Improper handling of watermarks in PDFs

[oboewan]

Binary package hint: evince

Expected behavior: The watermark in the PDF that is being viewed in the accompanying screenshot should only show when printed, not viewed on a PC.

What happened instead: See enclosed screenshot.

The PDFs that I have seen exhibit this problem are found on the "Amazing Spider-Man: The Complete Collection" DVD-ROM, published by Graphic Imaging Technology, now out of print.

In the README for the DVD-ROM, it said that there would be a "MARVEL" watermark on each page when you printed it; however, these watermarks would not appear when viewing the pages on your PC, assuming you were using Adobe Reader 6.0 or later.

I can personally verify that, when using the latest version of Adobe Reader on Windows, the watermarks behave as described: they only appear on the printed copy, not when viewing it on your screen.

However, when viewing it in Evince, the watermarks appear onscreen (see screenshot). I have not seen any way to hide them.

ProblemType: Bug
Architecture: i386
Date: Sat Nov 14 14:39:49 2009
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 9.10
ExecutablePath: /usr/bin/evince
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 9.10 "Karmic Koala" - Release i386 (20091028.5)
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia
Package: evince 2.28.1-0ubuntu1.1
ProcEnviron:
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.31-14.48-generic
SourcePackage: evince
Uname: Linux 2.6.31-14-generic i686

[Sergej Kotliar (sigge)]

I believe this has to do with poppler currently not supporting transparency.

I'm not too sure though, so I wont close this as duplicate just yet and let the
devs look at it...

[Nickolay V. Shmyrev (nshmyrev)]

For an example PDF, go to:
http://consumer.usa.canon.com/ir/controller?act=SupportDetailAct&fcategoryid=215&modelid=12929

Click on "Product / Software Manuals"

Download the "EOS 30D Introduction Manual (PDF, 6.15 MB)"

All pages show "COPY", instead of the content of the file, which is the product
manual with a "COPY" watermark on each page. I'll attach the file if attaching
files is possible here.

Similar evince bug 338445

[Berti (bertrand-haut-gmail)]

With my current installed kpdf (0.5.5) using libpoppler1 (0.5.1-0ubuntu7), I'm
able to read the two examples seeing the COPY and the text content. Maybe this
bug should be closed

[Janjans321 (janjans321)]

This is a bug.

The "COPY" text is rendered correctly, but since it is a "Print Only Watermark",
it should only be printed, not displayed when viewing the PDF on screen.

Adobe Acrobat does not show the COPY text, only when choosing Print Preview or
actually printing it.

[Arromdee (arromdee)]

This bug affects the Marvel Comics DVD-ROMs that have been published for the last year or two. If you use Adobe Acrobat 6 or greater each page has a big "MARVEL" plastered across it when printed, but not on the screen. However, all known Linux PDF reading programs show the watermark even on the screen.

[Brad Hards (bradh)]

OK, there are two different problems here.

The original problem was an opaque COPY watermark instead of the text. That problem has now been fixed (update to poppler 0.6 if you use evince and are still seeing this).

The problem identified in comment #4 and #5 is related to Optional Content implementation. This is the relevant part of the PSSISCUG-EN.pdf document:
779 0 obj<</Pages 753 0 R/Type/Catalog/OpenAction 780 0 R/PageLabels 751 0 R/Metadata 775 0 R/OCProperties<</D<</Order[]/AS[<</OCGs[782 0 R]/Category[/View]/Event/View>><</OCGs[782 0 R]/Category[/Print]/Event/Print>><</OCGs[782 0 R]/Category[/Export]/Event/Export>>]/ON[782 0 R]/RBGroups[]>>/OCGs[782 0 R]>>>>
endobj
782 0 obj<</Type/OCG/Name(Í2ZÒ°yLÏø)/Usage<</Export<</ExportState/ON>>/Print<</PrintState/ON>>/View<</ViewState/OFF>>/PageElement<</Subtype/FG>>>>>>
endobj

That might be quite hard to implement in poppler without an API change...

[Paul Hirst (paul-hirst)]

Created an attachment (id=17053)
A UK royalmail online stamp which doesn't print correctly

My experience is the other way around.

The UK postal service allow you to print stamps online (they come with a unique 2d barcode). The service is web based and provides you with a PDF to print and attach to your envelope. The on screen rendering contains a 'watermark' across the whole image which is supposed to be absent once printed. Using Evince the 'watermark' is present on the printed version rendering it useless.

The watermark in this case is the word 'Sample' written in large letters diagonally across the middle and a box containing 'Sample will not appear when printed'. Unfortunately when using Evince this is a lie!

I have reported this to Ubuntu which is what led me here.
https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/238817

This attachment is an example as produced at www.royalmail.com

[oboewan (oboewan42)]

Binary package hint: evince

Expected behavior: The watermark in the PDF that is being viewed in the accompanying screenshot should only show when printed, not viewed on a PC.

What happened instead: See enclosed screenshot.

The PDFs that I have seen exhibit this problem are found on the "Amazing Spider-Man: The Complete Collection" DVD-ROM, published by Graphic Imaging Technology, now out of print.

In the README for the DVD-ROM, it said that there would be a "MARVEL" watermark on each page when you printed it; however, these watermarks would not appear when viewing the pages on your PC, assuming you were using Adobe Reader 6.0 or later.

I can personally verify that, when using the latest version of Adobe Reader on Windows, the watermarks behave as described: they only appear on the printed copy, not when viewing it on your screen.

However, when viewing it in Evince, the watermarks appear onscreen (see screenshot). I have not seen any way to hide them.

ProblemType: Bug
Architecture: i386
Date: Sat Nov 14 14:39:49 2009
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 9.10
ExecutablePath: /usr/bin/evince
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 9.10 "Karmic Koala" - Release i386 (20091028.5)
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia
Package: evince 2.28.1-0ubuntu1.1
ProcEnviron:
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.31-14.48-generic
SourcePackage: evince
Uname: Linux 2.6.31-14-generic i686

[Dimitrios Symeonidis (azimout)]

Could you please attach an example pdf file demonstrating this problem?
Thank you

[Dimitrios Symeonidis (azimout)]

Likely upstream: https://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=4925

[Carlos Garcia Campos (carlosgc)]

This bug is fixed since poppler 0.11. Feel free to reopen it if the problem is still present for you with current poppler

[Sebastien Bacher (seb128)]

The bug referenced is supposed to be fixed in karmic though

[Dimitrios Symeonidis (azimout)]

no example pdf received. upstream is fix released. marking as fix released also here...

[Michael Gilbert (michael-s-gilbert)]

i can still reproduce this issue with poppler 0.12.

[Onno Steenbergen (osteenbergen)]

Bug of showing print-only watermarks is still present in Ubuntu Natty (evince: 2.32.0-0ubuntu12.1, poppler-utils/libpoppler13: 0.16.4-0ubuntu1.1)

[Dulsi2000 (dulsi2000)]

I have also seen the problem with The Incredible Hulk: The Complete Collection.

[Gitlab-migration (gitlab-migration)]

-- GitLab Migration Automatic Message --

This bug has been migrated to freedesktop.org's GitLab instance and has been closed from further activity.

You can subscribe and participate further through the new bug through this link to our GitLab instance: https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/poppler/poppler/issues/203.