Grey-Ish Font in Compiled PDF

I used Scrivener to compile my PDF in three parts, Front, Body, and Back. Then I used PDF Joiner to bring the parts together. I sent that file to Ingram Spark, they mentioned something about color issues, but that I could upload and they’d fix it. The proof I got from them was beautiful.

I did the same for CreateSpace, and got this half-grey font all throughout the proof. I wrote them and they said it was my computer settings, which should be 100% black. (And where do you set that?) The problem is, I sent the same file to both Ingram and CreateSpace. So I’m thinking that Ingram corrected the file and CreateSpace did not.

Going back, I saved the PDF as a X/1-a or whatever the setting is for High Resolution/Printing, and ordered another proof. It came back the same half-grey color. It looks washed out compared to the Ingram Spark copy.

Last year I did a PDF from Word and didn’t have this issue, so I’m wondering what to do in Scrivener to make sure the font is crisp for CreateSpace. I did the pre-flight check and conversion to X/1-a in a Pro version of Adobe. But what settings do I need to work with in Scrivener to help get the font crisp and black?

Thank you in advance.

Are they grey in Acrobat as well? If so, I would check off Remove text color in the Transformations compile pane. If there is any colour coming out of Scrivener, that should suppress it.

Yes, this particular setting when turned off provided me with much darker text. Thank you!