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Topic: Buy Acrobat or Photoshop?
| Author | Message |
| ISR | Posted – 2/9/2008 10:36:02 AM | show profile I need to lower the resolution of my PDF files so I can put them on my website---right now most are 10-30 megs. Which program should I buy to fiddle around with maintaining color but lowering the file size enough? |
| aoscruggs | Posted – 2/10/2008 3:38:50 AM | show profile Sounds like you need photoshop ...But I'm sure the designers will be able to help you more than I can. |
| chucho | Posted – 2/10/2008 7:55:47 AM | show profile You might be able to find a free online service for this online (search Lifehacker for "PDF" and it should direct you to the online PDF-processing seervices). Acrobat is a nice program to own that will down-sample PDFs. Photoshop will also do this (but it's not nearly as simple as it is with Acrobat, though it's pretty easy, too), but if you don't work with images, Acrobat is better and (I think) more affordable. I love Acrobat (6.0 or later) because it installs a print driver that allows you to "print" directly to PDF. (earlier versions use a separate "distiller" program that comes with Acrobat and it's not as integrated.) I use this a lot for printing out web pages quickly, easily and efficiently directly to PDFs. You can then add "sticky notes" to these PDFs (and search for text) and links them together as one document. It's very useful for archiving printouts for research or archival purposes. Acrobat also installs a "print to PDF" button in Word, which makes it easy to "print to PDF" directly from your .DOC. |
| nandy | Posted – 2/10/2008 2:33:14 PM | show profile Use Acrobat if you have a lot of type or other vector-based images you want to remain crisp. In Acrobat, under the "File" menu, there is a "Reduce file size" selection. This takes your bloated PDF (usually large because of some image) down to a more manageable size by reducing rasterized images to 72 dpi but maintaining the clarity for vector-based images, so your type stays clean and sharp. Photoshop will turn everything to a rasterized image, even your type. If you have many rasterized images (and very little type) and they are not going to be downloaded for printing, reducing the PDF via the instructions above is still worthwhile since your screen doesn't display anything better than 72 dpi anyway. However, Photoshop it is the better program for "fiddling around with maintaining color". Acrobat has no controls for that. |
| ISR | Posted – 2/11/2008 9:18:36 AM | show profile Thank you so much! |
| billhicks76 | Posted – 2/22/2008 1:46:00 PM | show profile Photoshop I'd give Photoshop a try. They have some pretty good features in terms of lowering file sizes. Acrobat seems to keep the file sizes quite large. |
| can't say | Posted – 2/22/2008 2:02:56 PM | show profile I heard that Photoshop Elements has most of the functionality of the full Photoshop, but at a fraction of the price. I don't have any firsthand experience with it though. You might want to check into it. |
| write2rachel | Posted – 2/22/2008 2:03:37 PM | show profile GIMP is a free program that will help you size photos. Very easy to use... Another alternative: I recently bought Photoshop Elements. It's the "consumer" version... not as great as the full version, but about $400 cheaper. I have used both. I didn't have the money (or need) for the full version, so I bought Elements and haven't missed the full version. If you are just doing basic stuff, you might want to look into it... good luck! ------ www.rachelcericola.com |
