Impress Pro

User Guide — Mapsoft Impress Pro Plugin for Adobe Acrobat

Overview

Impress Pro is an Adobe Acrobat plug-in that adds text watermarks and stamps to PDF pages. It provides comprehensive 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, serial numbers, or any custom text overlay.

Beyond watermarking, Impress Pro includes additional tabs for setting PDF document metadata (title, author, subject), configuring document open options (initial page, zoom level, page layout), and managing PDF security settings (passwords and permissions). This makes it a versatile all-in-one tool for preparing PDFs for distribution.

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.

Getting Started

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

1. Open a PDF document in Adobe Acrobat.
2. Go to Extensions › Mapsoft › Impress Pro.
3. On the Define tab, configure your watermark text, font, position, and appearance.
4. Switch to the Apply tab to apply the watermark to the current document or a batch of files.
5. Optionally use the Info, Open, and Security tabs to set additional document properties.

Defining a Watermark

The Define tab is where you configure all aspects of your watermark appearance. Here you specify the text content, choose a font, set the colour, control positioning, and adjust transparency.

Watermark Text

Enter the text for your watermark in the text field. This can be plain text such as “DRAFT” or “CONFIDENTIAL”, or it can include dynamic fields that are resolved when the watermark is applied. The Field Type dropdown provides quick insertion of variables including page number, page count, date/time, file name, and serial number. Helper dialogs are available for formatting dates, page numbers, and other dynamic content.

Font Selection

Choose between a standard font (one of the built-in PDF base fonts) or a system font installed on your computer. When using a system font, the font data is embedded into the PDF to ensure the watermark displays correctly on any system. Set the font size in points using the size field.

Colour

Select a watermark colour from the colour dropdown, which includes common presets such as black, red, blue, and grey. For precise colour control, click the colour chooser button to open a custom colour dialog. Impress Pro supports RGB, greyscale, and CMYK colour models, allowing you to match corporate brand colours or specific print requirements exactly.

Position

The position type dropdown offers several placement presets: Diagonal from Bottom Left, Diagonal from Top Left, Horizontal Centred, Vertical Centred, Centred, and Custom Position. When Custom Position is selected, you can enter precise X and Y coordinates with a choice of measurement units. The angle field lets you set an exact rotation in degrees, and the angle dropdown provides common presets.

Transparency

The transparency slider controls how opaque or see-through the watermark appears. A value of 100% makes the text fully opaque, while lower values allow the underlying page content to show through the watermark. This is particularly useful for background stamps that should be visible but not obscure the document content.

Page Selection

Impress Pro provides flexible page selection for targeting your watermark to specific pages. The page range options include:

• All Pages — Apply the watermark to every page in the document.
• Page Range — Enter specific pages or ranges, such as 1-5, 3,7,12, or 1-3,8-10.
• Odd Pages Only — Apply to odd-numbered pages only (useful for duplex printing).
• Even Pages Only — Apply to even-numbered pages only.

These options can be combined, so you could apply a watermark to odd pages within a specific range. The page selection is saved as part of the impression definition, so different saved impressions can target different page sets.

Applying Watermarks

The Apply tab controls how and where watermarks are applied. You can apply the currently defined impression to the active document in Acrobat with a single click. The Quick Apply button on the Define tab also provides a shortcut for immediate application without switching tabs.

After applying a watermark, you can use the Quick Undo button to remove it immediately. The undo history tracks each application so you can step back through multiple operations. This makes it safe to experiment with different settings until you achieve the desired result.

Batch Processing

Impress Pro can apply watermarks to multiple PDF files in a batch operation. On the Apply tab, select a folder of PDF files or add individual files to the batch list. The plug-in processes each file in turn, applying the current impression settings to all specified pages.

A progress dialog shows the current file being processed and the overall progress. Batch processing is ideal for applying consistent branding, classification stamps, or serial numbers across large collections of documents. When combined with dynamic fields like file name and date, each document receives contextually appropriate text.

Document Info

The Info tab lets you view and edit the PDF document's metadata properties. These are the standard fields visible in Acrobat's Document Properties dialog:

Each field has a checkbox to enable or disable it. Only checked fields are modified when you apply the settings, leaving unchecked fields at their current values. This allows you to update specific metadata fields without affecting others.

Open Options

The Open tab controls how the PDF behaves when it is opened in a viewer. You can set the initial page number, zoom level and page layout (single page, continuous, two-up), and various window display options such as hiding the menu bar, toolbar, or window controls.

These settings are written into the PDF's document catalog and are respected by Adobe Acrobat and most other PDF viewers. They are particularly useful for presentation-style documents, kiosk applications, or documents that should always open at a specific page or zoom level.

Security Settings

The Security tab provides PDF password protection and permission controls. You can set an open password (required to view the document) and a permissions password (required to change security settings or perform restricted actions).

Permission flags control whether users can print the document, copy text and images, modify the document content, add or modify annotations, fill in form fields, or extract content for accessibility. These correspond to the standard PDF permission bits and are enforced by compliant PDF viewers.

Saved Configurations

Impress Pro allows you to save multiple named impression definitions. On the Define tab, type a name in the name field and click Save to store the current settings. Saved impressions appear in the dropdown list and can be recalled at any time by selecting them.

Each saved impression stores the complete set of define-tab settings: text, font, size, colour, position, rotation, transparency, and page selection. You can maintain a library of commonly used stamps — for example, “Draft Diagonal”, “Confidential Header”, “Date Footer” — and switch between them quickly. To remove a saved impression, select it and click Delete.

All configurations are stored in the imppro.ini configuration file and persist between Acrobat sessions. The file is located in your local application data folder under the Mapsoft directory.

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:

• Contact Mapsoft
• Support page

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