T
Top Spin
I am writing a beginning piano method in Word (2000). For the graphic
illustrations, I am using Visio (2002) and a music notation program
named Mozart (2005).
I ran into some trouble because the Word document was getting very
large (almost 10MB and growing). This made it slow to load, save, and
work with. So I started looking for alternatives.
I discovered that Mozart can export its music images in a variety of
graphic file formats, so I did a little expermientation. I created a
1-page musical piece (Take Me Out to the Ball Park) in Mozart. I then
exported it in 5 file formats: bmp, emf, jpg, png, and tif.
I then opened each file with Visio and saved it as a Visio file. The
EMF file opened as a full page. All of the other files opened about 6
times the size of a page. All I saw was a small portion in the center
of the sheet music. I had to zoom the document down to about 8% to see
it all.
I then inserted each file into an empty Word document using Insert |
Picture | From file... using the Insert option and save that as a Word
document. All of the files came into Word as a full page. Word must be
doing something to make them fit onto a page.
As a quick test, I inserted the bmp and the emf files into Word
documents with a page size of 4x6. Word scaled the image to fit the
page. When I printed these, the emf version was tine, but clear. In
the bmp version, a lot of the staff lines dropped out.
I then looked at the file sizes and was surprised at the results. The
following table shows the file sizes in KB as reported by Windows
Explorer:
bmp emf jpg png tif
Export 26,064 188 1,313 213 722
Visio 3,178 108 10,271 3,178 3,178
Word 123 41 1,342 234 123
V:W 26:1 3:1 8:1 14:1 26:1
Why are the Visio documents consistently so much larger than the Word
documents containing the same graphics?
Does it have anything to do with the imaes being 6-7 times larger than
a page? But if that is so, then why is the Visio bmp file 1/8 the size
of the bmp export file?
Why did the jpg file grow by 10x and the other two by 4x when loaded
into Visio, but remained the same or shrunk in Word?
I then printed each document. All were about equal quality at 100%
scaling on my HP Laserjet 5000. But when scaled up, the emf file
remained sharp at all sizes. The raster formats started to get fuzzy
edges at 3x and lost some of the fine lines when scaled down below
20-30%.
So, my basic questions is this. It appears that for line art, which is
what most of my stuff it, the EMF format appears superior to the
bitmap formats in every respect. It's smaller in size, scales better,
and edits more quickly.
Are there any reasons not to use EMF exclusively for what I am doing?
--
Running MS Office 2K Pro
with Visio 2002 Standard
PC: HP Omnibook 6000
OS: Win 2K SP-4 (5.00.2195)
Email: Usenet-20031220 at spamex.com
(11/03/04)
illustrations, I am using Visio (2002) and a music notation program
named Mozart (2005).
I ran into some trouble because the Word document was getting very
large (almost 10MB and growing). This made it slow to load, save, and
work with. So I started looking for alternatives.
I discovered that Mozart can export its music images in a variety of
graphic file formats, so I did a little expermientation. I created a
1-page musical piece (Take Me Out to the Ball Park) in Mozart. I then
exported it in 5 file formats: bmp, emf, jpg, png, and tif.
I then opened each file with Visio and saved it as a Visio file. The
EMF file opened as a full page. All of the other files opened about 6
times the size of a page. All I saw was a small portion in the center
of the sheet music. I had to zoom the document down to about 8% to see
it all.
I then inserted each file into an empty Word document using Insert |
Picture | From file... using the Insert option and save that as a Word
document. All of the files came into Word as a full page. Word must be
doing something to make them fit onto a page.
As a quick test, I inserted the bmp and the emf files into Word
documents with a page size of 4x6. Word scaled the image to fit the
page. When I printed these, the emf version was tine, but clear. In
the bmp version, a lot of the staff lines dropped out.
I then looked at the file sizes and was surprised at the results. The
following table shows the file sizes in KB as reported by Windows
Explorer:
bmp emf jpg png tif
Export 26,064 188 1,313 213 722
Visio 3,178 108 10,271 3,178 3,178
Word 123 41 1,342 234 123
V:W 26:1 3:1 8:1 14:1 26:1
Why are the Visio documents consistently so much larger than the Word
documents containing the same graphics?
Does it have anything to do with the imaes being 6-7 times larger than
a page? But if that is so, then why is the Visio bmp file 1/8 the size
of the bmp export file?
Why did the jpg file grow by 10x and the other two by 4x when loaded
into Visio, but remained the same or shrunk in Word?
I then printed each document. All were about equal quality at 100%
scaling on my HP Laserjet 5000. But when scaled up, the emf file
remained sharp at all sizes. The raster formats started to get fuzzy
edges at 3x and lost some of the fine lines when scaled down below
20-30%.
So, my basic questions is this. It appears that for line art, which is
what most of my stuff it, the EMF format appears superior to the
bitmap formats in every respect. It's smaller in size, scales better,
and edits more quickly.
Are there any reasons not to use EMF exclusively for what I am doing?
--
Running MS Office 2K Pro
with Visio 2002 Standard
PC: HP Omnibook 6000
OS: Win 2K SP-4 (5.00.2195)
Email: Usenet-20031220 at spamex.com
(11/03/04)