Help exporting huge size artwork!!!

[lithium258]

Hello! I have the following problem: I have made an artwork with 215" width and 72" height dimensions, all looks nice in Xara. I worked it only with vectors --although a lot of transparencies, feathering, etc--, at 1/10th the print size. The printer guy is asking for full size, 300DPI...ie, 215x72 @ 300. But Xara can't handle that. I can export it ok to JPG, 1/10th @ 700, but nothing bigger as resolution. Opening an .eps export with Illustrator is worthless: some of the objects gets misplaced, and the nice gradient background is converted to lines, ie, "banding". So...how should I export this monster artwork!?

Thanks

Aram

[steve.ledger]

Have you tried exporting as PDF/X?

[lithium258]

Have you tried exporting as PDF/X?

Hi Sledger...what size should I use? If I resize the artwork to 215" Xara quits unspectedly or get an Acces violation error.

[steve.ledger]

Most printers require 200 - 300dpi so that they can resize via their RIP at print time and not loose too much detail or quality.
You should not need to supply the finished size.

[mwenz]

For that size poster, all vector, I would do 1/4 size. DPI means absolutely nothing with an all vector PDF. If your printer does not understand this, find another printer. The PDF can be scaled at print time from within either Acrobat to the RIP, or from within the RIP software.

Convert all text to curves. Save this copy under another name so your original can be edited should need be.

I just produced a sample PDF of your size poster at 25% scale, pretty much everything on it has some sort of transparency. I can upload to my server if you want to examine it.

I have never worked with a printer who did not expect a scaled PDF--once PDFs became a norm for hi-res posters. Before that, I would send pure PS files at scale. Largest banners I ever made were printed 50' wide and the scaled working files were about .75 gig.

Take care, Mike

[lithium258]

For that size poster, all vector, I would do 1/4 size. DPI means absolutely nothing with an all vector PDF. If your printer does not understand this, find another printer. The PDF can be scaled at print time from within either Acrobat to the RIP, or from within the RIP software.

Convert all text to curves. Save this copy under another name so your original can be edited should need be.

I just produced a sample PDF of your size poster at 25% scale, pretty much everything on it has some sort of transparency. I can upload to my server if you want to examine it.

I have never worked with a printer who did not expect a scaled PDF--once PDFs became a norm for hi-res posters. Before that, I would send pure PS files at scale. Largest banners I ever made were printed 50' wide and the scaled working files were about .75 gig.

Take care, Mike

Ok, I tried this and have the following findings:

At 25% Xara shows an error message, Internal Error. So I try 15% and the message is gone, however I get pixelated objects if they have certain things like drop shadows, feather edges, etc. Any ideas?