Importing a PDF with only Spot RGB Colors inside treats the document as CMYK
I am exporting PDFs from an RGB file using 'Export for screens’ with a PDF Preset that converts to sRGB.
Any artboard that contains a ‘process’ RGB color (white, in my case) comes out as an RGB PDF file.
Any artboard that only contains Spot RGB colored elements is seen as a CMYK file when opened in Illustrator or imported in InDesign (which is my goal).
My example file will export nicely until I hide the background layer to make my PDF transparent. Then the one with the (previously) white background becomes CMYK.
Reinko
shared this idea
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Figured out the details and confirm the bug.
Indeed, importing a PDF with only RGB spots and no process colors used on canvas makes Illustrator treat the document as a CMYK one.
Even though a PDF can have any combination of any swatches used, Ai has to guess a color mode when importing them, since it does not allow mixed color spaces, and have to choose one. In this case it guesses wrong. It also gives a 'missing CMYK profile' warning (if warnings are enabled in Color Settings).The title is corrected to reflect the problem.
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Reinko
commented
I've been sharing my files and screenshots of settings here: https://community.adobe.com/t5/illustrator-discussions/export-for-screens-creates-cmyk-pdf-instead-of-rgb-in-some-artboards/m-p/14796909#M416492
Can that do for now? I'm not sure I can spare any more time to alert Adobe to bugs. -
Reinko, I think would require the original file you have, along with the PDF Preset you use in Format settings in Export For Screens (or at least a screenshot of the Output section, to see what Color Conversion and Destination are picked).
Right now, when I place an attached PDF into an InDesign document, I don’t notice anything strange. The spot color swatches the link has are correctly displayed as RGB Spots...
I feel very confused with this report.
You say 'an RGB PDF file'.... but a PDF file can include both CMYK and RGB elements just fine... CorelDRAW can write these, for example, and files are valid. It’s Illustrator who requires to have either CMYK or RGB when importing a PDF. InDesign doesn’t say anywhere a linked PDF is 'RGB' or 'CMYK' as well.
Unless you use a preset that forces a conversion to the color space of the .ai document, ant this CAN convert RGB spots into CMYK, if you manually change the destination...So please help me to understand it better.
Provide the full steps, the original .ai file, show all the screenshots, screenshots, etc.
