I've got a business card file with different versions on separate layers. I want to output pdf's for review of each of the cards. Normally I simply make a layer visible, output as pdf, change visible layer, output next version, etc....

For some reason everytime I output to pdf, no matter what layer or art is visible, I am always getting the same card output to pdf. I figured there must be some caching problem with the pdf generator in illustrator(cs3) so I closed, reopended, tried again. Same result. Then I deleted the layer with the art that kept getting output and tried to output one of the remaining layers....the deleted layer was output to pdf!!

Has anyone else had this problem and solved it? My next attempt (after asking you guys first) will be after deleting the preferences....I just didn't want to do that right away with out testing other options. Any ideas are appreciated.

thanks

It's best to flatten layers before making pdfs. That way you get pdfs containing only what you want.
Try for example opening (in Illy) a pdf that you made from a layered Illy file. All the layers will show up even though they are not turned on. So if you work that way you are overloading your pdfs with a whole lot of stuff that's not supposed to be there. You can see the difference by looking at file sizes.

Or, keep your layers intact, but turn off Create Acrobat Layers from Top Level Layers in the Save As PDF dialog.

However, maybe what you're seeing could be an advantage to you. If each of your business cards is on its own layer, perhaps with all the items that are common to all the cards on a separate, bottom layer, save to PDF with Create Acrobat Layers from Top Level Layers turned on. When you open the PDF in Acrobat (or Reader), you can review all your cards one at a time in the one PDF, by turning off and on visibility of each layer.

If you have Create Acrobat Layers from Top Level Layers turned on, layers that are turned off in Illustrator are still present in the PDF, but should have visibility turned off. Check the PDF to see if a layer is on that should be off.

heeey....now that is an idea I never thought of. I was aware that invisible layers were still included in a pdf but didn't think much of it because the file is so small that it didn't seem to matter during a quick review stage. Using Acrobat (or reader) to enable and disable 'odd' content never occurred to me, even though I've built many a card that way in Illustrator/Photoshop.

Thanks a lot for your ideas!

InDesign is really a better application for doing business cards. That way you can keep standard info on a master page. If you have printing on both sides, make a facing page file with fronts on left pages and back on right pages. I've tried both ways but InDesign has the edge, especially if you've got dozens of similar cards to do like can happen when you're working for a big firm with lots of employees.