Anyone Else Hate PDF's

rainiswet

101 pages

Posted
April 25, 2008 - 8:15pm

Anyone Else Hate PDF's

So, Online, my script is like 81 pages, but when its been converted into word then PDF, it shrinks to like 75. Its not so much a problem as it is irritating.

SpreadLight

129 pages

Posted
April 26, 2008 - 12:03am

RE: Anyone Else Hate PDF's

Same here :)
Mine shrank from 48 to 29 or something like that. And it cramped a lot of my words together into paragraphs that weren't supposed to be there.

*sigh*

technology.

---
You can't wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a club.
~Jack London

Screnzy '06--The Underdogs
NaNoWriMo '07--Zella
Screnzy '08--Jonah! :)

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thesnowleopard

103 pages

Posted
April 26, 2008 - 12:12am

RE: Anyone Else Hate PDF's

I had the same problem. Mine was 101 pages and shrunk to 92. Had to write for another day to get it back up.

What I discovered is that the PDF shrinks everything to single-space. So, if you have any spaces between sections (as you should according to the formatting rules), you lose those in the PDF.

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2008: (ScriptFrenzy) Off Season (won!)
2007: Confederation (*so* won)
2007: (ScriptFrenzy) Serpentine (won)
2006: The Definition of a Madman (won)
2005: The Mighty Quinn (won)

JohnG.

117 pages

Posted
April 26, 2008 - 4:19am

RE: Anyone Else Hate PDF's

This is an area where having a good formatting software program really helps. I was sure that my Final Draft formatted Screenplay of 118 pages would shrink dramatically in the PDF format. Not so! I lost one page and I am not sure if that was from formatting or from my own re-writing before I did the format switch to PDF.

Incidentally, IMPORTANT NOTICE: to any FINAL DRAFT users who may be having difficuty getting your program to easily convert your screenplay to a PDF FILE. It could, as it was with me, be that you are running an older version of FINAL DRAFT! That will need to be upgraded. If you have your customer ID Number handy you can download the latest version from: FinalDraft.com.

HOPE THIS HELPS!
GOOD LUCK!
WRITE ON!

"It's never too late to become what you might have been."
- George Eliot

Dennis Jernberg

171 pages

Posted
April 26, 2008 - 4:26am

RE: Anyone Else Hate PDF's

I had no problem. I'm using the BBC script template (VBA-heavy -- you are warned!) for Word. My shrinkage came when I downloaded and installed the recommended Courier Final Draft font set (RECOMMENDED!). I loaded my Word script file into OpenOffice Writer and used it to convert to PDF. This was simply a test, but it worked beautifully. But make sure you get the Courier Final Draft fonts!

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Script Frenzy 2008: Spanner
Project Blog: Spanner's World

Taffy McTaffy

119 pages

Posted
April 26, 2008 - 6:42am

RE: Anyone Else Hate PDF's

Celtx did that to me, as well, when I used the TypeSet thingy. It didn't matter, since my script's 116 pages anyway and only ended up at 114, but it certainly was annoying.

But the damn PDF didn't save anyway, so I used PrimoPDF instead. Very simple and formatted it just as it was in Celtx (or near enough). Others recommend Cute PDF, so they might be better alternatives if the page-shortening becomes a nuisance.

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Arlene C. Harris

100 pages

Posted
April 26, 2008 - 7:49am

RE: Anyone Else Hate PDF's

Mine came out exactly the way I wrote them. I wrote them in MSWord (no scriptwriting program) and used freepdfconvert.com to create the PDF, and it came out looking exactly and counting exactly as submitted.

_______________________________________
Nano 2007: If Wishes Were Horses (aka IWWH) winnah!
Screnzy 2008: C4 (formerly IWWH, the GN) winnah!

Golden Ticket for Script Frenzy Donors
J. Daniel

100 pages

Posted
April 26, 2008 - 11:40am

RE: Anyone Else Hate PDF's

Funny, I had the exact opposite thing happen. I wrote the first half of my script in plain text, then switched to CeltX, and when I turned it into a PDF, I'd gained something like ten pages. Very strange.

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NaNoWriMo 2007- The Januarian: 27,500 words
Screnzy 2008- The Mad Scientist of Brightwell Road

la_la

100 pages

Posted
April 29, 2008 - 1:54pm

RE: Anyone Else Hate PDF's

I just typed, what microsoft said was 96 pages. And when I converted it, it turned to 93!!!

arnis1

101 pages

Posted
April 29, 2008 - 2:35pm

RE: Anyone Else Hate PDF's

I wrote 103 pages. Jumped up and down. Screamed self congratulations. Then converted to PDF and learned I'd only written 91. Which wouldn't have been so bad if I hadn't already told friends I'd finished. Or if I hadn't spent all day ignoring all life to write. Or if the whole jumping up and down screaming thing hadn't happened.

Yeah. It's irritating. I've had to think up more story. But mostly it's embarrassing.

Casseh Valentine

100 pages

Posted
April 29, 2008 - 3:24pm

RE: Anyone Else Hate PDF's

I did mine with Celtx (which converts it to PDF for you) and it didn't shrink it at all like I thought it would, and I have it spaced properly and everything.

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Shadow of the Millennium - '07 NaNoWriMo Winner

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