Exporting a raster with Production PDF (Aviation)

Production PDF supports mapping a grayscale raster to an output Spot color. As a Spot color, the grayscale raster prints using a unique ink on a single lithographic printing plate. Since the color does not mix with others, it can emphasize special effects during printing. This technique works well when using a raster, such as a shaded relief, as a background for printing.

ArcMap has two main methods of displaying raster images on a map: as layers in data view and as pictures on the layout. Production PDF support for raster image color mapping is limited to support grayscale images only. As only one image type is supported, there can only be one color mapping row for raster images based on this image type, grayscale. Production PDF export does not interpret images as grayscale using the raster file's defined pixel depth (1-bit, 8-bit grayscale, 8-bit palette, 24-bit, or 32-bit).

You can downgrade 8-bit palette, 24-bit, and 32-bit images to be interpreted as grayscale. To do this, adjust the symbology of the layer to render the images using a single black color with a range of values between 0 and 256 in a color ramp. If raster images of any of these bit depths are added to the layout, there is no option to modify the symbology. The pictures are not seen as grayscale images and are not color mapped on export. If a map document has these types of images they are interpreted as unsupported rasters during the Evaluate Map process.

If the grayscale color mapping rule is added, all grayscale images in the map document will be remapped to have the defined Spot color in the exported PDF file. The output color space of the PDF must also be CMYK to support the Spot color replacement of a grayscale image. The output color for a grayscale image must be a Spot color. The Spot color definition for rasters is written differently than for vectors, and therefore Spot color names used for rasters cannot be used by vectors, or vice versa. The output of the image in the .pdf file will always be shades of gray.

Rasters can affect other layers during export in the following ways:

Steps:
  1. Start ArcMap.
  2. Load a grayscale raster in to the map display area.
  3. On the main menu, click File > Export Map.
  4. Click the Save as type drop-down arrow and choose Production PDF.
  5. Click the Format tab.
  6. Click the Destination drop-down arrow and choose CMYK.
  7. Click the Production tab.
  8. Click Map Colors.

    The Color Mapping Rules dialog box appears.

  9. Click Evaluate Map.

    The Current Map Analysis dialog box appears.

  10. Click the grayscale raster row on the Current Map Analysis dialog box.
  11. Click Add.
  12. TipTip:

    You can also right-click in the table on the Color Mapping Rules dialog box and choose Add Input Raster.

  13. Double-click the output cell next to grayscale raster in the table of colors on the Color Mapping Rules dialog box.

    The Output Color Selector dialog box appears.

  14. Type a Spot color name in the Raster text box.
  15. Click OK.

    The Color Mapping Rules dialog box appears. The Output Value cell lists the Spot color name.

  16. Click OK.

Related Topics

12/22/2014