Adding compressed images to a Pages file

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Adding compressed images to a Pages file

Hi!

I'm adding compressed (jpeg-2000) images to my Pages file. When I export it to PDF, the file size does not reflect Pages using my compressed image. It is much much larger then my compressed image is. Of course I can account for the fonts, text and other elements in the PDF, but it does NOT seem to align.

My document HAS to be under 25mb. And with the compressed images its well under that limit. When I export it however, it suddenly gets up to 38mb.

Can anyone help me out here? I've double checked everything, even used a pdf analyze tool to make sure it's the images that cause this.

Is this a know problem? It seems like pages blows up the file size for no reason..

Please help!

Thanks!

Posted on May 30, 2024 6:58 AM

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Answer 1

May 30, 2024 9:50 AM in response to eli4s

PDF compression may use up to five different compression algorithms depending on the content and some compressed images may be made larger by recompressing them when generating the PDF. Pages is not the world's most efficient PDF generator either.

If you have the opportunity to do this from scratch in MS Word saving as a PDF and using the same content as in Pages, how do the resulting PDF sizes compare?

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Answer 2

May 30, 2024 1:03 PM in response to eli4s

You didn't state what version of Pages you were using but if it is recent enough, you can drag and drop SVG images onto it and add them to your custom shapes library. For backward compatibility, Pages will also convert those SVG shapes to PDF for older versions of Pages. I haven't checked if Pages will do the same thing with custom shapes made by exploding various Apple shapes and recombining them.

Adding gradients, outlines, shadows, or frames to images in Pages will introduce transparency and that may contribute to the PDF bloat in some unknown manner.

I just opened a blank template Pages v14 word processing layout document. I dropped a single 12K JPEG image on it, and added a picture frame as a border, a curved shadow, and all at full opacity.

When I look in the Pages document from the Terminal with zipinfo, I see 10554 and 9068 byte JPG images, along with the customary three {preview, preview-micro, preview-web} JPEGs.

zipinfo fhlh.pages

So, figure two JPEGS for every JPG that you add to the document. Adding two of my custom shapes from the Shape library does not create additional PDF or JPG files in the document as these are probably stored in one of the .iwa files as a vector array.

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Answer 3

eli4s Author

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May 30, 2024 11:26 AM in response to VikingOSX

Thanks for the reply! Recreating everything in word is not really possible (because I have used a lot of complex shapes, groups, etc. made in pages I want to use).

However, I've tried to paste a few of the compressed images in a different document. When I export that to pdf, the problem is gone. The file is 2,6mb with 5 of the compressed images. This almost makes me think it's because of all the shapes and groups I‘m using. But the PDF analyser tool clearly states that the images are taking up all 98% of the pdf's size...

Or does Pages convert the shapes (some with gradients, outlines, shadows, frames, etc) into images? That would maybe explain something...

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Answer 4

May 30, 2024 2:05 PM in response to eli4s

I don't know. I dropped foghorn-leghorn into another Pages document without any adornments and still got the same two JPEG images of it. So as I mentioned before, add an image, and get two in its place in the document. The second image is 1500 bytes less than the original, and that can add up if your images are large.

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Answer 5

eli4s Author

Level 1

5 points

May 30, 2024 1:08 PM in response to VikingOSX

Hey, thanks! Does this mean either the shadows or the borders could take up a large part of the pdf's file size? Or would the second jpg come from something else? Thanks :)

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