Thursday, July 31, 2008

How to print oversized PDF documents?


Some of the PDF documents that you want to print are too large to fit even the largest paper sizes that your printer can handle. Acrobat handles this in the Print dialog box by automatically selecting the Shrink Large Pages on the Page Scaling drop-down list. This option automatically scales down the text and graphics on each page to fit the paper size selected for your printer.
When the Shrink Large Pages option is selected, the program automatically selects the Auto-Rotate and Center Pages check box option. When this option is selected, Acrobat routinely rotates PDF documents that are wider than the selected paper size, while at the same time centering the text and graphics that do fit. When this check box is selected in conjunction with the Shrink Oversized Pages to Paper Size option, Acrobat shrinks the text and graphics on each page so that they all fit and are centered on the page. If you have a PostScript printer installed on your system, you can print oversized pages in your PDF documents using a method called tiling. When you print oversized pages by tiling, Acrobat or Adobe Reader divides each oversized page into sections, each of which is printed on a single page of paper. You can then fit the printed pages together to see how the oversized page will appear when printed with a printer that can handle the oversized paper.
Acrobat gives you two print tiling options on the Page Scaling drop-down list:
Tile Large Pages (only pages larger than the selected paper size are tiled) and Tile All Pages. Selecting either of these options displays the following new settings in the Print dialog box:
  • Tile Scale: Enter a value in this text box to scale the printed PDF file onto tiles. A higher percentage creates more tiles, a lower percentage creates fewer tiles.
  • Overlap: Enter a value in this text box to indicate the amount you want the printing on adjacent tiles to overlap each other so you can more easily align them with each other. Enter a decimal value for this overlap distance of anywhere between 0.125 and 0.25 inches. You need this overlap distance, because laser printers have to maintain a minimum of blank space on the page where they grab and pull the paper. The exact value you enter depends on your particular printer and the page size your tiles use.
  • Cut Marks: Choose an option from this drop-down list to indicate which guide marks you want printed on the page. Select None to have no guides printed for cropping the tiled printout, or select either Western (the crosshatched registration marks universally used in North American and European printers) or Eastern style cut marks.
  • Labels: Select this check box to print descriptive labels on each tile.

1 comments:

Digital Rights Management Software said...

Hi all,

There are two print settings that most directly affect how our online PDF documents print, the Shrink oversized pages to paper size and Auto-rotate and center pages settings. To print an oversized document on your desktop printer, you can print each page of your document in pieces, called tiles, and then trim and assemble those pieces. If you prefer, you can scale the document to fit the available paper size. Thank you...