Wednesday, April 02, 2008

How to convert jpeg images into eps?



If you use windows to write LaTeX files (by editors like WinEdit etc.) you may feel that it is terribly hard to find an effective way to convert a picture with format jpeg, bmp, etc into the appropriate format of LaTex, which is eps.

If you google it you will get many softwares which are mostly non-free. I tried several of them and faced with funny problems. For instant when you convert a picture in one of them, it does it on its trial version but it stamps (!) the outcome eps picture with a very large signature of their company, which makes the picture useless. Another software convert it with very poor quality in its trial version, etc.

I found two simple way to overcome this problem.

First method:

1- First install GSview and GhostScript from this page on your windows.

2- Download the humble, effective and small software called "jpeg2ps" that let you convert jpeg to eps with acceptable quality (and you can increase its quality manually). jpeg2ps is available from here and many other sites, notably CTAN mirrors.

UPDATE: If you are lost and do not know how to work with jpeg2ps software in Windows, read my jpeg2ps pedagogical helps on it.


Second method:

1- First install GSview and GhostScript from this page on your windows.

2- Install the driver of a Postscript printer (denoted by a "PS" at the end of the printer name. This can be done as follows: Start -> Control Panel -> Printers -> Add printer. Press next a couple of times until you reach the page where you can choose between different manufacturers. Choose a Postscript printer.) I have chosen the printer "Apple Color LW 12/660 PS."

3- Now come back to My Computer and find the picture you want to convert. Right click on it and press Edit, or you Open With - > Paint. If you do not know what Paint is, go to Start -> Accessories -> Paint. Now, File -> Print. Choose the printer you just installed. Tick on "Print to a file." Click on the printer Preferences - > Advanced. Where there is "PostScript Option" in the tree diagram, click on the little + sign next to it such that you see its sub-branches. In the "PosScript Output" change the default which might be Optimized for Speed into "Encapsulated Post Script (EPS)." You also can play with other features and properties to change the quality of the outcome EPS picture. Then OK everything and choose a name for the outcoming file. It will be created at the same foldr as the original file was in.

Enjoy!


More information:

How to work with jpeg2ps software in Windows? (Gauge Invariance)

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi Mohammaed,

Why not you use linux for this, any picture editor in linux read eps.

Best
Frank

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the info. More update is good for your sweet weblog Mohammed! :)

Anonymous said...

Its not usefull man jpeg2ps

Sindbad

Anonymous said...

followed the second method that works well, the only thing to add is that finally when the file is created you should add '.eps' to its name such that it get the right extension format.

Anonymous said...

Your second method works with a better quality control

Gon said...

Should try the "convert" command on Linux:

$ convert image01.jpg image01.ps

Xia Xing said...

To convert from eps to jpg using ghostscript:

gs -sDEVICE=jpeg -dJPEGQ=100 -dNOPAUSE -dBATCH -dSAFER -r300 -sOutputFile=myfile.jpg myfile.eps

This produces huge files. You can trim and resize them in image magick:

mogrify -trim -resize 800x600 myfile.jpg

Anonymous said...

Hi,

Thanks for sharing. There is a new google chrome extension that does the conversion. I think it is called either sci2ools or scitools.

Tess said...

Thanks for sharing. Made my day so much easier :-)

Jacq said...

still this post rocks! Just waned to thank you for having it written

Alley said...

Thanks for the third method. Works great on my Dell!