so no problem there.
• All style text opacities were 100%, no problem.
• The text color was set to RGB #231F20. When I changed it to #000000 (black) or unchecked the text color, that helped.
• Text outline was enabled (this is in the style settings, so assuming this is equivalent to Stroke) and set to 0.2 pt. When set to 0 pt or unchecked, that also helped.

Now the text on-screen is legible, and my test prints to paper look as I expected.

Thanks everyone again, I figured it was a "me" problem.

[lacerto]

Obsolete.