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I have a design made in Photoshop and Illustrator. It exists out of 10 texts varying in size. I have 1 image live traced in Illustrator and imported into PS after tracing it.
Now I want to upload it to my online t-shirt printing company. The max file size is 3MB.
They accept .ai, .svg, .eps, .pdf, .wmf, .ps. I use AI CS3 and PS 8.
After I convert the text to outlines in AI the file size increases big time. I seem to be unable to get the size below 10MB, despite trying the different outputs available by AI.
I tried lowering the PPI to 72 and image size to 100x100 (original for print will be between A4 and A3)
I would like to have some suggestions on how to lower the file size so I can upload it.
You seem to be rasterising, not converting to outlines.
Outlines are just vectors, an AI file with text will be a few kB, converting to outlines will increase that by 'not very much'. Converting it to a bitmap will give you your 10MB.
What is the size of the AI file?
I have 1 image in the design, but I don't think it is a rasterized image. What I did is this; I downloaded a 72ppi image. I selected all with the magic wand tool in PS. I created a new document (300ppi) and dragged the selection to the new document. I filled the selection with a color. Then I dragged the filled selection to my original design. Saved it as .psd. Then I opened the .psd in AI.
Also, when I delete the image in AI and save it makes almost no difference. Two of the texts I used the Warp tool in PS, maybe that has something to do with it?
I've warped some text and converted it to outlines and saved it - no real increase in file size.
Try deleting the PSD file and re-saving as another file name.
If that doesn't make a difference, delete other bits to eliminate the cause.
I suspect it is your image, 300dpi is what we call rasterised & could give a large file - is it linked or embedded?
Ok, I sort of 'solved' it. I deleted the .psd file and just started over from scratch but now in AI.
I saved after almost every step to see if something unusual happend. Strangely enough everything went fine and ended up with a file size of less then 2MB.
I guess it had something to do with the image I downloaded, cut out in PS, live traced in AI and dragged 'back and forth', saved as .psd, opened in AI etc etc. It probably ended up as a rasterized image or something, just like you guys suspected.
Well thanks a bunch all for your help, topic closed.
You can also try www.yousendit.com. A customer sent me some files with it and I have been using it ever since. Its free I think up to 100 meg file sizes.
Vector size 
