#34 PdfBooklet processes only the left pages of a scanned booklet that has been cut apart

[Ransom]

If I cut a scanned DIN A5 booklet into two halves (right and left) à DIN A6, combine these two halves into a continuously paginated DIN A6-PDF and then try to use this PDF to create a print template à DIN A4 using PdfBooklet, PdfBooklet only processes the left pages (and doubles them at the same time), while ignoring the right pages as if they did not exist.

I have described the problem in more detail in the Discussions – see here.

[Averell]

Hello,
you are not using the right way. As you noticed, Acrobat does not really crop a page, but only
makes the cropped part invisible. But PdfBooklet always uses the real data, and hence the full image. The reasons of the strange things you see is that in the different processes you use, the the pages come one over the other, or are not visible because they are outside the page, and you are unable to control the process. You re using PdfBooklet for something it was not designed to handle.

To make a good job you must first create a Pdf with single pages, using another tool. I use Irfanview.
- open your original file in it, and open a second instance of Irfanview, which will serve as a clipboard.
- Select the first A6 page, and do Edit/crop
- Copy this page and paste in the second instance.
- In this instance, choose Options/ Multipage images / Append current image to Pdf

The first time, you create a pdf file, for all other pages, you choose this pdf file.
Repeat for each page, it will take less than 15 minutes.
You have then a normal Pdf, with 8 pages and PdfBooklet will handle it without problem.

See attached an example for the first 4 pages (you can add yourself the 4 missing pages).

[Ransom]

Hello Averell,

Thank you for taking the trouble to offer a solution to my problem. However, I don’t like this one for two reasons:

1) Is it a lossy way. I use high resolution scans and I want to have their quality in the finished booklet.

2) It is a very cumbersome way.

I already came up with a similar way that is less cumbersome and less lossy (but I’m still not happy with it). I can extract all the pages as png from the finished cropped file (which cannot yet be used for PdfBooklet because of the invisible part) and then generate them again with Adobe Acrobat to a PDF, which will then be accepted by PdfBooklet. As I said, however, this solution still does not satisfy me.

In the meantime I found out a way (more by accident): I have to crop the left pages using the (free) “Resize Pages...”-tool from the abracadabraTools 2020 and then post-process them using the “Crop to TrimBox...”-tool (also from the abracadabraTools). Finally, I remove the information that is still included (but hidden) using the “Remove Hidden Information” protection tool included in Acrobat.

For the right pages, I use the “Trim and shift …” module from the (very expensive) Quite Imposing Plus to crop, edit this document again with “Crop to TrimBox”, etc.

If I put these two right and left PDFs together into one PDF, the latter can now be used in PdfBooklet without any problems.

[Averell]

Hello, Ransom, I don't think it is lossy, provided the parameters when creating the pdf are correct.
Cumbersome, yes, I understand well.
Anyway, the only way to obtain good results is to get a Pdf with single pages, and not double pages cropped.
Note that Irfanview has a batch mode which is very powerful. I extracted your left pages in 5 minutes. And it would have been the same time for 500 pages.

• Extract the images (multipage images menu)
• open one of the files
• choose Batch conversion/rename
• Check advanced mode and set the parameters properly
• Save your configuration for reuse
• Set the output directory and/or choose the rename pattern
• Go
• Same thing for right pages
• Create your Pdf
• You are done.

Examples with your left pages

[Averell]

Parameters used to extract the left pages :

[Ransom]

Hello Averell,

thank you very much for your effort in explaining to me in more detail your way using IrfanView. Although I have been using IrfanView for over 25 years, I did not know it was such a powerful tool. Thanks for the hint about the option “multipage images\Extract all images ...”.

My document uploaded here was already lossy because of upload problems. If I use my original scan and use IrfanView as you described, there are even big losses. Therefore, the way via IrfanView is out of the question for me. You write:

Anyway, the only way to obtain good results is to get a Pdf with single pages, and not double pages cropped.

The thing is that when scanning, you can only scan the double pages, or if you have a professional scanner, it’s easier to scan all the double pages of the (unstitched) booklet. There is simply no getting around the subsequent (digital) cropping. “The reasons of the strange things”, as you write, seems to be with Adobe. However, with the method I described, I have now succeeded in eliminating “the strange things” and generating a lossless, one-page PDF (very fast, approx. 1 min.), which in turn is accepted by PdfBooklet.