I have organized some photos, with captions, into PDF files (8.5×11″ paper size). The standard photo printing services, such as Mpix, will print 8.5×11, but they won’t accept PDF files as uploads (maybe because it becomes too hard to print when multiple pages may be printed?).
I could do this with home inkjet printer, right, onto glossy 8.5×11 photo paper? But all that I have currently is a “near photo quality” laser printer.
Isn’t there a service bureau that will accept PDF files, a credit card, and mail the resulting print-outs? Or can this be done at a FedEx/Kinko’s or Staples?
Why isn’t this something that a lot of people want? Everyone wants photo printing from JPEGs, right?
Kinko’s does this.
Make it with MagCloud.com
Nations Photo Lab and you have a choice of glossy, matte, or metallic.
Nations Photo Lab can also bind them into a Photo Book for you, too.
Moveable in Toronto will do it and not fuck it up, unlike every other option suggested here.
You can convert PDF to jpg (or TIF, etc.) if you have the full Acrobat product. I’m sure there are other programs that do this as well.
Jackie: Thanks. Acrobat Pro will expert to JPEG, but it seems to use super low resolution, about 1700×2200 for the final image. So a PDF page with 3+ MB of information becomes a JPEG only about 500 KB in size. I’m not sure that the font would look smooth at this resolution for 8.5×11 (200 dpi instead of a standard laser printer’s 600 dpi).
Jackie: It turns out that if you do the same export but from the Tools menu there is a menu of options for resolution and quality. I was able to get the JPEG up to a LARGER size than the PDF! And to force Acrobat to use 600 dpi. So I guess that is success! Thanks!
OfficeMax and Staples will both take PDFs for high quality printing on their website. I recently took my PDF into OfficeMax instead of using the website and was pretty happy with the results.
I can’t help but see the irony of being unable to print PDFs. A format that was created for printing.
Try
perfectposters.com
I love the 1998 style web interface.
I don’t know which version of Acrobat Pro you are using. In Acrobat Pro XI (which is what I have) , if you do File, Save As Other…, Image, JPG there is a button for Settings… which gives you options for quality and resolution.
I’m not sure that file size is a sure guide to quality because of differences in the efficiency of compression algorithms (or whether compression is used at all). Nor do I know what type of compression is used in JPEG vs PDF. For example, you can take an audio file from a CD and using FLAC squeeze it down to half the size with zero loss of information. Or vice versa – you could uncompress a FLAC file and end up with a file that is twice as big but contains no more information.
Chances are if an image output file is 1/6th the size of the input file you are losing information in there somewhere. But an output file that is slightly bigger or smaller than the input might be of the same quality with the difference being entirely explained by compression method.
Duggal.com
They are in New York City. There must be an equivalent in the Boston area. Or use Duggal and ask them to mail you the prints.
Whoever you use, I would talk to them on the phone and rely on their expertise. That expertise is why they charge a high premium over self-service or Kinko’s.
PDFs are containers; the embedded image may be in a variety of formats (JPEG, TIFF) but the important thing is that you should be able to extract the image without recompression. I don’t know the specifics of your application but I can do it with mine.