I Cannot Open EPS Files in VE LXi

Graphics like this race car number often come from a vinyl cutter.

Scanvec Amiable's Vinyl Express LXi enables signmakers to create and cut graphics from adhesive-backed vinyl to craft vehicle customization, window- or substrate-mounted signage, and other forms of promotional designs. The program supports a wide range of file formats, including Encapsulated PostScript or EPS, for import into its design interface and production module. If you experience trouble bringing in an EPS file for output through VE LXi, look to several possibilities for the source of your file incompatibility.

Vinyl Graphics

Computer-controlled vinyl cutters use a knife-like blade to cut out graphic shapes from sheets of colored or printed vinyl. Some cutters also print on the vinyl using special inks or output ribbons. Because many vinyl graphics include text and multiple component shapes, installing the finished material requires care and skill to remove individual pieces from the backing and position them appropriately on surfaces ranging from flat plastic boards to the curves of a race car.

Creating Graphics

Some vinyl graphics shops accept customer files for output. They may charge a premium to preflight, or prequalify the workability of these documents. Unlike traditional graphic arts producers, vinyl cutters can require adherence to very specific standards, including type converted to static outlines, path strokes converted to filled objects and overlapping shapes combined into one. These specifications reflect the difference between guiding a knife blade around the outline of a shape and laying down ink or toner to print an image.

Importing Files

VE LXi supports several PostScript-based file formats for import into its design and production modules. However, like many specialized programs, it lags behind the current versions of many of the formats it supports, partially because new file formats introduce new features that bring with them new complexities to accommodate. If you try and fail to bring an EPS file into VE LXi, find out with which Adobe Illustrator version the file is compatible. As of late 2011, VE LXi requires EPS files that match the specs for Illustrator 10 or earlier. You can ask your customers to resave their EPS files with legacy compatibility, so you can bring them into VE LXi.

Alternatives

Although VE LXi only supports legacy versions of the Adobe Illustrator format, it also offers compatibility with Acrobat Portable Document Format, or PDF, provided the files comply with PDF version 4. Recent versions of illustration software can save files in PDF format, which offers your customers another option besides EPS. You can check the PDF version of a document by viewing its file information. Inside the Acrobat or Adobe Reader application, file versions appear in a decimal format, with version 4 rendered as 1.3.

References

• Scanvec Amiable: VE LXI User Manual for Versions 7.5 and Higher
• Sign Warehouse: Vinyl Express LXi Sign Making Software
• Sign Warehouse: LXi Features

Resources

• A First Guide to PostScript
• Prepressure.com: The EPS File Format
• Adobe Systems; Encapsulated PostScript File Format Specification Version 3.0; May 1992
• Adobe Systems: PostScript Language Reference Third Edition