Jerome Colas

Q: Reduce PDF file size : free Acrobat replacement for Leopard

*Well, at least this fits my need*, which to be able to email PDFs of my iWork or Office presentations with both :
*+ acceptable quality*
*+ acceptable file size*



It uses the poorly documented Quartz filtering ability for PDFs in Preview. There are a couple of articles I found here or elsewhere on the web, but they still don't make things simple.

You can manually edit those same settings (using Colorsync Utility) but can also benefit from my trial-and-error process and directly download from my iDisk.
After download and decompressions, *simply drag the downloaded "Filters" folder to your Library folder* (inside your user folder to install it just for this user, or at the root level of your hard disk in order to install it for all users) - And if you already have such a folder, simply copy the contents of the downloaded folder into it.

*Here are the filters :*
*http://idisk.mac.com/jcolas-Public*

Feel free to use, download, copy, use the idea ... in any way you like.

*Then, in order to create a compressed PDF with decent quality :*
+ Open your existing PDF in preview, or Print any document using "Open PDF in Preview" from the PDF pop-up menu in the Print dialog
+ Choose Save As in the File Menu (pretty easy I guess), then choose PDF as format, and one of the "Reduce to XXX dpi ..." Quartz filters, and click Save.

I included 8 settings which produce increasingly large files, with increasingly better quality.
I find the 150 dpi / average JPEG compression to be quite suitable for most purposes.

I have tried (before Leopard) PDF compression software like PDFshrink but was not satisifed with the results and interface.

These filters produce much better (better being in terms of consistency, file size and quality) than the filter Apple includes with Leopard (and maybe Tiger ?).
The Apple "Reduce file size filter" scales images by 50%, with target dimensions between 128 and 512 pixels, which can give very unusable results.

The filters I use 2 two things :
+ resample images to 75, 150, 300 or 600 dpi (I do not not if there is upsampling)
+ compress the images using Jpeg compression at average or low quality
Once installed, you can visualize, edit or copy them using Colorsync Utility (in the Applications/ Utilities folder)

As an example, using a 73 MB PDF from a 55 page Powerpoint presentation, the compressed files have the following sizes :
+ 75 dpi low quality : 2.7 MB
+ 75 dpi average quality : 3.2 MB
+ 150 dpi low quality : 4.2 MB
+ 150 dpi average quality : 5.3 MB
+ 300 dpi low quality : 7.6 MB
+ 300 dpi average quality : 10.2 MB
+ 600 dpi low quality : 16.0 MB
+ 600 dpi average quality : 20.3 MB

Voilà.
I don't think I'll be using Adobe Acrobat anytime soon.

"Thanks" a lot to Adobe for not being able to have a working version of Acrobat on Leopard until next January.
I hope many people (with needs similar to mine) will discover that they don't realy need it.

And I just wonder why Apple does not include these filters in Leopard.
Is this just in order to be nice with Adobe ?

Feedback or comments greatly appreciated.

Jérôme.

MBP 17" 2.4Ghz/4GB, Mac OS X (10.5), and other Macs too

Posted on Dec 15, 2007 4:08 AM

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Q: Reduce PDF file size : free Acrobat replacement for Leopard

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  • by osx_user_FA,

    osx_user_FA osx_user_FA Jul 27, 2008 4:59 PM in response to Jerome Colas
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jul 27, 2008 4:59 PM in response to Jerome Colas
    Another easy way to reduce PDF file size (since for some reason it is much harder than it should be) is simply to re-save the file as a JPEG of the desired size and then re-save the resulting JPEG as a PDF.

    Sounds complicated, but simple (and free!) considering the alternatives.
  • by pezworld,

    pezworld pezworld Oct 1, 2008 11:25 AM in response to Jerome Colas
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Apple Watch
    Oct 1, 2008 11:25 AM in response to Jerome Colas
    Jerome, thanks a ton. I tried several other suggestions, and they didn't work. I had a 30-something-page scanned document that consisted of 30 pages of JPGs combined to one massive 40 meg PDF. Using the 150 dpi standard (my first attempt) I got it down to 5 meg, and it printed perfectly. Much better than the standard compression, which got it down to 1.5 meg but was unreadable.

    Thanks again!
  • by BLightle,

    BLightle BLightle Nov 1, 2008 4:17 PM in response to Jerome Colas
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Nov 1, 2008 4:17 PM in response to Jerome Colas
    Fantastic. I have been trying to figure out how to scan documents into my Mac and reduce their file size without losing so much resolution and crispness and without buying the full Adobe package. Your filters work great because the Preview default was almost unreadable. Thanks for posting.
  • by angryclown,

    angryclown angryclown Dec 19, 2008 12:54 PM in response to Jerome Colas
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Dec 19, 2008 12:54 PM in response to Jerome Colas
    Thank You SOOOOO much. Works perfectly.
  • by Carolyn Samit,

    Carolyn Samit Carolyn Samit Dec 19, 2008 1:06 PM in response to Jerome Colas
    Level 10 (120,256 points)
    Apple Watch
    Dec 19, 2008 1:06 PM in response to Jerome Colas
    Post it here in the User Tips Library: http://discussions.apple.com/forum.jspa?forumID=599



    Carolyn
  • by alphaferyl,

    alphaferyl alphaferyl Mar 1, 2009 11:15 AM in response to Jerome Colas
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Mar 1, 2009 11:15 AM in response to Jerome Colas
    Very helpful, well done and thanks!
  • by Marco De Vitis,

    Marco De Vitis Marco De Vitis Mar 12, 2009 5:05 AM in response to JustinHM
    Level 1 (15 points)
    Mar 12, 2009 5:05 AM in response to JustinHM
    JustinHM wrote:
    I have the same problem - the pdf in question is CMYK generated by InDesign. I have seen CMYK jpgs appear inverted, so I wonder if that might be it?

    Indeed, I stumbled upon the same problem. AFAICT it can be fixed by adding a conversion to RGB to the ColorSync filter: clicking on the down arrow at the right of the filter name, choose (roughly translating back from my Italian system) "Add color management component" -> "Convert to profile", then configure the added component by choosing something like "Adobe RGB".

    Anyway, a pity that ColorSync filters cannot reduce PDF file sizes as much as any PDF printer (even free ones) on Windows will do :-/.
  • by ae9eayi4qe,

    ae9eayi4qe ae9eayi4qe Mar 24, 2009 10:46 PM in response to Jerome Colas
    Level 1 (10 points)
    Mar 24, 2009 10:46 PM in response to Jerome Colas
    Hi Jerome,
    My tweaking of quartz filters didn't work to compress a pdf. Do you know why this could be? I downloaded your filters and they work great. I've seriously spent about 5 hours trying to get my quartz filter tweaks to do something...but they don't do anything. Does it have to do how the pdf is created in the first place (from my Canon AIO printer/scanner)? Why would your filters work? Also, the native "reduce file size" on my mac works fine...but it renders the result unreadable almost. And another question, why is Preview kind of blurry compared to Adobe Reader? Do I really have to spring $450+ for Adobe Acrobat Pro?
    I hope you're out there somewhere in cyberspace.
    Yours truly,
    Sai
  • by Katedu,

    Katedu Katedu Mar 28, 2009 9:20 PM in response to ae9eayi4qe
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Mar 28, 2009 9:20 PM in response to ae9eayi4qe
    I had the same experience. I followed some instructions on making quarz filters using the ColorSync Utility. But those didn't reduce my file size for some reason. However the filters I downloaded here worked fine.

    Thanks!
    - K

    PS Same here with the Mac "reduce file size" -- way too blurry! I also agree that Preview is blurrier than Adobe Reader. It's not too bad though.
  • by JWLoft,

    JWLoft JWLoft Apr 4, 2009 11:55 AM in response to Jerome Colas
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Apr 4, 2009 11:55 AM in response to Jerome Colas
    Thanks so much. Compressed my 8.6 M to 2.8 with no noticeable loss. Now can email.

    Thanks for the time saver. Not sure why Apple doesn't provide this standard.
  • by 6ears,

    6ears 6ears Apr 24, 2009 10:44 AM in response to Jerome Colas
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Apr 24, 2009 10:44 AM in response to Jerome Colas
    OK, so I'm an idiot, I admit...I can't figure out how to unzip and open your filters. When I click on it, it says there's no default application specified to open the document and then asks me to choose one. Can anybody help me out here? Thanks!
  • by alloceki,

    alloceki alloceki Apr 30, 2009 9:34 AM in response to 6ears
    Level 1 (10 points)
    Apr 30, 2009 9:34 AM in response to 6ears
    No you are not an idiot, there must be some bug: click on the little down arrow next to the file description in the iDisk folder. The filters folders should appear with no problem in your download folder ready to use (under the name "filters"). Then you move the whole thing in your user Library as directed.
  • by twheidt,

    twheidt twheidt May 29, 2009 7:07 AM in response to Jerome Colas
    Level 1 (0 points)
    May 29, 2009 7:07 AM in response to Jerome Colas
    Jerome -- You are a genius! Thanks so much for this handy download. I've been pulling out my hair for days trying to figure out how to reduce the file size on some scanned documents. Works wonders, I'm going to be using this new functionality a lot.
  • by BiggStuu,

    BiggStuu BiggStuu Jun 19, 2009 9:35 AM in response to Jerome Colas
    Level 1 (75 points)
    Jun 19, 2009 9:35 AM in response to Jerome Colas
    Jerome...all I can say is...YOU DA MAN!!!

    This saved my hide today in a deadline. Keep up the good work.
  • by Markus Oliver,

    Markus Oliver Markus Oliver Jun 26, 2009 9:45 AM in response to Jerome Colas
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jun 26, 2009 9:45 AM in response to Jerome Colas
    YOU ARE THE MAN! Thanks a lot! Unfortunately Automator can't save these PDF into one file, but it is great!
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