PDF (AGAIN!)

[Em Tee]

I know this has been answered before, but now that we have a new forum I'm not sure where to look. Anyway, here goes: I need to know how to reduce the file size of my PDF document. I went into Adobe Distiller and changed the graphics setting to 72 dpi, but that didn't help much. My 10 page report is over 1meg in size.

Thanks!

 

[airphoto]

Mary,

I think you're doing really well to get 10 pages of report under one Meg ..

Cheers~

 

[Daniel Williams]

This is Straight from alamode tech doc (#4107)

http://www.alamode.com/tech/pdf/4107.pdf


I typically send 13-14 page reports with a file size of around 350+/-Kb.
Hope this helps.

Daniel in SoILL

*********************************************************

Issue: How can I configure my PDF files for
optimum size and quality?
You may wish to configure your PDF files in a manner
that provides acceptable quality, while maintaining a
relatively small file size.
To configure PDF file size and quality within Adobe
Acrobat Distiller, complete the following steps.
1. Click Start | Programs | Adobe Acrobat | Acrobat
Distiller.
2. On the Acrobat Distiller dialog, click Settings.
Select Job Options…. The Screen Optimized – Job
Options dialog displays.
3. Place a check mark in the Optimize PDF
checkbox. The ASCII Format and Generate
Thumbnails checkboxes can be left blank.
4. Enter a Resolution dpi of 600. Even though there
are higher settings, 600 dpi will produce excellent
output.
5. Click the Compression tab. These settings will
have a major effect on the quality of the output
and the size of your electronic document. We have
found the following settings to work quite well.
For both the Color Bitmap Images and Grayscale
Bitmap Images:
· Place a check in the Resampling: checkbox, select
Average Downsampling at, and type in 150 dpi.
· Place a check in the Compression: checkbox and
select Automatic.
· Set Quality: to Minimum. (Your images will look
fine.)
For Monochrome Bitmap Images:
· Place a check in the Resampling: checkbox,
select Average Downsampling at, and type in
150 dpi.
· Place a check in the Compression: checkbox
and select CCITT Group 4.
Note: You are always free to try to increase quality by
choosing a higher dpi or quality setting, but you will
drastically increase the size of the PDF files created,
thus slowing the electronic transmission significantly.
Compare actual printouts using these settings against
possibly higher quality settings and you should see the
output is quite satisfactory.
6. Place a check mark in the Compress Text and
Line Art checkbox.
7. Click the Fonts tab and select Embed all fonts.
8. Click Save As and type in something like
“appraisal” to denote these are the settings
used for appraisal reports. What’s nice about
this “save” feature is that you could copy this
settings file to other PC’s that use Acrobat
Distiller to create PDF documents. Click Save
once you have entered the name.
9. Click OK to exit the Job Options dialog.

 

[David Mullen]

In addition to the settings described in a posting above, there is more you can do.

One more step to take with the Distiller and the PDF writer is to go to the "control panel" and then to "printers".

Find the PDF Writer and the Distiller and one at a time, right click them. You will find more settings there that will be a big help.

One that will make a big difference is the compression settings. Default in Version 5.0 is 1200 dpi. Version 4.05 is lower but still too high.

I set mine at 300 dpi but have gone to the settings between 150-200 and they still look the same but once you get below 300 dpi, the file size does not seem to drop too much.

My reports with 10 or more pages are about 250-350k and that includes a minimum of 6-9 photos. This is with the settings at "legal" size paper.

Also, while in those "printer" files you can set the paper size too. It makes the files a little larger (20k or so) but I set mine to legal anyway.

 

[Em Tee]

Okay, I've tried all those suggestions and still can't get the file size below 950. I must be missing something. Any other suggestions?

 

[Jo Ann Meyer Stratton]

I use the Day One programs. They have a choice of printers, one of which is "Configure Portable Document Driver". Which is the Adobe Acrobat Writer program within Day One. When I went to options for that specific printer (adobe acrobat) I went to compression, set it to .jpg high. That has made my 6-7K files down to 2-3K files. Sure makes the file email faster. If there is a way to compress your photo pages (which in Day One includes scanned documents), the shrinks your files.

 

[David Mullen]

You might go to www.appraiserstoolbox.com and then find their "How To" instructions. You can download them and they have one for Adobe Acrobat that is pretty thorough.

A while back, I went to the Ala Mode site and they had one too. It was really good but I cannot remember the link

Wouldn't hurt to download both of them.

 

[Charlotte Dixon]

Mary...You won't believe this...but now I have the same problem. I didn't until I upgraded to Internet Explorer 6 on Friday morning. I've had to break my appraisal reports in to 3 e-mails to send them, and never did before. I always sent 15-17 pages with no problem. Now, all hell breaks loose, the e-mail Outlook Express Blue Bar comes up and then quits, saying "e-mail to large"....then hangs there. The lenders tell me they aren't getting them. I have MCS and have been enjoying sending these reports over the internet. Did you just upgrade to IExplorer 6? I posted here earlier stating this same problem, then saw your post later.
Charlotte in Delaware

 

[Em Tee]

I finally got it to work this weekend. My files are down to about 185k!!! Here's what I did. In Acrobat Distiller, I went into Settings, then Job Options. Under the General tab, I set resolution to 150 dpi. Under the Compression tab, I set Color to 72 dpi, Greyscale to 72 dpi, and Monochrome to 150 dpi. Under the Fonts tab, I checked Embed All and Subset Embedded. Then I emailed myself a report and it looked good. Whew! It took me a couple of hours to figure all this out and I tried all kinds of different settings. Let me know if this works for you.

 

[Jo Ann Meyer Stratton]

I have Adobe Acrobat Writer 3 on my computer and cannot find the distiller. Anyway, try this if you can. Go to control panel, find printers, find the Adobe Acrobat printer. (or go to start, settings, printers) Left click on it. Left click on properties. click on details, then setup, then compress. Under color/graysacle image, change the compress to .jpg high

That cut my files in half. My dpi is still at 600 but my files went from over 8,000K to between 1,500K to 3,000K. The high compression for the .jpg files includes any scanned documents as well as all photos.