radial gradients do not export properly in PDF

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guus
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Joined: Wed Oct 19, 2011 9:30 pm

radial gradients do not export properly in PDF

Postby guus » Wed Oct 19, 2011 9:44 pm

Hi all,

I'm using Inkscape 0.48.2 on Mac OS X Lion.
I simply created a rectangle and set the fill to a radial gradient, and then exported as pdf.
The gradient is read properly by adobe reader but not by Apple's Preview.
The weirdest thing is that I used radial gradients with another mac running Leopard and they were read properly by Preview...

Any idea why? Is that an Inkscape or a Preview problem? How can I generate pdf radial gradients readable in Preview?

Thanks for you help!

Guus
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~suv
Posts: 2272
Joined: Sun May 10, 2009 2:07 am

Re: radial gradients do not export properly in PDF

Postby ~suv » Thu Oct 20, 2011 3:40 am

guus wrote:I'm using Inkscape 0.48.2 on Mac OS X Lion.
I simply created a rectangle and set the fill to a radial gradient, and then exported as pdf.
The gradient is read properly by adobe reader but not by Apple's Preview.
The weirdest thing is that I used radial gradients with another mac running Leopard and they were read properly by Preview...

This could also indicate that something in Lion's Preview has changed (internally) and it no longer handles cairo-generated PDF files well [1].

I haven't seen such issues in Preview with radial gradients in PDFs generated by Inkscape on Mac OS X 10.5.8 Leopard (the rare exceptions might have been with some round-trip edited PDF or EPS files - i.e. PDF files opened in Inkscape and saved again as PDF repeatedly, instead of opening them once, saving as Inkscape SVG during later edits, and only in the end saving a copy as PDF).

Could you attach a sample SVG file which - saved as PDF - fails to properly display the radial gradients in Lion's Preview? I could at least test it on Leopard, and check for any known issues with gradients in cairo-based exports.


[1] Inkscape uses the 'cairo' library to generate PDF/PS/EPS files.
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guus
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Joined: Wed Oct 19, 2011 9:30 pm

Re: radial gradients do not export properly in PDF

Postby guus » Thu Oct 20, 2011 4:08 am

Thanks ~suv, here are the svg and the corresponding pdf file.

Guus
Attachments
drawing.pdf
(2.91 KiB) Downloaded 245 times
drawing.svg
(8.38 KiB) Downloaded 216 times
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~suv
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Re: radial gradients do not export properly in PDF

Postby ~suv » Thu Oct 20, 2011 5:41 am

guus wrote:I simply created a rectangle and set the fill to a radial gradient, and then exported as pdf.
Apparently I missed this line when writing my earlier reply. Sorry. I assume that the radial gradient goes from fully opaque in the center to fully transparent at the outer gradient stop.

Maybe you could attached such a PDF file generated with Inkscape on Lion? Or did you already try yourself whether the same PDF file views as expected if transferred to a Leopard Mac and viewed with Leopard's Preview.app? (I doubt though that the same Inkscape binary would create different PDF output on OS X Lion and older versions of Mac OS X).

Attached PDF was created with Inkscape 0.48.2 on Mac OS X 10.5.8 Leopard and views ok in Preview on Leopard. Could you test it in Preview on Lion?
Attachments
radial-gradient-preview-pdf-screenshot.png
radial-gradient-preview-pdf-screenshot.png (79.43 KiB) Viewed 3348 times
radial-gradient-preview.pdf
(2.78 KiB) Downloaded 180 times
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guus
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Joined: Wed Oct 19, 2011 9:30 pm

Re: radial gradients do not export properly in PDF

Postby guus » Thu Oct 20, 2011 8:04 am

Hi ~suv,

I've replied to your first answer and sent the svg and corresponding pdf a few hours ago but it is still not displayed :(
I've downloaded your gradient pdf and it does not work either on my Mac with Lion and Preview 5.5 (see attached file).
However, I ran a test with your pdf and mine. None of them do display correctly with Preview 5.5 on Lion, but display perfectly well on Tiger with Preview 3.0.9 (I can't access the Mac Pro w/ Leopard I used to work on...). So it looks like the bug either comes from Lion or Preview 5.5!

Guus
Attachments
nastygradient.tiff
nastygradient.tiff (60.38 KiB) Viewed 3332 times
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brynn
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Re: radial gradients do not export properly in PDF

Postby brynn » Thu Oct 20, 2011 1:07 pm

Off topic:
Sorry for the delay in approving your last messages. We're not such a huge forum that a moderator is present round the clock. Anyway, just wanted to let you know that your messages will be posted immediately from now on (we just moderate the first 2 - the 3rd was held because the 2nd was still awaiting approval). :D
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~suv
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Re: radial gradients do not export properly in PDF

Postby ~suv » Thu Dec 29, 2011 4:52 am

guus wrote:So it looks like the bug either comes from Lion or Preview 5.5!

Finally having had the chance to test and confirm this in Preview (Version 5.5.1 (719.11)) on a current OS X 10.7.2 Lion system myself: Preview fails to render the radial gradients correctly (created by Inkscape with cairo 1.10.2 or 1.11.2).

Did you find any related information about Preview on Lion (or Apple's Quartz PDFContext Framework)?
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~suv
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Re: radial gradients do not export properly in PDF

Postby ~suv » Sat Dec 31, 2011 3:04 am

Handling of radial gradients seems to be an issue elsewhere on Lion (in Apple software): see the attached screenshot of Safari 5.1.2 (7534.52.7) on OS X Lion, showing the (PDF-based) print preview for the same SVG file used to generate the PDF file as seen in the screenshot of Preview.app (attached to my earlier comment):
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radial-gradient-preview-SVG-Safari-print.png
radial-gradient-preview-SVG-Safari-print.png (96.52 KiB) Viewed 3093 times
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