Creating an uneditable PDF

Can it be done?

[SoPretty]

Hi Everyone.

I have created an illustration in Illustrator 8 that I want visitors to my site to be able to print out. My preference is that they only be able to print it out and not edit it in any way.

I saved it as a PDF and uploaded it to the web. In Adobe Reader it was great, uneditable of course and it printed out very nicely. I opened the downloaded PDF in Illustrator and was able to make changes to it, something I don't want others to be able to do so easily. After much searching, I can't seem to locate any info on how to lock the objects permanently.

As a gif, it is too large of a file (57kb). I tried importing the gif into Illustrator and saving that as a PDF but the print quality was awful.

Any ideas on how to make an uneditable PDF? Or another method to make a uneditable printable document for download.

Thanks in advance! :o)

[limbo]

You can probably edit the gif to further reduce the file size. Do you have access to Photoshop, fireworks etc? They have optimising tools that allow you to compress images. If your logo is not too complicated you will be able to crunch it down way beyond 57kb. You could also create 2 versions, a thumbanail and link to larger print version. People don't mind downloading larger images so long as you tell them what's happening. Also using PDF's to display images is a bit clumsy for what you describe, in my opinion.

[psychobilly]

Acrobat 6.0 Professional
Documents > Security > Restrict Opening and Editing

Also can be done when saving a PDF from Illustrator CS...

Set as needed...

[choster]

As with just about any content delivered over the web, no method will be entirely foolproof-- try a web search on "pdf password recovery." Anyone will also be able to take screenshots. While securing a PDF is an order of magnitude more effective than, say, using Javascript to block right-clicking, determined thieves will still be able to take anything they can see.

[lexipixel]

A watermark may be better security for the image.

Not only does a watermark serve to identify the work, but editting a watermarked image is much more difficult than say, removing a "(c)2005 ABC" type copyright notice that occupies a very small portion of the image area.

You can use the "watermark" tool of many paint programs, or just create a watermark of your own design (preferably something with a lot of small details like the engravings on a dollar bill), then use it as a semi-transparent (10% or so) and layer over or under your image. Iif its a commercial (pay for use) image you can make the watermark heavier on "samples" of the image and omit it or make it very faint for paid / licensed users of the image.

As others have pointed out --- there is NOTHING you can do to stop someone from copying / editting any image they can view on their screen --- even a locked PDF can be displayed in Acrobat and screen captured using a screen capture utility.

[SoPretty]

Thanks for all the advice but I DO want people to be able to print out the illustration. I want the print to be high quality so a watermark or a gif reduced in file size doesn't really work for my purposes. I just don't want them to be able to edit/modify the illustration easily.

I asked a friend who is an illustrator and she said that when you save the file as a PDF to make sure the preserve editing capabilities option in the dialogue box is not checked and that will prevent people from editing it. Unfortunately, that option doesn't seem to be available in Illustrator 8, it must be something in later versions.

psychobilly: I don't have Acrobat 6.0 Professional but I will look into it. Thanks for the tip.

If anyone has more ideas of options I may have with Illustrator 8, let me know. Many thanks! :o)

[smokeyb]

Why is 57kB too large? it's only a 15sec download on a dial-up. A solution would be to save it as a good quality jpeg, but the filesize would go up even more, but that may not be a bad price for saving your work from being tampered with.

[SoPretty]

Hmmm... that's a good point, smokeyb, maybe it's not too big.

The PDF is over 300kB and seems to open reasonably fast. I thought maybe that had something to do with how
Acrobat works and that the gif might take 'forever' but now that you have me thinking maybe 57kb isn't so bad, especially since I would have the larger file linked to a cropped version so only the people who want to print it would have to wait.

I think I will do a test page with links to the PDF & the gif and get a few friends to test the download times. Thanks so much! :o)