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Re: Exported PDFs are too big in file size.

  • To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
  • Subject: [mg90983] Re: Exported PDFs are too big in file size.
  • From: Jean-Marc Gulliet <jeanmarc.gulliet at gmail.com>
  • Date: Sat, 2 Aug 2008 03:24:46 -0400 (EDT)
  • Organization: The Open University, Milton Keynes, UK
  • References: <g6uch9$pda$1@smc.vnet.net>

Mahn-Soo Choi wrote:

> I usually export Mathematica plots to PDF format.  I don't like bitmap
> formats.
> 
> The problem is the file size.  Most of the 3D graphics on Mathematica 6 
> are exported to PDF files as large as several megabytes
> (even several tens MB sometimes).
> 
> For example, this simple 3D graphics
> 
> ContourPlot3D[
>  Exp[-(x^2 + y^2 + z^2)/2], {x, 0, 2}, {y, 0, 2}, {z, 0, 2}, 
>  Mesh -> None]
> 
> generates a PDF as large as 3.7 MB!!
> 
> With Mathematica 5, the file size was reasonable.
> 
> Is there something I'm missing with Mathematica 6?
> Thanks in advance for any help.

On my system (Mac OS X Leopard 1.5.4) I would select the plot, then use 
menu "Print Selection" and choose "PDF". The Mac built-in PDF rendering 
engine produces a file of only 628 KB (rather than the 3.6 MB file 
produce by Mathematica), file that is rendered virtually instantaneously 
within Preview (built-in PDF viewer) rather than showing a animation of 
the polygons being drawn.

Having say that, if you need an even smaller size, setting a lower value 
for the option *MaxRecursion* might dramatically decrease the size of 
the PDF file generated by Mathematica. For instance,

     ContourPlot3D[
      Exp[-(x^2 + y^2 + z^2)/2], {x, 0, 2}, {y, 0, 2}, {z, 0, 2},
      Mesh -> None, MaxRecursion -> 0]

yields a 68 KB PDF file when the plot is exported by Mathematica.

Regards,
-- Jean-Marc


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