[OS X TeX] Preparation of illustrations for press

[Alan Litchfield]

Hi Bruno,

Bruno Voisin wrote:
>
> What I often use Illustrator for is idiosyncratic in this respect:
> namely, take advantage of its ability to separate a graphics into its
> different elements, so as to be able to transform some of these
> individually afterwards. For example, make some lines thicker,
> transform others into dashes, fill some closed elements with
> background, change fonts.

Not so idiosyncratic. I do the same thing with files I get from clients.

>
> Appended is an example (obviously not exhibiting the size problem): a
> Mathematica-produced graphic, and the same after processing in
> Illustrator to rotate, add symmetric elements, etc. All the same could
> probably have been achieved using Mathematica commands, but I'm not a
> very competent Mathematica programmer and I found it easier to use
> Illustrator for this. That said, the interactive graphic editing
> facilities of Mathematica 6 possibly makes this straightforward: I
> haven't experimented with these yet.
>

I have had a look at them and it appears you have an overabundance of anchor
points, which can add a lot of overhead when processing. This is not uncommon,
especially from programs that produce poor postscript. In general those
graphics are very simple in form.

I would suggest you have a play with the Simplify (Object > Path > Simplify)
function to remove excess points and make better bezier curves. Otherwise you
can remove individual anchor points, but given the large number that could be
quite tedious.

>
> Not in those cases. I don't remember precisely, but I think it was
> when applying some transformations, effects or filters. Apparently a
> process is launched then, which may take something like 95% of the CPU
> and 1 or 2 GB of virtual RAM.

It does run in the background. It is especially annoying if there is a
firewall that prevents access to the Adobe site (as I have).

Cheers
Alan

-- 
Alan Litchfield MBus (Hons), MNZCS
AlphaByte
PO Box 1941, Auckland
http://www.alphabyte.co.nz