AUTHOR ASSISTANCE - Creating high-quality PostScript files

When processed by Acrobat Distiller, high-quality PostScript files produce high-quality PDF files. A high-quality PostScript file is one that reliably produces pages with the desired effects as efficiently as possible. In general, the more efficient a PostScript file is, the smaller it is. Suggestions for producing high-quality PostScript files follow.

Use standard fonts. The Base 14 fonts are always available with Adobe Type Manager, and hence with Adobe Acrobat. All other fonts must be embedded in the final PDF, which results in a large filesize, and less room for images. Many printers have the base 14 fonts already installed, which makes for faster printing, as well.
Use the latest version of the PostScript printer driver.
Select PostScript Level 2 (if available) when setting up a printer driver to create PostScript files.
Do not select Smooth Graphics. When creating a PostScript file from a Macintosh application, make sure that the Smooth Graphics option in the Page Setup dialog box is not selected. The printer driver smooths graphics by adding many tiny images to the document. The result is a large PDF file that takes a long time to display and print.
Don't use fill patterns. Some applications use thousands of Type 3 characters to create fill patterns when they print to a PostScript printer. These Type 3 characters create very large PDF files with pages that take a long time to display and print.

Distiller Limitations

All of the PostScript we receive will be process into PDF with the Adobe Distiller. Knowing the limitations of the Distiller will be useful in creating good PostScript.

Acrobat Distiller substitutes shades of gray for the fill patterns available with some drawing, painting, and charting applications. In most situations, this substitution produces acceptable results. However, if two bars of a bar chart are filled with left and right diagonal stripes, Acrobat Distiller fills both bars with the same shade of gray.
Acrobat Distiller does not process custom halftone functions; instead Acrobat Distiller uses standard halftone functions. Usually, this procedure produces acceptable results. However, halftone images created with complicated halftone functions will not look the same with Acrobat as when printed from the application used to create them.

Creating PostScript in Windows

To create PostScript versions of your documents in a Microsoft Windows environment, install a PostScript printer driver, Use preferably the HP LaserJet 4/4M PostScript driver (alternatively Apple LaserWriter driver), from the Windows installation disks. Then, print the document from your word processing application to the PostScript printer driver. You should have an option to print to a file instead of a printer, take this option. General purpose postscript drivers can be obtained from Adobe:
Windows 95/98 - http://www.adobe.com/support/downloads/5b22.htm
Windows 3.1x - http://www.adobe.com/support/downloads/4cf2.htm

Using a Mac to Create PostScript

Generating PostScript on a Mac is very easy, since most Mac printers already use PostScript. You need to be sure you have selected a PostScript printer, which is done through the chooser. The Apple Laser Writer is a good choice, and should be available on your system, although any PostScript printer driver should work fine. Note that you do not have to actually have the printer, since you will only be sending your data to a file. Once you have choosen your printer, you can simply print the document, changing the 'Destination' from 'Printer' to 'PostScript file' in the Print dialog box. If you have greyscale in your document, you will want to select the "Greyscale" option, which is available by clicking on the "Options" button of the Print dialog box.

Click on 'Save' from the Print dialog box will create a file named 'PostScript', which will contain a PostScript version of your document. This file should be transfered as ASCII text, not as binary data.

Creating PostScript with LaTeX

If you are using LaTeX, you should have no trouble producing PostScript from the DVI file which is created from TeX, with dvips. Most LaTeX authors do this already. However, dvips can use many different fonts, and their differences are not obvious from inspection of the printed results. There are, then, a few issues that LaTeX authors should understand when publishing in an electronic medium:

Use Scalable fonts.
Use the Base 14 fonts.
Submit all of your source files, including images, style files, bibliography files, etc. This gives us a lot more flexibility in the conversion process. If you submit complete LaTeX sources, you can ignore the font issues.
Use relative pathnames when making reference to external files. This makes your source files portable. For example, say:

../images/fig1.eps

/home/MyLoginName/ICIP95/images/fig1.eps

~MyLoginName/ICIP95/images/fig1.eps

Use up-to-date versions of style files like psfig.sty and times.sty

Bitmapped v. Scalable Fonts

A bitmapped font is designed to be rendered at a single resolution, typically eith 300, 400, or 600 DPI, depending on the printer you have installed. A scalable font, in contrast, can be displayed at almost any resolution. On a printer, the two are virtually indistinguishable. But on a computer screen, where the display resolution is changing as the user zooms in and out, the bitmapped fonts are significantly slower to render, and have do not look as good.

Q: How do I use scalable fonts in my paper?

Recent versions of dvips will use scalable (PostScript) fonts if they are properly installed on your system. Many sites have PostScript versions of the Base 14 fonts already installed. At these sites, you can set the primary font to Times by using the Times style file, like:

\documentstyle[times]{article}

Using this method will result in most text being rendered in a PostScript version of Times, leaving the equations in a bitmapped format. This hybrid format is quite nice.

Updated by webmaster
Petr Schauer
on Jan 11, 2000