RE: [PCTECH] Adobe Illustrator

[John Harvey <jharvey@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi Bob,

I've passed your question on to our graphic designer to see if he has a
solution, but I suspect that you might be up a creek sans paddle (at least
in terms of finding a simple answer). 

Page layout programs (like PageMaker or Quark) produce everything using dots
per inch (dpi) to determine quality. 266 -300 dpi is roughly print quality.
72 dpi is web quality (and that's also why graphic designers can't take
images from the web and use them for print purposes). 

On the flip side, Adobe Illustrator AI files are composed of paths and
shades. This allows graphic designers to create a graphic that can be pasted
on the side of a blimp or on the back of a matchbox without losing any
quality.

The upshot is that the two programs see and produce graphics in completely
different ways. Your vendor probably needs an AI file because they want to
be able to scale it up or down without losing quality. Even worse, AI is a
proprietary file type used only by Illustrator. 

The only thing I can suggest is that when you export from Quark to EPS, make
sure that the dpi setting is 300 or over. That should improve the quality,
but won't make it fully scaleable.

I'll let you know if our graphic designer has anything else to contribute.

All the best,
John
----
Quadrant Software
http://www.quadrantsoftware.com/
800-258-3399

-----Original Message-----
From: pctech-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:pctech-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx] On
Behalf Of Bob Cagle
Sent: Thursday, December 16, 2004 12:03 PM
To: PC Technical Discussion for iSeries Users
Subject: [PCTECH] Adobe Illustrator

This may be a little off-topic, but our graphic designer has left the
company and management just assumes I know how to do his job, cuz it's still
computers...

I have a layout in Quark Express that I need to send to a vendor.  They
require it in Adobe Illustrator format.  We do not own Illustrator, so I
exported the file from Quark Express to an .EPS format.  The vendor is able
to read the file, but the quality is extremely poor, and they are asking
specifically for the .AI format.

Can anyone tell me how to convert from a Quark Express file to an Adobe
Illustrator file, when you don't have Illustrator???  Are there any free, or
relatively cheap, utilities available on the web?  I have done some google
searches and keep coming up empty.

Bob