1EPSTOOL(1) General Commands Manual EPSTOOL(1)
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6 epstool - Edit preview images and fix bounding boxes in EPS files.
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10 epstool command [ options ] inputfile outputfile
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14 epstool is a utility to create or extract preview images in EPS files.
15 It can also calculate optimal bounding boxes.
16 EPS (Encapsulated PostScript Format)
19 EPS is a specialised form of a PostScript file that complies with the
20 Document Structuring Conventions (DSC) and is intended to be embedded
21 inside another PostScript file. An EPS file must contain a special
22 first line that identifies it as an EPS file (e.g. %!PS-Adobe-3.0
23 EPSF-3.0) and it must contain a %%BoundingBox: line. The EPS file only
24 draws within the rectangle defined by the bounding box. The PostScript
25 code must avoid using PostScript operators that would interfere with
26 the embedding. These include operators with global effects such as
27 changing the page size and changing the half tone screen.
28 PREVIEWS
31 EPS files may contain a preview to be used by programs that can't
32 interpret the PostScript code. There are three ways to add a preview to
33 an EPS file.
34 Interchange
37 This preview is included within PostScript comments in a section
38 marked %%BeginPreview: / %%EndPreview. The actual image data is
39 stored in hexadecimal format. This format is most commonly used
40 on Unix.
41 DOS EPS
44 The preview is a TIFF or Windows Metafile. A DOS EPS file has a
45 30 byte binary header which gives offsets and lengths for the
46 PostScript, TIFF and Windows Metafile sections. You can't send a
47 DOS EPS file directly to a printer - you have to remove the
48 binary header and preview first. This format is most commonly
49 used on MS-Windows.
50 PICT The preview is in PICT format stored in the resource fork of the
53 file. This format is most commonly used on the Macinstosh.
54 Epstool provides limited support for this format.
55
58 -t4, --add-tiff4-preview
59 Add a TIFF 4 preview. The preview is monochrome and is intended
60 for use with old programs that won't read TIFF6, such as Word
61 Perfect 5.1 for DOS.
62 -t6u, --add-tiff6u-preview
65 Add a TIFF 6 uncompressed preview. See --add-tiff6p-preview for
66 how to add a greyscale or monochrome preview.
67 -t6p, --add-tiff6p-preview
70 Add a TIFF 6 preview compressed with packbits (simple run length
71 encoding). The preview will normally be full colour, but you can
72 make it greyscale by adding the option --device bmpgray or
73 --device pgmraw, or monochrome using --device bmpmono or
74 --device pbmraw.
75 -tg, --add-tiff-preview
78 Add a TIFF preview using ghostscript to generate the TIFF file.
79 You must specify a suitable TIFF device using --device. If you
80 want a compressed monochrome image, you might use --device
81 tiffg3.
82 -i, --add-interchange-preview
85 Add a monochrome interchange preview.
86 -w, --add-metafile-preview
89 Add a Windows Metafile (WMF) preview. The metafile will contain
90 a bitmap, not vector information. The preview will normally be
91 full colour. See --add-tiff6p-preview for how to add a greyscale
92 or monochrome preview.
93 --add-pict-preview
96 Add a Mac PICT preview. EPSF files with PICT previews can gen‐
97 erally be used only on Mac computers. The preview will be full
98 colour. The AppleSingle and MacBinary formats will contain the
99 EPSF and the preview. The AppleDouble or Resource format will
100 contain the preview only and needs to accompany the original
101 EPSF file. To specify the file format use --mac-single,
102 --mac-double, --mac-binary or --mac-rsrc.
103 --add-user-preview filename
106 Add a user supplied image as a preview. The image can be a Win‐
107 dows bitmap, a PBMPLUS file, a TIFF image or a Windows Metafile.
108 Window bitmaps and PBMPLUS files will be converted to TIFF6 com‐
109 pressed with packbits. TIFF and Windows Metafile images will be
110 added unchanged.
111 --bitmap
114 Create a bitmap of the area within the EPS bounding box. The
115 bitmap type must be specified with --device. If processing a
116 DCS 2.0 file, the separation can be specified with --page-num‐
117 ber.
118 --copy Copy the EPS file. This is generally used with the --bbox option
121 to update the bounding box.
122 --dcs2-multi
125 Convert DCS 2.0 separations to multiple files. See DCS 2.0. If
126 the output name is out.eps, then the separations would be named
127 out.eps.Cyan etc.
128 --dcs2-single
131 Convert DCS 2.0 separations to a single file. See DCS 2.0.
132 --dcs2-report
135 Write the separation names, lengths and CMYK values to standard
136 output. This can be used to identify if a DCS 2.0 file is miss‐
137 ing the composite page or preview.
138 --dump Display some information about the file type and DSC comments.
141 -p, --extract-postscript
144 Extract the PostScript section from a DOS EPS file.
145 -v, --extract-preview
148 Extract the preview section from a DOS EPS file.
149 -h, --help
152 Display a summary of the epstool commands and options.
153 --test-eps
156 Partially test if a file complies with the EPSF specification.
157
160 -b, --bbox
161 Calculate the bounding box using the ghostscript bbox device and
162 update in the EPS file.
163 --combine-separations filename
166 Combine the separations of the input DCS 2.0 file with those of
167 this file. It is an error if the bounding boxes do not match or
168 they contain separations with the same name. This option must
169 be used with --dcs2-multi or --dcs2-single. The composite page
170 may later need to be updated with --replace-composite.
171 --combine-tolerance pts
174 When using --combine-separations, allow the bounding boxes to
175 vary by up to pts points. The default is 0 so the bounding
176 boxes must match exactly.
177 --custom-colours filename
180 When using --replace-composite on a DCS 2.0 file, use the
181 colours specified in this file in preference to those specified
182 in the composite page.
183 -d, --debug
186 Be more verbose about progress. Do not remove temporary files.
187 --device name
190 Specify a ghostscript device to be used when creating the pre‐
191 view or bitmap. For --add-tiff-preview this must be one of the
192 ghostscript tiff devices (e.g. tiffg3, tiff24nc). For any other
193 preview, it must be one of the bmp or pbmplus devices (e.g.
194 bmpgray, bmp16m, pgmraw, ppmraw). For bitmap output (--bitmap)
195 it can be any ghostscript bitmap device.
196 --doseps-reverse
199 When writing a DOS EPS file (TIFF or WMF preview), the default
200 is to write the PostScript before the preview. Using
201 --doseps-reverse puts the preview before the PostScript section,
202 which is required by some buggy programs. Either order is cor‐
203 rect.
204 --dpi resolution
207 Set the resolution of the preview or bitmap. The default is 72
208 dpi.
209 --dpi-render resolution
212 Render at a higher resolution set by --dpi-render , then down‐
213 sample to the resolution set by --dpi. This works when adding a
214 preview image or using --replace-composite , but not when using
215 --bitmap. This improves the preview quality when the original
216 contains a pre-rendered image and --dpi-render is set to match
217 the original target printer.
218 --ignore-information
221 Ignore information messages from the DSC parser. Use at your
222 own risk. These messages usually indicate that something is
223 wrong with an EPS file, but that most EPS handlers probably
224 won't care. An example is a line with more than 255 characters.
225 --ignore-warnings
228 Ignore warnings from the DSC parser. Use at your own risk.
229 These messages are usually about faults in the DSC comments that
230 are recoverable by epstool, but may confuse other EPS handlers.
231 An example is a bounding box that incorrectly uses floating
232 point numbers instead of integer.
233 --ignore-errors
236 Ignore warnings from the DSC parser. Use at your own risk. You
237 really should fix the EPS file first.
238 --gs command
241 Specify the name the ghostscript program. On Unix the default is
242 gs. On Windows, epstool will check the registry for installed
243 versions of ghostscript and use the latest, otherwise it will
244 use gswin32c.exe.
245 --gs-args arguments
248 Specify additional Ghostscript arguments. This might be used to
249 select anti-aliasing with "-dTextAlphaBits=4 -dGraphicsAl‐
250 phaBits=4"
251 --output filename
254 Specify the output file (instead of using the second file param‐
255 eter). Using the filename - causes epstool to write to standard
256 output, which requires the use of --quiet.
257 --mac-binary
260 When adding a PICT preview, use the MacBinary I format. for the
261 Mac
262 --mac-double
265 When adding a PICT preview, use the AppleDouble format for the
266 Mac.
267 --mac-rsrc
270 When adding a PICT preview, use the Resource format for the Mac.
271 --mac-single
274 When adding a PICT preview, use the AppleSingle format for the
275 Mac.
276 --missing-separations
279 When writing a DCS 2.0 file, epstool will normally fail if a
280 separation is missing. When this option is used, it will remove
281 references to missing separations when writing the file.
282 --page-number page
285 When creating a bitmap with --device from a DCS 2.0 file, page
286 specifies the separation to be used. Page 1 is the composite
287 and page 2 is the first separation. Use --dcs2-report to get
288 the list of separations.
289 --quiet
292 Try to run without writing to standard output.
293 --rename-separation oldname newname
296 When copying a DCS 2.0 file with --dcs2-multi or --dcs2-single,
297 rename separation with oldname to newname. This option implies
298 --missing-separations. It is assumed that the new name is just
299 an alias for the same colour and that the CMYK or RGB values for
300 the separation are not changed. This option may be used multi‐
301 ple times. This must be used if the input file incorrectly has
302 two separations of the same name.
303 --replace-composite
306 Some DCS 2.0 files do not have an image in the composite page.
307 This option replaces the composite page with a CMYK image
308 derived from the separations. This option must be used with
309 --dcs2-multi or --dcs2-single. See also the options --dpi and
310 --custom-colours.
311
315 The Macintosh does not use a flat file system. Each file can have a
316 data fork and a resource fork. EPSF files have the PostScript in the
317 data fork, and optionally have a preview in the resource fork as a PICT
318 image. In addition, file type is obtained from the finder info rather
319 than a file extension. File types use a four character code such as
320 "EPSF" or "PICT". When Macintosh files are copied to a foreign file
321 system, the resource fork may be left behind. Alternatives to retain
322 the resource fork are to package the finder data, data fork and
323 resource fork in a single MacBinary or AppleSingle file, or to put the
324 data fork in a flat file and the finder info and resource fork in an
325 AppleDouble file. The Mac OSX finder will handle AppleDouble files
326 automatically when copying files to and from a foreign file system.
327 When copying test.eps to a foreign file system, the data fork would be
328 written as test.eps and the finder info and resource fork to the Apple‐
329 Double file ._test.eps or .AppleDouble/test.eps.
330 Epstool can read MacBinary and AppleSingle files. It can write MacBi‐
332 nary I, AppleSingle, AppleDouble or Resource files. Files written by
333 epstool will have type EPSF and creator MSWD. When adding a preview to
334 test.eps, it is suggested that you create the MacBinary file
335 test.eps.bin. On a Macintosh computer you then need to extract it with
336 StuffIt Expander. Another alternative is to write the AppleDouble file
337 to ._test.eps then copy both files to a file system accessible to a Mac
338 computer.
339 If the output file name starts with . then AppleDouble will be assumed,
341 otherwise if it ends with .as then AppleSingle will be assumed, other‐
342 wise if it ends with .rsrc or /rsrc then Resource will be assumed, oth‐
343 erwise MacBinary will be assumed. When writing a MacBinary file, it is
344 recommended that you end the filename in .bin. To force the file type,
345 use --mac-single, --mac-double, --mac-binary or --mac-rsrc.
346 On Mac OS X you can access a file's resource fork from command line
348 tools by appending /rsrc to the original file name. The easiest way to
349 add a preview to the file test.eps on Mac OS X is to let epstool write
350 in --mac-rsrc format to test.eps/rsrc (see Examples).
351
354 The Desktop Color Separation (DCS) image file format contains a low
355 resolution preview, a main file with the full resolution composite
356 image, and colour separations with full resolution separated plates.
357 The separations will typically contain Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Black and
358 possibly spot colours. There are two versions of DCS 2.0.
359 Multiple File
362 The main file contains %%PlateFile: (name) EPS Local filename
363 comments which give the filenames of the separation plates. The
364 main file may contain a low resolution DOS EPS preview. The
365 separation files do not contain previews.
366 Single File
369 This is an abuse of the EPS specification. The single file con‐
370 tains the main file and the separations concatenated together,
371 which makes the DSC comments incorrect. The main file specifies
372 the byte offsets to the separations using %%PlateFile: (name)
373 EPS #offset size. The single file may then be placed inside a
374 DOS EPS file with a low resolution preview. By default, epstool
375 writes single file DCS 2.0.
376 Epstool can add previews to single and multiple file DCS 2.0. It can
379 split single file DCS 2.0 into multiple files and vice versa. This
380 allows a single file DCS 2.0 to be split, the composite image replaced,
381 a new preview created, and then be recombined into a single file.
382 Some DCS 2.0 files do not have an image in the composite page. To
384 determine if the composite page does not contain an image, use
385 --dcs2-report and look to see if the composite section is very short.
386 Using --dcs2-single --replace-composite replaces the composite page
387 with the headers of the original composite page and a body containing a
388 CMYK image derived from the separations. Set the resolution of the
389 CMYK image using --dpi.
390 When replacing the composite page with a CMYK image using
392 --replace-composite, the --custom-colours option is useful for dealing
393 with DCS 2.0 files that have incorrect CMYK colours, for example speci‐
394 fying that the varnish layer is grey. Each line of the CMYK colours
395 file is formatted like a DSC %%CMYKCustomColor: or %%RGBCustomColor:
396 line, as shown in the example below.
397 %%CMYKCustomColor: 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 Varnish
400 %%CMYKCustomColor: 1.00 0.68 0.00 0.12 (Dark Blue)
402 %%RGBCustomColor: 0.5 0.0 0.0 (Dark Red)
404 DCS2 files should not have two separations with the same name. Epstool
406 will not allow a DCS2 output file to have duplicate separation names.
407 Use --rename-separation to resolve this.
408
411 Add colour preview (24bit/pixel) to EPS file
412 epstool -t6p tiger.eps output.eps
413 Add TIFF (G3 Fax) preview to tiger.eps.
416 epstool --add-tiff-preview --device tiffg3 tiger.eps out‐
417 put.eps
418 Any GS TIFF device can be used, e.g. tiffg4, tiffpack
420 Extract TIFF preview from tiger.eps
423 epstool -v tiger.eps tiger.tif
424 Fix incorrect %%BoundingBox then add TIFF4 preview.
427 epstool --bbox -t4 golfer.eps output.eps
428 Adjust the BoundingBox of an existing EPS file, but don't add a pre‐
431 view:
432 epstool --copy --bbox input.eps output.eps
433 Add user supplied Windows Metafile to EPS file.
436 epstool --add-user-preview logo.wmf logo.eps output.eps
437 Typically used when an application can export EPS and WMF separately
439 but can't export EPS with WMF preview.
440 Add a PICT preview and write an AppleDouble file.
443 epstool --add-pict-preview --mac-double tiger.eps ._tiger.eps
444 To be used by a Mac, both tiger.eps and ._tiger.eps need to be on a
446 foreign file system accessible to the Mac.
447 Add a PICT preview, overwriting the existing resources.
450 epstool --add-pict-preview --mac-rsrc tiger.eps tiger.eps/rsrc
451 On Mac OS X you can access a file's resource fork from command line
453 tools by appending "/rsrc" to the file's original name.
454
457 When adding a WMF preview to an EPS file using -add-user-preview file‐
458 name, the placeable metafile header is removed from the metafile as it
459 is put into the EPS file. When extracting a WMF preview from an EPS
460 file, a placeable metafile header is created from the EPS BoundingBox
461 information. This placeable metafile header assumes that the WMF has
462 its origin at (0,0), which might not be correct.
463 When epstool is creating a TIFF or WMF preview, it will convert palette
465 colour images into 24-bit/pixel.
466 The environment variable TEMP should point to a writeable directory for
468 temporary files. If not defined, /tmp will be used for Unix and the
469 current directory will be used for other platforms.
470
474 epstool was written by Russell Lang <gsview@ghostgum.com.au>
475 This man page was contributed by Martin Pitt <martin@piware.de> for the
477 Debian GNU/Linux system (but may be used by others).
478Martin Pitt and Russell Lang 2005-06-10 EPSTOOL(1)