Paragraph Rules Disappear when Converting Text to Outlines?

Tracy R

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Dec 7, 2002, 12:42:00 AM12/7/02

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I am new to InDesign, and on one of my first projects applied paragraph rules to text used as a heading. When I converted the text to outlines - the rules disappeared. Is this a glitch with InDesign, or am I doing something wrong?

Tracy R

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Dec 7, 2002, 12:41:38 AM12/7/02

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Bob Levine

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Dec 7, 2002, 8:39:19 AM12/7/02

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Perfectly normal. The rule is a paragraph attribute. Once you convert
the type to outlines you don't have a paragraph anymore.

Bob

Tracy R

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Dec 7, 2002, 12:19:51 PM12/7/02

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Thanks for the quick response. So is this a feature that shouldn't be used if the project you are creating in InDesign needs to be converted to outlines or exported as an .eps file? Would it be best to draw in rules with the line tool to avoid the disappearing paragraph rule? Are there any other paragraph attributes that disappear when converting to outlines that you are aware of?

Bob Levine

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Dec 7, 2002, 2:51:03 PM12/7/02

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>So is this a feature that shouldn't be used if the project you are creating in InDesign needs to be converted to outlines

No, it should not be used.

>Would it be best to draw in rules with the line tool to avoid the
disappearing paragraph rule?

Yes.

>Are there any other paragraph attributes that disappear when converting to outlines that you are aware of?

None that I'm aware of.

Bob

Dave Saunders

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Dec 7, 2002, 5:14:05 PM12/7/02

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Well, you could always copy and paste the outlined text back into paragraphs as inline grapics, giving those paragraphs the rules that you want.

A bit fiddly, but probably not as bad as it sounds.

I'm surprised that the rules get lost. On the other hand, I can't conceive of a job where I'd indulge in wholesale converting of text to outlines, either.

Dave

Tracy R

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Dec 7, 2002, 10:56:07 PM12/7/02

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In answer to Dave - here's the reason I'm having to convert text to outlines. I work for a very small printshop and I do all the in house graphics. We occasionally deal with outside vendors, all with very specific requirements regarding what file formats they will accept. I'm having to convert text to outlines per vendor requests to ensure that the .eps files that I am sending get printed as they should. Previously I have used CorelDraw (converting files to .eps) to design the majority of jobs that we send out to our vendors and have had no problems. Since we have InDesign, and I'm also a longtime Pagemaker User, I've been trying it out and really like the features, and the issue with the disappearing rule is the first problem I've encountered. I'm on a PC platform, and many of my vendors are mac only. I haven't run across any that will accept InDesign files. In most cases, they don't want to deal with fonts. I know some may suggest I should change vendors, but that isn't an option.
Maybe InDesign is something I shouldn't be using if what I'm currenlty using works fine?

Bob Levine

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Dec 8, 2002, 9:35:15 AM12/8/02

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Tracy,

Why not send PDFs?

Bob

Tracy R

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Dec 8, 2002, 1:11:07 PM12/8/02

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I have sent PDF's to my vendors that accept them, but very few of my vendors do accept them and my service provider doesn't either. I deal with many customers who aren't designers and are designing their jobs themselves. Often I get pdf files that aren't saved properly, and I'm sure that is why my vendors and service provider don't accept them. I've considered just sending him a test file and having him try it - though he seems reluctant. I myself know very little about imagesetters. Should anyone who can output film on an imagesetter be able to output a pdf file? Does it matter what platform you are on? If it's possible that he can't accept a pdf file, what if I place it in a page layout program like PageMaker? This is what he does with Illustrator and most CorelDraw files I send.

Bob Levine

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Dec 8, 2002, 3:22:11 PM12/8/02

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>Should anyone who can output film on an imagesetter be able to output a pdf file?

Yes.

>Does it matter what platform you are on?

No. That's the beauty of it.

I think it's time you had a talk with him. PDF is the future anymore.
It's the present. Any printer refusing to accept properly prepared PDFs
won't be in business very long.

Bob

M Blackburn

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Dec 9, 2002, 11:32:58 AM12/9/02

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I have one job that I do on a regular basis that I have to convert to curves — even though I do send it as a PDF. The printer does only this job for us and he supplies the film for free so it's in our best interest to accept his limitations. I guess I'm lucky that there are no paragraph rules, eh.

F.Y.I. The problem with the PDFs that weren't first converted to curves was that certain specific characters get subtituted : apostrophes to í and en-dashes to ñ

Guy Smiley

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Dec 9, 2002, 11:37:41 AM12/9/02

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"certain specific characters get subtituted : apostrophes to í and en-dashes to ñ "

Just out of curiosity, I wonder if embedding fonts without subsetting would fix this? Embedding the entire font seems to help sometimes with ligature problems.
-Mike Nitabach

M Blackburn

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Dec 9, 2002, 12:56:34 PM12/9/02

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I used to embed fonts complete as standard practice and the problem came up back then (this printer is way out of date and uses a questionable workflow). Now I don't always have that luxury because sometime these files use Chinese characters and the Chinese font I use is almost 9 Megs. Without subsetting I can't print to our laser printer or sucessfully generate a PDF. choke choke hack :(