Impress

User Guide — Mapsoft Impress Plugin for Adobe Acrobat

Overview

Impress is an Adobe Acrobat plug-in that stamps text watermarks onto PDF pages. It provides control over the watermark text, font, size, colour, position, rotation, and transparency, making it suitable for marking documents as “DRAFT”, “CONFIDENTIAL”, adding date stamps, page numbers, or any custom text overlay.

The plug-in supports dynamic field insertion, allowing you to include variables such as the current date and time, page number, page count, file name, and serial numbers in your watermark text. Multiple named impressions can be saved and recalled, and the plug-in supports batch processing across multiple PDF files.

For advanced features including image stamping, barcodes, document metadata editing, and PDF security settings, see Impress Pro.

Getting Started

After installation, Impress adds a menu item under Extensions › Mapsoft › Impress in Adobe Acrobat. Clicking this opens a tabbed dialog with two tabs: Define and Apply.

Open a PDF document in Adobe Acrobat.
Go to Extensions › Mapsoft › Impress.
On the Define tab, enter your watermark text and configure the font, colour, position, and appearance.
Click Stamp to apply the watermark to the current document, or switch to the Apply tab for batch processing.

Defining a Watermark

The Define tab is where you configure all aspects of your watermark.

Watermark Text

Enter the text for your watermark in the text field. This can be plain text or include dynamic field codes inserted via the Fields dropdown.

Font

Choose from the standard PDF base fonts: Courier, Helvetica, and Times Roman in normal, bold, italic, and bold-italic variants. Set the font size and line spacing in points. Font rendering can be set to Normal, Invisible (hidden but searchable), or Outline.

Justification

Align the watermark text to the left, centre, or right relative to its position anchor.

Layer

Choose whether the watermark appears in the Foreground (overlay, on top of page content) or Background (watermark, behind page content). The transparency slider controls opacity from fully transparent to fully opaque (Acrobat 5 and later).

Position

Position presets include Diagonal from Bottom Left and Diagonal from Top Left. Select Custom for precise X/Y coordinates with a choice of measurement units (points, inches, or centimetres). An angle field sets the rotation in degrees. Additional options let you use the page clipping area and account for page rotations.

Colour

Select a watermark colour from presets including black, greys, red, green, and blue, or use the custom colour picker for precise greyscale, RGB, or CMYK values.

Tip: For a classic diagonal “DRAFT” watermark, use the Diagonal from Bottom Left position with a large font size (e.g., 72pt), a light grey colour, and transparency around 30–40%.

Dynamic Fields

The Fields dropdown on the Define tab lets you insert variables that are resolved when the watermark is applied:

Field	Description
Page Number	Current page number, with optional start offset and Bates or Roman numbering.
Page Count	Total number of pages in the document, with optional offset.
Date and Time	Current date and/or time in a custom format (local or UTC).
File Name	The document file name, with or without extension or full path.
General Info	PDF metadata fields: Title, Subject, Author, or Keywords.
Serial Number	Auto-incrementing number with configurable width and leading zeros.

Each field type has a helper dialog for configuring its format options.

Page Selection

Control which pages receive the watermark:

All Pages — Apply to every page.
Page Range — Enter specific pages or ranges, such as 1-5, 10, 15-20.
Odd Pages Only / Even Pages Only — Useful for duplex printing or alternating headers.

Batch Processing

The Apply tab handles batch processing. Select the current document or multiple files and folders. Options include:

Add individual files or entire directories to the batch list.
Recurse into subfolders.
Optimise PDFs after processing to reduce file size.
Import a file list from a delimited text file.

A progress dialog tracks the current file and overall completion. Combined with dynamic fields like file name and date, each document receives contextually appropriate text.

Undo

After applying a watermark, click Undo to remove the last applied impression. The undo history tracks each application, so you can step back through multiple operations safely.

Saved Impressions

Type a name in the name field and click Save to store the current settings. Saved impressions appear in the dropdown and can be recalled at any time. Each saved impression stores the complete set of settings: text, font, colour, position, and page selection. Click Delete to remove a saved impression.

All configurations are stored in the impress.ini configuration file and persist between Acrobat sessions.

System Requirements

Adobe Acrobat: Acrobat Pro or Standard DC (2017 or later). Not compatible with Adobe Acrobat Reader.
Operating System: Windows 10 or Windows 11 (both 32-bit and 64-bit Acrobat installations are supported).

Support

If you encounter a problem or have a question not covered here, please get in touch: