coreldraw exporting

December 11, 2006 9:51 AM

When exporting from CorelDRAW to Adobe Illustrator, why does the file size jump from 4 MB to 50 MB? What am I doing wrong?

its not easy being green. i need help. for real.

posted by rare_g to Computers & Internet (4 answers total)

Perhaps it is embedding a linked file? And: why do you assume you are doing something wrong? It's possible that the Corel exporter just isn't that good at optimizing file size.
posted by wemayfreeze at 10:28 AM on December 11, 2006

corel is just weird, sorry. why would you even think of using it when you have illustrator?
posted by krautland at 10:46 AM on December 11, 2006

Best answer: When you export, what version of Illustrator are you exporting too? Are you exporting something with a lot of gradients?

wemayfreeze mentions the possibility of embedding a linked file seems a very likely reason.

I have noticed that when I export Corel format files to Illustrator the file size usually doubles.

corel is just weird, sorry. why would you even think of using it when you have illustrator?
posted by krautland at 1:46 PM EST on December 11

Probably to export a file that one has only in Corel format so that one can edit it in Illustrator.
posted by juiceCake at 11:07 AM on December 11, 2006

I worked doing export filters for Corel. In 1990. I also ported Draw code from Windows 2 to Windows 3. So take my insight for what it's worth - not much.

Draw can do some fun stuff, like gradient fills, that were a big deal back in the day. To deal with file formats that didn't have gradients, we'd turn a single polygon with a gradient fill into lots of tiny polygons for each change in colour in the original polygon. So one square could turn into several hundred rectangles.

So, if they haven't improved their export filters in 16 years, it may be because Draw is turning single objects into lots of objects due to funky fills.
posted by GuyZero at 11:12 AM on December 11, 2006