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Scribus => Beginner Talk => Topic started by: acrisoft on March 24, 2013, 08:19:20 PM

Title: Help with red frames
Post by: acrisoft on March 24, 2013, 08:19:20 PM
Hi

I am new to Scribus and I am not sure what all that frames mean, so I will try to explain it my way.

I've created I new document (  27 x 21cm) which shows a white board and then I imported an .eps sample file.

After importation I can see a  transparent frame with red borders which is bigger than my white  board
  and this transparent frame has a small  picture in its center which is the imported .eps sample file.

I tried to drag the frame by its edges to reduce it, but the picture become still smaller.

How can I reduce the red frame to fit the white board and drag the picture to make it bigger ?

Regards

Moses
Title: Re: Help with red frames
Post by: utnik on March 25, 2013, 09:29:06 AM
hi moses

your picture is surrounded by white space (or distant other objects).
it may help to ungroup the opjects of the .eps, then select the parts in the middle, regroup them and delete the rest. (the success depends on the content of the .eps file...)

btw. i almost never work with .eps files and would recommend to avoid this outdated format whenever there are alternatives – it's a permanent source of troubles...

utnik
Title: Re: Help with red frames
Post by: GarryP on March 25, 2013, 02:36:21 PM
Moses,

If you don't have the tools or technical ability (and many of us don't) to edit the EPS file - as advised by utnik above - you can use the "Properties" palette (PF2) and in the "Image" tab you can set "Free Scaling" then alter the scale and offsets to change how the image is displayed.

You can double-click the image frame then drag the mouse to move the image around inside the frame. Also, while you're in "free scaling" mode you can drag the handles of the image frame to resize that too.

This isn't a perfect answer since there's still an issue with the original image - again, as mentioned above - but it'll let you get on with learning Scribus and show you more of its features at the same time - the free scaling options can be used with bitmaps too so you'll probably need to learn this at some point soon anyway.

I hope this helps.

Garry.

P.S. utnik - I normally use EPS in image frames because they seem to work for me, while importing SVGs normally displays a dialog that some unsupported features will not work, so I cannot be sure if the import was totally successful. Can you suggest a better alternative to EPS that can be used in image frames so I can still use the features such as text flow etc?
Title: Re: Help with red frames
Post by: utnik on March 25, 2013, 03:14:12 PM
hi garry

Quote from: GarryP on March 25, 2013, 02:36:21 PMI normally use EPS in image frames because they seem to work for me, while importing SVGs normally displays a dialog that some unsupported features will not work, so I cannot be sure if the import was totally successful. Can you suggest a better alternative to EPS that can be used in image frames so I can still use the features such as text flow etc?

i don't know, what this 'unsupported features' report is about – usually everything looks correct...

an easy textflow management may be a reason to import vectors in image frames. the disadventages are the same with imported .pdf and .eps files: either the frame will be rendered as an image or (with 'embed pdf and eps files' checked) they aren't converted to the final color profile. usually this is not a big problem, but if you use your artwork in different print environments, you have to exchange your grapic sources (if the work is color sensible...)

the requested alternative to .eps would be .pdf. what makes it better is that .pdf isn't outdated and will still be supported in the near future of prepress work.
for this reason i don't recommend the use of .eps, but you may stay with it – i suppose, you know what you're doing... (even in my workflow there are some rare occurrences of .eps, but never for textflow reasons – this only happens with files i receive from some strange source...)

utnik
Title: Re: Help with red frames
Post by: GarryP on March 25, 2013, 04:01:02 PM
Hi utnik, thanks for replying.

I see what you mean about colour profiles but most of the stuff I do is very simple compared to what some people do and is either for on-screen use or "home" printing where exact colour matching isn't a problem. But it's right that you bring it up so people know the limitations.

The "unsupported features" in an SVG is a bit of a worry, especially for casual users like me. I've attached example screen shots of what I mean. The original file was downloaded (at random) from OpenClipArtLibrary - http://openclipart.org/people/worms_x/worms_x_flower_pink_1.svg.

On importing to Scribus I get the message about unsupported features. It then imported but, as you can see from the other two screenshots (one inside Scribus, ignore the baseline grid behind the image, the other from inside FireFox), they don't look the same - the shadow isn't displayed as I'd expect in Scribus.

I've seen the message on many other SVGs from this site (and others, it's not just this one) but some other images don't show the message. It looks random to me as I don't know what Scribus supports or whether the files with the "problem" have stuff in them they shouldn't have. It's just mysterious to a user like me.

If you think this is worth flagging as a bug/feature request then I'd be happy to do so.

Anyway, I'll have a look at using PDF instead of EPS in the future. I've just noticed that Inkscape allows you to save as PDF so I'll try that and see how it goes for me. If it works well then, as you say, that should help to "future-proof" my work.

Thanks again, Garry.

P.S. Moses - I'm sorry to "gatecrash" your thread with this. It's just that I thought it was important to get the issues out there. I hope you've found what's being said to be of use to you too.

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Title: Re: Help with red frames
Post by: utnik on March 25, 2013, 04:38:51 PM
hi garry

i see!
it looks as scribus wouldn't support native transparencies in svg. files. does it in .eps? – i don't know, but if it does, this would be a reason to keep some vector graphics in image frames!
if i find some time, i'll look closer at this – thank you for enlighten me a little bit!

utnik
Title: Re: Help with red frames
Post by: GarryP on March 27, 2013, 02:47:54 PM
I did some testing myself and here's what happened.

Workflow:
* Original SVG downloaded from: http://openclipart.org/detail/30301/tango-face-angel-by-warszawianka
* Loaded into Inkscape and scaled up by 600% to approx. 236x270 pixels (original was tiny).
* Copy 1. Save as PDF: version 1.5, 144 res for raster, drawing area only, no other options selected.
* Copy 2. Save as EPS: PS level 3, 144 res for raster, drawing area only, no other options selected.
* Created Scribus document with imported SVG (message about unsupported features), EPS in image frame (fit image to frame), and PDF in image frame (also fit image to frame).
* Exported to PDF with PDF 1.5 compatibility. Results are in attached image_format_test.pdf

As you can see from the output:
* The SVG looks okay but the shadow effects aren't right, and there's a strange effect added to the halo that isn't apparent in the original.
* The EPS looks fine and the shadow looks right (but it doesn't seem quite as "refined" as the SVG version, to me at least).
* The PDF doesn't show the bottom shadow at all (while it does exist in the PDF that was exported from Inkscape) and it's also a bit "ragged/blocky" (to me anyway, look at the front of the halo).

(I also tried using the "embed PDF" feature but that doesn't look right at all. However that's an experimental feature so we can let it off. You takes your chances etc.)

So, some results from my admittedly non-exhaustive tests are:
* Importing SVGs gives great results but you can't trust what's been imported, meaning that you have to carefully check the PDF output to make sure nothing is missing/added (this could be a real pain if you're using lots of artwork).
* Using EPS looks fine (up to a point) but may not be right for "proper" printing depending on output resolution and the colour space issues mentioned in a previous post.
* Using PDF doesn't seem to give good results either with some bits missing and resolution issues.

I know I could probably get better results by endlessly fiddling with various options and stuff like that but I don't have the time to experiment with that sort of thing. I just want to pop the artwork in without worrying about it.

*** Important: I'd like to make the disclaimer here that I'm sure a lot of SVG files can be imported without any problem at all and a lot of people won't ever have issues. It's just that people need to know that what you import may not always be exactly what you get in your output. ***

I guess I'll be using a mix of EPS and SVG in the future until I hear otherwise. Trying to import the SVG first but if I get the "unsupported features" message I'll switch to EPS where necessary. It seems a fair compromise for my simple needs but may not be right for everyone.

If anyone has any suggestions or experiences I'd like to hear about them.

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