Soon after InDesign CS3 was announced, I posted about the wonderful new ability to place an InDesign file inside another InDesign file. I must now report that there is a potentially show-stopping bug which may make you want to put that new feature on hold for a little while.
It was reported on the InDesign User to User Forums that when you place an InDesign file that contains a large image (we’ll call this the “child” InDesign file) into another InDesign file (we’ll call this the “parent” file), that stitching appears in the image from the child file when viewed in High Quality Display. An example is shown below. Apparently, the larger the image, the more intense the effect of the stitching.
After further testing, it appears that, in many cases, the stitching does not actually print. However, as one User Forum poster stated, “the stitching is so dramatically visible that it completely undermines the confidence in the process.” I exported a PDF from the parent file with the Press Quality PDF preset, and the stitching is not visible in the resulting PDF file (shown below):
Further investigation in Acrobat 8 Professional shows that the stitching is there, as evidenced by the using Acrobat’s Touchup Object tool. Shown below, I’ve selected some of the stitched tiles to show their presence. They are also reportedly visible in Pitstop Professional’s outline mode. (Pitstop Professional is a high-level PDF editor used by many print service providers and others.)
Inside Adobe sources reveal that they are aware of the issue. Presumably this will be fixed in a future unannounced update to InDesign CS3. In the meantime, you may want to use this feature with great care, or wait until the bug fix arrives.
This article was last modified on December 18, 2021
This article was first published on July 16, 2007
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