Ubuntu – Convert PDF to images to PDF

command lineconvertimagemagickpdfscripts

I have a PDF that I want to show to someone without giving them the ability to copy it. One possible way would be to convert pages to images, then these back into a PDF. How can I use convert or pdftk or otherwise script? Not GUI.

Best Answer

Imagemagick rasterizes everything. You could simply do:

convert -density 200 input.pdf output.pdf

Of course the recipient might decide to run an OCR program on your file. The density parameter sets the resolution expressed as PPI.

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Ubuntu – How to convert a .pdf file into a folder of images

OK well, I did some more research and although tohuwawohu's method does work, I found it easier to use a program called pdftoppm to achieve what I wanted done. Since I am pretty much a layperson when it comes to using command line apps, I will do my best to explain how I got this to work for me.

Navigate to the folder containing the .pdf you wish to edit and open a terminal there. I did this by using the sample command:
```
cd ~/Documents/PDF
```
Let's say the file I want to edit is called Sample.pdf What I want to do is use pdftoppm to create image files of each page of the .pdf. Several formats can be chosen (see the man pages link above) but I prefer to use .png. The basic command looks like this:
```
pdftoppm -FORMAT FILENAME.pdf PREFIX
```
or in the example above:
```
pdftoppm -png Sample.pdf Sample
```
This command creates an image file of each page in the same folder as the original .pdf file with names like Sample-01.png, Sample-02.png and so on. I have tried it with the .png and .jpeg extensions successfully. .jpg is apparently not supported.
Then I just use Archive Manager by selecting all the newly-created image files, right-clicking, and choosing "Compress" from the context menu. I then choose the archive format I prefer (in this case .cbz or Comic Book Zip) and create the new archive.
Now I have a shiny new .cbz file called Sample.cbz which I can then view with my Comix reader!

Hopefully what I have posted above makes enough sense that someone else can learn from it. If I need to change it in any way please let me know.

Ubuntu – Convert PDF to image

One different way would be GhostScript:

gs -dNOPAUSE -dBATCH -sDEVICE=jpeg -r96 -sOutputFile='page-%00d.jpg' input.pdf

where -r96 is desired dpi resolution

Output are multiple JPEG images.

You can generate transparent PNGs also if you wish:

gs -dNOPAUSE -dBATCH -sDEVICE=pngalpha -r96 -sOutputFile='page-%00d.png' input.pdf

Best Answer

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Ubuntu – How to convert a .pdf file into a folder of images

Ubuntu – Convert PDF to image

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