PDF text in annotation is blurry

[evernotesofarmeh 1]

Hi, I have been having trouble annotating pdf in evernote desktop. I can read the pdf text fine, but when I try to annotate it, the text becomes blurry. 

I have tried changing DPI scaling, disabling it. Nothing improved. I started this topic because I got no help after submitting a ticket a few days ago.

Any suggestions?

[zorak 0]

I also have this problem in desktop and the iPad app. That, along with the inability to neatly highlight a pdf, the annotate function is virtually useless to me. 

[gazumped 12,028]

Hi. 'A few days' doesn't mean a lot in the Support universe - you should still get a response if you're a paying user.  Might help to post you ticket number here so any passing Evernote employee can look it up as things progress..

Meantime,  what OS are you using,  and is this Evernote web or app,  and are you annotating in Skitch?

[evernotesofarmeh 1]

I did finally get a response. I was in a hurry, because I only have Evenote installed for all note taking activities. So, not being able to use a feature I use regularly is disruptive to my routine. I should mention this was my first use of annotation of a pdf in Evernote.

I am using Windows 10. I am annotating in the desktop version, not Skitch. I have already reinstalled Evernote without seeing any difference. Image files are not blurry during annotation only pdf files are (big or small). I thought it might be due to a slow storage, but installing in ssd did not result in any improvement. I can only guess there is some compatibility issue with the annotation window and dpi scaling due to the annotation window being slow with pdf files. In Evernote window, in Options under the Note tab, the font option is small and the font label is only half visible. I think this shows dpi scaling problem, but the text is not blurry anywhere else (in note). 

I think(guessing) the annotation window treats a pdf file like an album and treats each page as an image since you cannot edit the text in pdf. This changing of a pdf file into picture format (if it is that) could be the reason the annotation window makes the text blurry. But at this time, this is only my guess, since I do not know if other users have had this problem. Not to mention the support person could not recreate the problem on his/her end.

I have attached a link that shows the issue. I hope someone can help. I fear this could be a problem only  on my end. 
https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B5M-zYUEBBj9U3FhQXN1SGZFNWM&usp=sharing 

Cheers!

[Dave-in-Decatur 3,998]

Thanks for posting the videos. That helps clarify (heh) the problem. Actually, it doesn't look to me like there is a problem; that's just the font and style that Evernote uses, for some incomprehensible reason, for annotations. I'm attaching a few samples, both PDF and JPG, from the annotation window and as annotated. They look just as blurry as yours. Objections to this font have been raised here, with good reason, IMHO: it looks unprofessional, unless your profession is kindergarten teacher, and takes up too much space.

[evernotesofarmeh 1]

Thanks Dave. But, I am not talking about the text you put in through evernote, but the text of the pdf itself. I think it is best shown on the calendar section of your image. The text there looks blurry, compared to the text you can put on top of it; yes, that font(of the text you can put in) and emboss/shadow thing is annoying.

[Dave-in-Decatur 3,998]

OK, if I understand correctly now, you're saying that the text in the PDF looks blurry in comparison with the text of the annotation itself. You don't mean that annotating the PDF causes its text to become blurry, correct? Well, I do see that, but surely that's a function of the original PDF, isn't it? I've attached another annotated PDF; I think some of the problem before was a function of taking a screenshot and then uploading it as an attachment. See how this PDF itself, rather than a screenshot looks. But it does seem to me that the answer is, if possible (which it may not be), to control the quality of the PDF in the first place.

 

PDF annotated 3.pdf

[evernotesofarmeh 1]

Hi, thanks for the reply.

I don't think I was clear enough. My apologies for that. What I am pointing to is the text of the pdf that looks blurry during annotation. This is not the text u write on the pdf during annotation. The text on pdf looks fine when looking at it inline in the note, or even if I open it up in a browser, like Edge. The text only becomes blurry in the annotation window. I will show the examples here:
https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B5M-zYUEBBj9MkRMeDhub3dJVEE&usp=sharing

BDW, I am talking about the black text that is originally on the pdf looking blurry in annotation window. 

You are right that the quality of the pdf file itself would have an effect on how the text looks when opened. But, the pictures I include show the same pdf page in note window, in edge browser and the annotation window. I hope the difference is clear.

[Dave-in-Decatur 3,998]

Ah, now I've got it! Sorry. I do see it in your latest post. I did another experiment, and I guess I can see some blurriness. But I have to say that, at least in the items I tested on my equipment, it's barely noticeable, and not enough to be a problem for me; even in your latest post the difference doesn't seem very great. But obviously it is a problem for you in what you're doing. It must have to do with the PDF rendering engine, or whatever, in the annotation window.

[evernotesofarmeh 1]

Thanks. The problem is more apparent on my surface pro 3. The blurriness becomes evident. This causes reading and annotating cumbersome that is why I posted about it. Thanks for your help anyways. 

I agree with you that there is some issue with rendering pdf in the annotation window. It is not good. I might have to try One Note instead. Oh well. Have a good day.

[evernotesofarmeh 1]

I realized sometime ago that the kind of blurriness seen in annotation window for pdf is similar to the blurriness seen in installation windows of some softwares, specifically pre-Win 8. This could indicate some display scaling issue inherent in win 10, but I am not sure. I do really hope Evernote will resolve the blurriness, whatever the cause.

Fingers crossed.

In the mean time I have switched to OneNote for note taking and keeping Evernote for categorizing things.

 

[weaverh 4]

Hi! Any updates on this issue?

[emerick 155]

On 6/21/2016 at 10:47 PM, evernotesofarmeh said:

Hi, thanks for the reply.

I don't think I was clear enough. My apologies for that. What I am pointing to is the text of the pdf that looks blurry during annotation. This is not the text u write on the pdf during annotation. The text on pdf looks fine when looking at it inline in the note, or even if I open it up in a browser, like Edge. The text only becomes blurry in the annotation window. I will show the examples here:
https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B5M-zYUEBBj9MkRMeDhub3dJVEE&usp=sharing

BDW, I am talking about the black text that is originally on the pdf looking blurry in annotation window. 

You are right that the quality of the pdf file itself would have an effect on how the text looks when opened. But, the pictures I include show the same pdf page in note window, in edge browser and the annotation window. I hope the difference is clear.

Based on your screenshot, your annotation window is zoomed to 80%, which will definitely result in artifacting. Does it become sharper when you zoom in to 100% (Ctrl+1)?

[evernotesofarmeh 1]

Hi Emerick.

Yes, the blurriness stay even with 100% zoom. I have tried changing resolution and zoom level, but the blurriness is still there.

Thanks!

[Thala 0]

Any way of changing the font and dropping the bubbly look with the under shadow? Some of us are trying to do actual professional work here. Evernote is falling quickly in my scale... Paying for premium features that are so below par.....

 

[amanda_h 300]

Hi @Thala - You can remove the shadow effect by clicking the "a" above the text.

[birdhead10 1]

I am really get angry for the new updates .. 

When I try to annotate a PDFfile, all the texts look blurry. However, I open the file with Adobe PDF or foxit reader PDF, it looks very very fine. I remember that original version of evernote-annotation program was also great enough to read the text. 

If this problem keeps happen, I do not really want to use evernote anymore to annotate the papers that I will/would read.

[evernotesofarmeh 1]

Hey birdhead10,

I had blurriness problem with pdfs in evernote too. The files were fine in other readers/editors so, the issue was tied to evernote and not just the files themselves. I have also stopped using evernote since then, since the majority of my files are in pdf. I waited about a year(the length of my subscription) to get a resolution, I received no update. I will not suggest keeping your hopes up.

 

[_Alain_ 0]

Is this problem solved meanwhile ?

I get this blurred text also if there are special characters like "ä, ö and ü". See Comparison here (left is blurred because of the "ö", right one is ok).


Evernote is useless for me if I get those blurry, unprofessional notations.

[meganisoptera 1]

Have they looked into this at all? I am new to Evernote and want to use it mainly for PDFs to organize my research as a graduate student. But, it's not worth it if the PDFs are blurry because I would like to share my annotated versions with my PI. This thread started in 2016...seems kind of ridiculous that nothing has been done in this time frame. (I have windows 10 and the PDFs look fine in every other reader, just not the Evernote PDF annotating app).

[gazumped 12,028]

On 5/9/2018 at 9:10 PM, meganisoptera said:

Have they looked into this at all? I am new to Evernote and want to use it mainly for PDFs to organize my research as a graduate student. But, it's not worth it if the PDFs are blurry because I would like to share my annotated versions with my PI. This thread started in 2016...seems kind of ridiculous that nothing has been done in this time frame. (I have windows 10 and the PDFs look fine in every other reader, just not the Evernote PDF annotating app).

Hi.  If you're using an up to date version of the app and still seeing this issue,  then clearly there is still a problem on your system.  It may be to do with screen scaling.  Have you tried opening your PDFs in another reader?  You're not obliged to use the Evernote reader / annotater - you should be able to open the PDF in another app and annotate the content,  then save it back to your note.

[diabloneo 6]

I still have this problem on my system. I running latest Evernote on Windows 10, the experience with PDF annotation is awful.

1. Rolling up and down are not smooth at all
2. Text is blurry
3. Annotation operations are hard to control.

[emk93 1]

I am having the same issue. I just bought Evernote premium today, specifically for the PDF annotation / organization feature. Evernote needs to fix this. See blurry PDF, below.

[AlanNotes 7]

I also see this issue for what's it worth. Based on this thread it does seem specific to Windows 10, but possibly not all users. 

[AlanNotes 7]

For reference, I attached two screen captures of a PDF at 200% zoom. The clear image is with Adobe Acrobat Reader(AAR). The blurry picture is using the annotate function built into the Evernote Windows client. I would think if this was affecting every user then there would be more reports, so maybe currently it's only a subset. 

I'm also going to see what happens if I annotate the PDF and then open it in AAR to see if the final copy I saved is the blurry, pixelated version. 

[AlanNotes 7]

I did testing annotating the native Evernote Reader(not sure what runs this behind the scenes.) I then opened the PDF I edited in Adobe Acrobat Reader, and the text was clear again! It seems that the original quality is preserved somehow. If I had to guess, some kind of compression has to take place for the annotation function, but I'm not sure. Annotating with Evernote and reading in a different app could be a good workaround for some.

 

[Amot 1]

I am also having this issue. Was there a patch or a way to fix this? I am trying to read as I annotate and its near impossible due to how blurry the text becomes.

[gazumped 12,028]

18 hours ago, Amot said:

I am also having this issue. Was there a patch or a way to fix this? I am trying to read as I annotate and its near impossible due to how blurry the text becomes.

Judging by the comments so far,  the trick seems to be to annotate in a different editor.  If you don't already have another option,  try Xodo.

[kcarson 0]

This is a huge issue for me.  I'm a long time Evernote basic user and just signed up for the free trial of premium because I want to start to be able to highlight in pdfs.  But just as the other users on here mention, the pdf has a good resolution before and after annotating, but during annotation, its incredibly blurry and difficult to be able to read the text.  The only suggestion they help chat suggested was to annotate at "100%" instead of more zoomed in, but this makes the text too small to see properly as well.  

I'm definitely disappointed as I preferred to use Evernote for all my note taking needs, but guess I won't be able to.  

[Gear Feng 0]

I am running into this issue as well.
Any plan to fix this problem ?

[gazumped 12,028]

13 hours ago, Gear Feng said:

I am running into this issue as well.
Any plan to fix this problem ?

Best option to get direct feedback would be to raise this as a support request (this is a -mainly- user supported forum).

 

[HygorCosta 1]

I think Evernote isn't care about Windows users, because this is a huge issue.  This post started in 2016 and for now they have make nothing about this. Sorry, but it's disrespectful with users (I'm a Premium user for more than a year).

[gazumped 12,028]

On 5/8/2019 at 12:19 PM, HygorCosta said:

I think Evernote isn't care about Windows users, because this is a huge issue.  This post started in 2016 and for now they have make nothing about this. Sorry, but it's disrespectful with users (I'm a Premium user for more than a year).

See comments above - the way to get direct feedback,  and help Evernote realise the scale of this issue is to raise a support request.  The fact that a fix hasn't been published yet doesn't mean Evernote aren't working on it or that they "don't care" about Windows users.

[Jakub Smetana 0]

Hi,

I have the same issue on MacOS, it's not just Windows 10 specific - when I open a PDF in the annotator, it is blurry. No problem in other normal PDF readers.

 

[Sonnengoth 2]

I sent a request to the support team for this issue, cause I have the same problem in Windows 10 and be a kind of worried that it isn't fixed jet. In case I will receive an answer that helps, i'll let you know  

[tesshuff 0]

It's July 2020 and I am also (still) experiencing this problem. I've submitted a ticket, but haven't heard back. Anybody found a fix?

[Te3re 0]

DItto here. 

Above is 200% in Evernote Annotate 

Above is 265% in Adobe Reader. 

 

I've logged a ticket but have yet to hear back. like other users the annotate function was my main reason for upgarding to premium. If anyone has an upate I'd apprecaite it. I'm running windows 10 as well.

[Alexandrekv 0]

I am facing this same issue on W10, how can I proceed? I am thinking seriously in cancelling my premium, cause this is a huge deal to me and seems that the developers are just ignoring it

[Vlad_M 0]

Any Update regarding this matter?..........

[PinkElephant 8,700]

This subforum is all about the old legacy client.

Asking for an update is hopeless - there will be no more changes at all on these clients. Even if they fail completely, they are deprecated and the only hand that will raise will just do so to drive the last nail into the coffin.

If you want to know about the v10 client, post your question in the subforum for Windows version 10.