Loading fonts question

kelt1013 November 2009 · 07:21

I am mac based at work and I had an issue with a font.
I opened a pdf in acrobat and the font on my screen was different and printed out different than a co workers computer did.
I went to my font library in my macintosh hd and loaded the font that they said they had. Then the font showed up after i restarted acrobat and opened the file. I run suitcase as well. What is the deal? Do i have to have all the fonts i use in suitcase in this font library in my hd. I mean i go through a lot of different fonts during the year with different jobs.
Can anyone give me advice on this?

aluminum3 November 2009 · 07:32

Does the font show up fine in Preview or any other non-crappy PDF viewer? If so, then the issue is acrobat.

kelt1013 November 2009 · 07:44

no actually the font doesn't show up in preview or acrobat until i loaded it in the font library on the hd. Comments?

Ben McElroy3 November 2009 · 10:14

It suggests that the font in question wasn't embedded in the PDF. Whoever made the PDF should make sure that the necessary fonts are embedded (also make sure that the font can be embedded - some do not allow PDF embedding which could also be a reason for this happening).

kelt1013 November 2009 · 10:19

hmm. Well it may be a pc mac font issue too. What do you think. But once the font was placed in my library of fonts on my hd it worked. I wish pcs and macs could play nice.

Ben McElroy3 November 2009 · 10:25

I still think it's an embedding issue. If the font is embedded in the PDF correctly, it should look the same (barring screen rendering issues like ClearType or other technologies) *regardless* of where the PDF is viewed.

kelt1013 November 2009 · 10:37

I think the client made the document in word then made it a pdf but he is no computer wiz so i am sure you are right.

CreativeNRG3 November 2009 · 14:14

Open up the PDF and view the 'Document Properties-Fonts'. If the font was embedded you'll see something to the effect of 'Font Name -- Embedded Subset'.

A correctly made PDF will open and print fine on a PC or a Mac (I've been doing this since 1993) and will contain all it needs (fonts, and images) to be viewed and printed as intended.

Insert someone who doesn't know what they are doing and it's a crap shoot. (72dpi RGB images, fonts not embedded, etc.)

In Essence PDF (Portable Document Format) was created by Adobe to be platform and device independent.

http://www.adobe.com/pdf/about/history/
"Regardless of the computer's operating system, PDF was reliable and consistent, displaying and printing the same every time."

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