Re: inserting Word .docs as graphics

["Gary S. Callison" <huey -at- interaccess -dot- com>]

References: <001001c28bfd$5b644580$31c263d8 -at- merant -dot- com> <004601c28c0e$3b491030$8d051342 -at- Bonnie>

On Thu, 14 Nov 2002, bgranat -at- editors-writers -dot- info ("Bonnie Granat") wrote:
> | The challenge is to skip the cumbersome scanning phase and somehow
> | insert the form files as graphics.  She has tried .pdf'ing the forms
> | and inserting them in Word as Objects, but all she gets is the icon
> | image.  The field Link and Ref options also don't do the trick
> | because of formatting problems and dropping the form's headers and
> | footers.
> This is what I did once: I displayed the Word document (or the part of
> it that I wanted in a graphic) in Print Preview at the size I wanted
> the graphic to be. Then I took a picture of it with SnagIt and made a
> .gif. I should think your friend could do that with forms, but maybe
> I'm missing something.

Assuming W2K, here's how to make a print-to-JPG printer driver. You need
three pieces: 
1) a windows printer driver that only prints PostScript
   (I'm using the Apple Color LaserWriter 12/660PS),
2) a thingy called 'RedMon' from 
   <http://www.cs.wisc.edu/~ghost/redmon/index.htm> to create a 
   printer queue that redirects the printer queue to STDIN for a 
   program, and 
3) GhostScript <http://www.cs.wisc.edu/~ghost/doc/AFPL/get704.htm>
   to turn the PostScript into a JPG. 

You do this by installing RedMon and GhostScript, adding a new printer
(I call mine 'Print-to-JPG'), under 'Ports' choosing 'Add a new port', 
and pulling down 'Redirected port' from the list. After you've added the
printer, you go to the Properties pane for that, and on the Ports tab
there's a button for 'configure port'. Configure the port as follows: 

Redirect this port to the program: 

C:\(full path to the Ghostscript executable)\gswin32c.exe

frinstance, mine says:
C:\Progra~1\gs\gs7.04\bin\gswin32c.exe

Arguments for this program are: 
@C:\(full path to the config file)\jpeg.rsp -sOutputFile=C:\(full path to
where you want the output to go)\output.jpg - 

(that space and '-' sign on the end there are important)

again frinstance, mine says: 
@C:\Progra~1\gs\jpeg.rsp -sOutputFile=C:\Docume~1\callisong\MyDocu~1\mypict~1\tmp.jpg -

Output: Copy temporary file to printer
Printer: (name of a printer. Doesn't matter, we're not printing anything)
Run: Normal  and check 'Run as User'

Then you need to create the config file. 
In notepad, I wrote my C:\Progra~1\gs\jpeg.rsp to look like this:
 -Ic:\progra~1\gs\gs7.03\lib;c:\progra~1\gs\fonts
 -sDEVICE=jpeg
 -r600
 -dNOPAUSE
 -dSAFER
 -sPAPERSIZE=letter

where the first two args are paths to the \lib & \fonts directory, and 
the -r600 is the resolution you want in dots-per-inch. 72 looks blocky,
but 600 makes a one-page screencap take up about 2 meg- I'm more 
interested in 'pretty', but if you just want a quick & dirty look at 
what the page is going to look like, '-r72' will probably work just
fine for you. Or something in-between. I like to resize my images myself
for the specific need I have.

Then whenever I get a 'printer selection' dialog box, I choose 
'print-to-JPG', and whatever the printer would have spat out appears as
a JPG in the file I set the path & filename to in the args to GhostScript.

You can also get a thing called GSView 
<http://www.cs.wisc.edu/~ghost/gsview/index.htm> (which requires that 
Ghostscript already be installed) and just set up a 'print-to-file' 
printer using a pure postscript driver, and use GSView to look at the 
output. This way it'll prompt you for a different filename each time 
you print something, and then you can look at multiple *.ps files with
GSView. This spares you the whole bother of installing a printer queue
redirector. ...but I prefer JPGs. More portable, easier to wedge into 
documents & stuff. 

I don't know why Windows doesn't have a 'print preview' built into the OS
instead of in individual apps,  but this is one way to see what a
printout would look like without actually killing trees.

-- 
Huey



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