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Full Version: Export setlist to pdf > (really) different page sizes
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Hi, when I export a setlist / collection to a PDF (using the Join into one Pdf option), the resulting pdf file have different pages with really different sizes, which is kind of weird.

The annotated songs seems to be the most problematic and are enormous compared with the non annotated ones. However, the problem sometimes appears also when the "export annotations" option is unchecked. I can send some examples if it's necessary.



The size of the original pdf files is identical.

Any idea?

Thanks.
If the dimensions of the pages are just inherently different sizes, then that's not really something that I can control. For example, if you export all of the images from the PDF pages, you'll probably see that they are all different sizes. There isn't a "page normalization" type feature in MobileSheets that would shrink or enlarge pages to force them to a certain size. That would require rebuilding the pages most likely and would lead to inefficiencies in the generated PDF (because the PDF library I use doesn't support compressed images).

If you are confident all of the original PDF files have identical page/image sizes, then please verify that you have unchecked the "Export cropping" option to ensure that isn't part of the problem.

Mike
Thanks, Mike

I've uploaded an example, if you want to take a look:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1r9ogdr...Nv09R2vsvo

I used just one original PDF file, and the copied it in MS, creating two versions the original and another, annotated one.  I then exported the two songs to PD, with these options:
[Image: _1QTE2eXT_bcdAB1blJ6fNN8x08EUxVEMIa8_nVR...FwsI=w2400]

The resulting PDF has two pages, the first one (the annotated version) is much bigger than the second one, even if both are created from exactly the same original file. 

PS: Upon further investigation, I've discovered that the problem is specific to some PDF readers. For example, PDF Reader from Google Drive (Android version) or Foxit for Windows shows pages with different sizes, while PDF Reader from Google Drive (Chrome for Windows version), not.
It probably depends upon whether those readers are scaling up the page to fit the available width vs showing the page in its original dimensions.  I just looked at the PDF you uploaded, and the first page has dimensions of 34.43 x 48.72 in, while the second page has dimensions of 8.26 x 11.69 in (I can see this in Adobe Acrobat). So that is why you are seeing such a large discrepancy between the two pages. When I am exporting a PDF and have to create a brand new page using a generated image, I scale the image by 300/72 (300 dots per inch divided by 72 pixels per inch to get dots per pixel). This results in a larger image being used which is then scaled down in the PDF when it is displayed on the monitor. I found that this greatly increased the quality of the images in the PDF. Unfortunately, those images are not compressed, so the PDF is generally much larger due to this. 

If you uncheck "Draw highlights behind content", then your page sizes won't be changed at all. This is because I'm able to embed annotations as actual PDF annotations versus having to generate new images for every page where the annotations are drawn behind the content (which is not possible with normal PDF annotations). So you will have to decide which is more important for you.

Mike
I'm really glad you questioned me about this. Turns out I just need to reduce the page size by the scale factor I mentioned in the previous post, and the image will be automatically scaled down to fit the page. So I can still render the image 4x larger to get the high quality, but make the page size match the original PDF page size. So after the next update, this should no longer be an issue for you.

Thanks,
Mike
Thanks Mike, not only your program is fantastic, but also the support you offer to the users is really first class.

Thanks very much.