Problems printing a (semi-) transparent square over a photo

[Kathryn]

I'm working in publisher, and trying to get a nice background for each page.
I have a photo covering the entire page, and then a rectangle filled in with
a color, but about 50% opaque so that the photo shows through and then text
over that. It looks absolutely fantastic, BUT it won't print out that way OR
convert to PDF that way. Instead, the photo does not show through at all and
so the background is only the plain color. I've tried changing the opacity
levels, I've tried different colors, I've even tried different printers
(color, black and white, pdf, etc) and made sure the the quality and dpi are
at the highest levels. Why isn't this working!?

Please help!

 

[Kathryn]

Margolotta-
Thanks for your pleasant response! I already tried searching for my topic
but no subjects were found to match. Apparently, I am too stupid as well as
lazy to use the correct search terms and so came here for help.
Actually, no I am not lazy- just incredibly busy here at work and a
little frustrated that I feel compelled to answer people like you. Thanks for
nothing anyway for telling me the answer and what search terms to use- since
I obviously couldn't find it the first time around. And please don't use
chatspeak or whatever that was, I have no idea what STFW means... that is why
I'm on a help board!

-Kathryn

 

[Kathryn]

Now, I doubt anyone will read this. But I just, ironically, googled "STFW."
You're sweeter than I thought, Miss Margolotta!

Thanks for distracting a hard working, overloaded girl at work for a few
brief moments so she can engage in high school-esque banter with someone
obviously bored and without a "real" job.

 

[Chuck Davis]

Kathryn,

What PDF converter are you using? I use Adobe Acrobat 6.0 Pro and have never
seen it fail to produce a PDF from some rather zany documents. If the file
is relatively small (<3 MB), send it to me at
chas at anthemwebs dot com

 

[Ed Bennett]

50% opaque ...
it won't print out that way OR convert to PDF ...
Why isn't this working!?

There's a bug in Publisher that means Publisher (or pretty much any other
Office XP or Office 2003 application for that matter) is unable to print the
semitransparency that looks so nice on screen on the majority of
printers/drivers.

A workaround in Publisher 2003 is to save as a high-resolution PNG file.

Otherwise, you just have to keep trying different printer drivers until you
find one that works. Some people have reported success with Canon
printers/drivers.