Converting Colour PDFs to B&W

[ACraib]

Does anyone know if this is possible?

I've got a few thousand PDFs that are colour and need to convert them to B&W PDFs

 

[Matzki]

What version of acrobat do you have?

 

[ACraib]

The version that comes with Adobe Creative Suite. (not CS2 though)

 

[Matzki]

Select: Save As> Format=Postscript and in the settings tab set your printer profile to Generic Grey Profile then re-distill your new .ps file.

 

[ACraib]

Sorry I didn't get back sooner.

thanks you that works like a charm.

Can I ask one more question ? .... is there a way to batch automate this process as I have quite a few to do ?

Cheers

Andrew

 

[Matzki]

There may be some 3rd party software out there, but within acrobat 6 itself I don't thimk so. Acrobat 7 can make it easier, but not totally automate.

 

[tgreer]

Well... it's "nearly" impossible, due to Acrobat's horrible API. But, Acrobat 6 IAC provides a "GETJSObject" method. It's supposed to be COM, but is so poorly implemented it's actually Visual Basic ONLY. That allows you to perform a "SaveAs" PostScript. Distiller also has an automation interface.

So, with a good deal of non-intuitive programming, it would be possible to take a given folder of PDFs, save them as PostScript, and re-distill them as black-and-white PDFs, automatically.

Every single project I've ever attempted, using Acrobat's IAC, has had to be scrapped due to bugs, and/or non-implemented or poorly implemented objects and methods.

Look into Batch Sequences, instead. You can SaveAs PostScript through a batch sequence. Then, when you're done, drop them all into a Distiller Watched Folder. That is almost automatic.

Thomas D. Greer

http://www.tgreer.com