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imported rasterized text heavily aliased, even though doc has plenty of extra resolution
I am shocked, but after searching on these forums, as well as using the Google Machine and Lynda.com, but I can find no mention of raster images degrading when imported in Illustrator. The same files are crisp and clear in Photoshop. A colleague who sits behind me just shrugged and said images always look bad in Illustrator. This can not be possible, can it?
I did a test, and made a PDF, which looked fine, so I know that the full image is in there, somewhere. Since I am going to be doing some tracings of raster images, it would be nice to have them as high a quality as possible. Photographs look not so great, but I have some rasterized text I wanted trace in vector (in addition to some photos and silk screen/rubber stamp prints.
All apologies for what must be a stupid question, but I can find no mention of it, at all, anywhere after a day of poking around. I’m not sure if my search terms are poorly defined but the only info I can find is about AI files imported into other software looking degraded.
This is a huge hole in my knowledge- I am an expert in Shake, Combustion, PS, AFter Effects, as well as having worked in Nuke, Digital Fusion, Flame, etc etc. Help out an old dog learning a new trick?
Thanks.
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2 Replies
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Generally, imported raster images look sharp and crisp in AI. If they don’t, there is probably some technical details that messes this up.
When you look at the image in PS and bring up the ‘Image Size’ dialog, the width, height, and resolution under the ‘Document Size’ group is what you should look at and NOT the pixel size – when you consider placing the image in AI.
If in the ‘Image Size’ dialog in PS, the width and height of the pixel dimension will say 2000×2000 pixels BUT the document dimensions will say 0.25×0.25 inches, you will see a nice, crisp 2000×2000 image in PS. However, in AI it will be a tiny tiny 0.25×0.25 inch size.
The opposite is also true. If you have a smaller image whose pixel dimensions are 50×50 pixels, BUT the document dimensions are 40cm x 40cm, then you will see a crisp, but small image in PS. However, when you place it into AI, you will see a HUGE 40cm size image, which is badly degraded in quality, since the 50pixel size image was stretched out to 40cm!!!
Lesson: pay attention to the width, height and resolution setting of the document size (in PS) if you consider placing it into AI.
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PS: Generally, when you have a final image that is given to you, you can check whether the document and pixel sizes are correct or not.
Example. Let’s say in PS you see that the image’s pixel dimensions are 300×300 pixels. Then under the ‘Document Size’ group, the width and height should be 4.167 inches IF the resolution is set to 72dpi.
You can uncheck the ‘Resample Image’ checkbox, and change the document’s dimensions OR the resolution. This will have an effect on how big the image will display in AI.
However, there are some instances when the image can be corrupt, or saved incorrectly (for whatever reason) and the pixel dimensions will incorrectly correspond to the document size/resolution. In that case it’s best to obtain the original image and re-save it with correct dimension information.
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