Printing to PDF Filesize issue

[JeffTech]

Good people,

I currently do drafting for my firm, and am lucky enough to used AutoCAD 2004 currently until we update...

When I print some drawings to PDF, i notice my 500kb CAD file will print a 6-10Mb PDF File. It usually happens with the following

Inserting a Jpeg (which is usually a screen shot from a pdf for a faux quick site plan).

It increases with the following:
- The image is rotated at all.
- The view port shows alot of the image (zoom in too far or out too far it will diminish some)

I am using CutePDF writer as my "printer"
Plotstyle doesn't seem to make a difference, Color doesnt, DPI output doesn't Purging doesnt. I know its the image inserted because I have deleted eveything else out of the drawing just to see.

Help?!

 

[SMiK21]

Does CutePDF allow you to choose the quality of the print?

The PDF printer that I use has a number of quality options that do change the size of the file a lot (e. g. print quality, web quality, etc.)

 

[JeffTech]

I can edit some settings:

For the properties of the drawing:

Vector Graphics - Cannot Change
True Type Text - Cannot Change
Merge control (lines overwrite) - Cannot Change

Raster Graphics Can change the following:
- OLE: No Change in filesize

- Raster and shaded/rendered viewports:
This one will greatly change the size of the file, however, the change in quality is to the point where sliding it one tick away from "Best" causes the drawing to be below par quality wise.
I.E. I get better quality from Printing my 10Mb File, and rescanning it, but this waste paper and time, and I can only do it up to 11x17...

 

[PMR06]

How big are your jpegs and how are you obtaining them from the original drawing? I suspect they are full color 32bit captures from acrobat, which would bloat the jpeg file and of course your output pdf. If you can, try saving the original pdf as tif or convert the screen capture to tif.

 

[MiketheEngineer]

PDF's tend to be much larger than any CAD files. I use PDFfill - free download - and while it also "bloats" seems pretty good!!!

 

[JeffTech]

@ PMR06,
The images I obtain, I really just print screen with Windows, Paste into Microsoft Paint, and then save it as a Jpeg (easiest way I have learned), so however many bits would be in that..

I found CAD and PDF's directly do not like each other, and this has been the easiest way to insert anything that needs to be shown cosmetically (Keyplans etc)

Fyi the image (Jpeg) in the drawing Im working with is only 1Mb.

 

[PMR06]

I try to use tif or bmp when possible. It does not appear the MSPaint generated tifs are importable to AutoCAD.

From MSPaint, I'd try saving the screen captures as bmp. You can try the 3 defaults (24 bit color, 256 color or 16 color) to see how the file size and quality are affected.

 

[JeffTech]

PMR06,

Was a good idea, however no sucess...

Regular Jpeg Prints at about 6.2 Mb

16bit and 256bit both printed about 8Mb,
24 Bit printed at 6.12Mb

Im sure there is a switch in the lost depths of programming hell that needs to be switched to make this work... but where?

 

[MEM1]

I've seen this problem as well. I have seen CAD files print rather large, then use a different PDF Printer driver and it print small. I don't know what the difference is, but you might try some other pdf printer drivers.

 

[JeffTech]

Print Driver eh? Makes sense

Any you guys recommend?

Any Easy to Install on a company server that blocks more content then is helpful?

 

[dik]

I use Doro pdf.... it's freeware and works well with all size sheets (so far).

Dik

 

[JeffTech]

Downloaded Doro and explored it Thanks for the idea

Apon printing I saved 21kb's off the file size... I am thinking the pdf printer maay be the culprit, or that there is no way to print this damn picture without cause 6mb worth of information,... Unless anyone else has a magic lever?

 

[jgailla]

There is also a Reduce File Size in the full Adobe Acrobat package under the File/Save As menu.
The pdf file size printed from AutoCAD (or other source) can be reduced up to ten times, usually around three times.