Just to add to this one thing which has changed in the latest version (since Snow Leopard, I think) - it confused me for a while until I learnt about how the change worked (can¹t remember now where I read it):
It used to be that to add/copy pages from one pdf to another (or even, as Kirk notes, add-in a whole pdf) you just dragged/option dragged them into the sidebar (as per Kirk¹s article) - you could then either ³save² or ³save as² to create a new document with the extra pages (depending whether you also wanted to retain the unchanged original). If you try this in the new Preview, say just drag another pdf into the sidebar, you will notice that rather than adding it to the original pdf, Preview now treats them as two separate pdfs just displayed in the same window if you ³save² or ³save as² then you will be saving just one of these 2 pdfs (whichever is in focus at the time). I originally thought this was a major backwards step until I learnt the new method to do this: If you want to ADD the dragged pages (or whole pdf) to the original document, when you drag them to the sidebar you need to drop them ON TOP OF the sidebar icon of the original pdf the sidebar icon will then ³open up² to allow you to place the dragged content where you want it - before, after or in-between pages of the original pdf (assuming the original pdf was multi-paged). You will then see that Preview then lists the window contents as: ³name.pdf (page x of n)² (ie as a single document) rather than ³name.pdf (page x of a) (2 documents, n total pages)² Once you get used to it, the new method is great you can work with multiple pdf documents in the same window and add/subtract pages from the individual documents and save the documents separately it¹s just not that obvious how that works if you are used to the old method! Cheers Neil -- Neil R. Houghton Albany, Western Australia Tel: +61 8 9841 6063 Email: n...@possumology.com on 18/3/10 9:24 AM, Ronda Brown at ro...@mac.com wrote: > Hi People, > > After Peter's comments about Preview, I felt perhaps some people are unaware > of what a very good application Preview is. > Quite some time ago Kirk McElhearn, Macworld published this article. > In the original document there are a couple of images, which I have excluded > due to WAMUG Mailing list not wanting attachments sent to the List. > --------- > Preview¹s hidden powers > 8 things you didn¹t know you could do with this built-in tool > > by Kirk McElhearn, Macworld.com <http://Macworld.com> > > Apple¹s Preview is more than just a fast and efficient program for reading > PDFs, viewing graphics, and running slide shows. The version that comes with > Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard) has some powerful features stashed away in its menus. > Now you can enhance your images, annotate and merge PDFs, print multiple > images on one page, and moreall without opening a specialised (and often > expensive) image editor or PDF tool. Read on to discover eight great things > you can do with Preview. > > 1. Annotate PDFs > One of the best things about Adobe¹s Portable Document Format (PDF) is that it > allows you to share documents while making sure that everyone sees the same > layout, even if the recipients don¹t own the software that created the > document. You can create PDF files from the Print dialog box of any Mac OS X > program and then send them to friends and colleagues. In the past, if you had > detailed comments about the PDFs your colleagues sent you, you were stuckyou > couldn¹t change the text, so you had to put your suggestions in another file, > such as an e-mail message. Alternatively, someone in your group had to buy a > copy of Adobe¹s $449 Acrobat Professional 8 to allow you all to add comments > directly to the file. > > But Leopard¹s Preview lets you add notes, highlight and strike through text, > or use ovals and rectangles to call attention to specific sections of the > page. You can even add links to other pages in a document or to Web sites. > Best of all, other PDF readersincluding both Mac OS X and Windows versions of > Adobe Acrobat Readercan view all of these annotations. > > To begin, open any PDF in Preview and then choose Tools: Annotate. A submenu > gives you four options: Add Oval, Add Rectangle, Add Note, and Add Link. Use > either the oval or the rectangle shape to draw attention to specific elements > on the page (see ³Share Comments²). Select the one you want in the menu and > then click and drag to draw. Select the shape on the page and drag it around > to position it precisely, or drag one of its corners to resize it. > > Share Comments: Preview lets you mark up your documents through a variety of > annotation tools, including ovals and notes. > > To add comments, choose Add Note and then click where you want the note to > appear; you¹ll see a small yellow icon that looks like a speech bubble. Place > this wherever you like. Enter your text in the yellow box that appears in the > margin. To move a note¹s icon later, double-click on it. A dark box around the > icon means that it¹s selected. You can then drag it to a new location. > > Want to link to a Web page that explains something in more depth, or to a note > or table at the end of a document? Choose Add Link and then click and drag to > create a link box over the text or area you want to link to something else. > (You can also select some text and then choose Add Link, to have the link > applied to the selected text.) When you do this, an Inspector appears, with > the Annotations tab selected. Click on the Action menu and choose either Link > Within PDF if you want to link to another page in the document, or URL to link > to an external Web page. To complete the link within your document, scroll to > the page you want as the target and then click on Set Destination. To link to > a URL, type the full address in the URL text field (including http:// ) and > click on Set URL. Save and close the file, and when you reopen it, the link > will be active. > > One big downside to using Preview¹s links is that they aren¹t indicated in > PDFs. (If you happen to pass a cursor over the spot, it will change from an > arrow to a hand.) Make sure readers don¹t miss yours by underlining the text > or highlighting the area with an oval or rectangle. > > To mark up the text, select some text in the document and then choose Tools: > Mark Up. (Hold down the option key while selecting, to choose text in a > column.) Pick from options including Highlight Text, Strike Through Text, and > Underline Text. Unfortunately, you can¹t replace or add text in-line (in other > words, you can¹t replace or directly add to any part of the text). You have to > indicate those changes in a note. > > If you need to edit your annotations later, open the document again, choose > View: Sidebar, and then, from the pop-up menu at the bottom of the sidebar, > choose Annotations. Click on one of your annotations in the sidebar to make it > active; you can now edit, move, or delete it. To edit links, select the > Include Links option at the top of the sidebar, and click on a link to edit it > in the Inspector. > > 2. Delete or Rearrange PDF Pages > When you open a multipage PDF in Preview, you may find that you want to delete > extraneous pages or change the order of pages. You can do this easily: display > the sidebar if it¹s not visible (press Command-shift-D if it¹s not), and then > select a page and press Command-delete. To move a page, select it and drag it > to the desired location. You can even add blank pages, if you want: select the > page after which you want to add a blank page, and then choose Edit: Insert > Blank Page. > > 3. Merge PDFs > What if you have two PDFs, and you¹d like to make a single document or move > pages from one file to another? Before Leopard, you could do this only in > Acrobat Professional or with a utility like MonkeyBread Software¹s free > Combine PDFs. Now Preview makes it a piece of cake. Open both PDFs and make > sure the sidebar is visible. Drag a page from one document¹s sidebar to > another, and drop it in the appropriate location. To add an entire document, > you can drag the file¹s proxy icon (the icon in the title bar) to any location > in the other document¹s sidebar. > > 4. Crop and Resize Images > Say you need to quickly resize or crop an image to send to a friend or post on > your blog. There¹s no need to open an image editorPreview¹s image-editing > features can do the trick. To crop an image, open it and then click on the > Select button in the toolbar (if you don¹t see a square on this button, click > and hold it and choose Rectangular Selection). Click and drag to create a > rectangle around the area you want to crop. You can resize this rectangle by > dragging one of its corners, or you can move it if you need to. Then choose > Tools: Crop or press Command-K. If you like what you see, save the file; if > not, press Command-Z to go back to the original image. > > You can then resize your image and even change its resolution. Choose Tools: > Adjust Size to enter a width or height in pixels, inches, or other units > (choose the unit you want from the pop-up menu to the right of these fields). > To maintain the image¹s proportions, make sure to select the Scale > Proportionally option. To make an image smaller without losing quality, keep > Resample Image selected. > > 5. Quickly Mask Part of Your Image > Sometimes you have a picture of a person or an object that¹s in front of a > confusing background, and you¹d really like to see that person without the > clutter. Preview has two nifty features that let you do thisInstant Alpha and > Extract Shape. To use the first, open a picture and then click and hold the > Select button in Preview¹s toolbar. From the menu that appears, choose Instant > Alpha. Next, click and drag to remove background areas of the image. Start by > dragging small areas to see how Preview expands the selection. You don¹t have > to get everything in one passjust click and drag again to add to your > selection. If you make a mistake, press the escape key to remove the selection > altogether or option-drag to deselect particular areas. When you¹ve > highlighted everything you want to remove, press return to crop the background > from your picture. > > Using Extract Shape is even easier. Choose it from the Select button menu, and > then start drawing a line around the item you want to retain in your picture. > As you do this, a thick red line follows your cursor. Make sure to draw > entirely around the item you want to keep; continue until you¹ve joined the > beginning and end of your line. You¹ll then see a number of handles on the > line. Move any of these if you need to improve part of your outline. Don¹t > worry about drawing perfectly. The magic starts when you press returnPreview > calculates what to keep, and removes your picture¹s background. In many cases, > you¹ll be able to crop out all the dreck the first time, though with some > pictures you may need to repeat the process a couple of times. > > 6. Adjust Image Colour and More > Adjust Colours: Don¹t bother opening an image editor when you need to make a > few enhancements to your picture. Preview¹s Adjust Colour palette lets you > tweak colours, brightness, and more. > > Programs such as Apple¹s iPhoto offer tools to adjust image colour, > brightness, and exposure, but what if you simply want to adjust a single image > without adding it to your iPhoto library, or you don¹t have the iLife suite. > Open the image in Preview and then choose Tools: Adjust Colour. The tools in > this palette let you tweak your picture¹s colour balance and brightness and > even add a sepia tone to it (see ³Adjust Colours²). Move the different sliders > to see, in real time, what your picture will look like if you save your > changes. For pictures that are too dark or overexposed, try clicking on the > Auto Levels button to see if that fixes them. > > 7. Print Multiple Images per Page > It¹s a shame to waste a lot of paper printing a handful of images one to a > page. While many programs let you print a bunch of images on a page, they > typically require multiple steps to do so. Preview has a printing trick that > does it automatically. First, put all your images in a single Preview window. > If you already have one image open, display Preview¹s sidebar and then drag > the other images from the Finder to the sidebar. If you don¹t have any images > open, you can open them at once by dragging them all onto Preview¹s icon in > the Dock or in the Finder. Next, select all the images in the sidebar by > clicking on one and then pressing Command-A. Now choose File: Print Selected > Images, or press Command-P. In the dialog box that appears, choose the number > of images you want on each page from the Images Per Page pop-up menu. (Don¹t > see this? Reveal more options by clicking on the disclosure triangle to the > right of your printer¹s name.) You can choose to have multiple copies of each > image if you check the Print N Copies Per Page option; otherwise, each image > is printed once. > > 8. Add Keywords to Your Images or PDFs > Spotlight keywords make it possible for you to find certain files easily by > using a special keyword that other files won¹t contain. For example, if you > add the keyword REPVOLC to that report you are writing about volcanoes, > Spotlight will find it instantly. > > You can add Spotlight comments to any file by selecting it in the Finder, > pressing Command-I, and typing in the Spotlight Comments field. But if you > send files by e-mail or iChat, or even just transfer them over a network, > comments added in this way disappear. To add keywords permanently in Preview, > open the file and select Tools: Inspector (or press Command-I). In the palette > that appears, click on the Spotlight tab. Click on the plus sign (+) to add a > new keyword, and then type your text. You can add as many keywords as you > want. (Note that this doesn¹t work for images in PNG format.) When you¹re > done, save the file. Now these keywords will stay put, no matter where the > file travels. You¹ll find them in the Finder¹s Info palette (Command-I) in the > More Info section, listed under Keywords. > > Cheers, > Ronni > > 17" MacBook Pro Intel Core 2 Duo > 2.4 GHz / 4GB / 800MHz / 500GB > OS X 10.6.2 Snow Leopard > Windows 7 Ultimate (under sufferance) -- The WA Macintosh User Group Mailing List -- Archives - <http://www.wamug.org.au/mailinglist/archives.shtml> Guidelines - <http://www.wamug.org.au/mailinglist/guidelines.shtml> Unsubscribe - <mailto:wamug-unsubscr...@wamug.org.au>
