-
Posts
-
Trying to use illustrator or learn to use it. When saving the EPS file is EPS 17.0 ok? or should I go for one of the legacy options like EPS 10?
Saving an Illustrator file down to version 10 is common practice in the microstock industry.
However, with our Symbiostock sites, we don’t have to follow those common practices. If you have an Illustrator file that doesn’t work if saved down to version 10, still put it up for sale on your site. Just make sure to mention clearly in the description what version of Illustrator the customer needs in order to edit the file.
Nate
Some sites offer a zip file with “extras” – iStock, for example, does this. So the EPS (it used to be v8 but I think everywhere now is ok with version 10) is the basic file and the zip file could contain the .ai file so if anyone had illustrator they wouldn’t have to put up with the many losses that saving to an earlier version of EPS would entail.
One thing that I think is very important is ensuring you don’t embed bit maps in your file (the clue will be massive file sizes) or use fonts that aren’t converted to outlines (and which the purchaser may not have).
Some of the sites’ rules are a pain, but a lot of the rules are there to save buyers pain. Might be worth looking at Shutterstock and iStock’s rules for vectors and in general follow those as your baseline – that’s what most buyers will be expecting.
I agree 100% with jsnover. Those are great points, especially her comment about delivering “what most buyers will be expecting”.
Nate
Yes, there’s no way to know what version of Illustrator (or another vector program) buyers will be using, so it’s safer to save it down to version 10. I include which version I use in my description (because I was saving to version 8 until recently).
Thanks for the info, could someone answer this if I have the settings set up correctly
If you have any fonts in your work, you should convert to outlines.
Here are Shutterstock’s guidelines
http://www.shutterstock.com/buzz/vectors/saving-your-vector-illustrations-using-adobe-illustrator
And their blog post about having only a single color profile
http://www.shutterstock.com/buzz/rejection-reasons/color-profiles-in-vectors
iStock’s rules
including notes about stray shapes outside the artboard
And their rules on custom fills
@Snap Vectors wrote:
I agree 100% with jsnover. Those are great points, especially her comment about delivering “what most buyers will be expecting”.
Nate
And I’m on the long learning curve on this topic too. Good reading all.
Not sure about this part. (I have no fonts so that was easy) And the re-size to page? I’ll have to watch that and see what I have to do. Just starting and haven’t finished more than two test files.
“Disable the preview generated by Illustrator: Including a rasterized preview will only needlessly increase the file size. When you save your file, choose “None” for the preview section under the EPS options dialog box.”
Is that the place where the example from markscatesphotography had Preview and the TIF format? I’ve already been setting that as none. Correct?
Glad that someone started me by saying EPS10 is the standard, because there are so many variables.
Thankyou the information is much clearer now. I did use corel draw before. Is the language level 2 ok on the postscript?
I think you should use PostScript v 3 as you’ll lose too much with version 2
http://www.istockphoto.com/article_view.php?ID=156
Some history
There is not point in repeating any of the great info already provided but here is a tip that will help you to spot if your exported EPS file has bitmaps in it.
Export it with your settings then open up that exported EPS 10 file and from the Menu click on Windows > Info > Document Info (Tab on the panel that pops up) > Click on the corner icon that looks like “V=” (down arrow with three lines) and select “Embedded Images”.
If there are no images imbedded then it will say “None”. Otherwise it will tell you which ones there are and you can track down which parts of your Vector is causing the “Bitmapping”.
Some bits of advice from my limited experience.
[list=*]
[*]Keep text to a minimum and only where needed. Make sure to put text on a separate layer so it can be easily switched off or edited by you and the buyer. Make sure you do not use copyrighted fonts and make sure to explode them for your export but keep your original unexploded so you can still edit it.[/*]
[/list]
[list=*]
[*]Work in separate layers! You AND your buyer will thank me later! Just trust me, keep your items in separate layers and groups. Makes editing SO much easier and you can also lock parts of the vector if you keep them separate.[/*]
[/list]
[list=*]
[*]If you play and create artistic vectors that is great. For stock you need to avoid using all special effects if you want to export successfully. Avoid blurs and drop shadows and most of the built in effects that work like they do in Photoshop. Learn from tutorials online how to manually and safely create special effects that export to EPS 10[/*]
[/list]
[list=*]
[*]For some reason the actual file size can get complete out of control but one way to reduce the size is to select everything on your canvas (make sure to unlock EVERYTHING) and reduce it down to a very small artboard for your export. For some crazy reason this works. So much for Vector heh? Strange bug but this works.[/*]
[/list]Jo
The forum ‘Archives’ is closed to new topics and replies.