Problem With PDF On Printout

Some PDFs, usually ones created using older software versions (PageMaker before it became InDesign, or Quark 5 and older) or non-standard graphics programs (like Publisher or Excel), don’t print out correctly after being imported into Number Machine Pro.

This sample PDF was created using a very old version of PageMaker. It looks fine here, but the PDF plugin used by Number Machine Pro will try to reinterpret the tabs into columns.

This older PDF prints out from Number Machine Pro badly – the text is forced to reflow into columns that aren’t in the original PDF and the start/stop and margins for the PDF are corrupted.
Transparent vector images are incompatible with the PDF plugin being used in Number Machine Pro version 2.1.0.14. They will be imported as solid.

Number Machine Pro’s PDF plugin doesn’t interpret the greyscale transparency correctly and prints it out as solid black and white.
There are two different ways to overcome these issues: 1) Quickly, or 2) Professionally.
1) The fastest way to fix the transparency is to open your current PDF in Photoshop, make sure the color settings are set the way you want them (Photoshop tends to default everything to RGB when you probably want grayscale), and resave as a PDF. This will effectively rasterize the whole document. The downside is it may increase the file size and decrease the quality.
(WARNING: Photoshop doesn’t interpret PDF margins very well and may alter your intended gutter spacing and finished size. You will likely need to resize the image to get the margins and project size correct before saving and importing into Number Machine Pro.)