Finale Forum

Hi,

I'm having a bit of an issue with a file I'm working on.

Basically the staff line thickness on 1 of the staves is very slightly but noticeably thinner than all the rest when I export to jpg... Not sure why this is but I've changed tried changing the line thickness in document options but no joy. Any ideas? It looks fine in Finale but not as jpg!

Thanks!

My first guess is that it has something to do with the resolution of your jpg graphic - in combination with the staff layout settings (vertical staff spacing, scaling percentage, staff line thickness).

Does it have to be jpg?
You can't use PDF instead?
If you "print" the document to a PDF file, the graphic will be vector graphic (= resolution independent).

Hi Peter,

Thanks for the reply! The pdf idea is an option actually I didn't think of that. Any idea if you can print multiple files to pdf in a batch or am I stuck with doing each individually?

doovers wrote:…Any idea if you can print multiple files to pdf in a batch or am I stuck with doing each individually?

The FinaleScript plug-in might be able to do the task for you.
Couldn't hurt to try it.

Are you using Windows or Mac OS X?

Mac, I'll give that a go!

Since you are using Mac, have you considered Automator?

I haven't actually but it's something I'd like to learn a bit about. Any good sources of info on getting up to speed with it?

A web search for the word Automator brings up a lot of resources.

I have not tried it, but here is an idea:

There is an AppleScript script that will convert a document to PDF.
If you use that AppleScript script in an Automator workflow, then it should be possible to convert multiple documents to PDF in a batch.

Would that convert a mus file?

What version of Finale are you using? - 2012? - 2011? - 2010? - 2009?

2012

I have not tried it, but here is an idea:

In the FinaleScript palette for Finale 2012 there is a script that you can use for batch converting to graphic (the script uses Finale's Graphics Tool).
You will have to modify the script, since it is written for conversion to TIFF.
But Finale 2012's Graphics Tool can export to PDF, so I think that you just need to change the script's graphic format to PDF.

There is a limitation in the script:
It can only batch-convert the contents of a folder (not multiple folders).

However, with AppleScript and Automator you may be able to set up a more complex workflow that can process multiple folders.

That sounds exactly like what I need. I'll give that a go tomorrow! Thanks

Hey guys,

May I jump in on the conversation? I came to the forum through a search because of the same issue and was wondering if anyone found a viable solution.

Is there no way to raise the resolution of the JPG prior to exporting it from Finale? PDF isn't really an option for me because I'm often taking that graphic file to Photoshop to be further edited.

Thanks, y'all.

You can edit the PDF in photoshop. What I ended up doing for multiple files (if I remember correctly) was to batch export to PDF with a script from finale, and convert the PDFs to JPGs using a Photoshop action.

I use finale 2009 and and I also get this line thicker scenario.

But I always export as pdf, where the problem doesn't occur - particulary because pdf is vector rather than raster/bitmap.

if you're not sure what the difference is zoom right in (1000-2000%) on a tiff or jpg file and and you'll see the edges of diagonal and round shapes are ragged, whereas if you do the same thing with a pdf they are as they should be (because vector is mathematical rather than pixels).
(though i do understand there are raster pdfs, but the ones I get from Finale are vector..)

There's no pdf option in the graphics export in Finale 2009 so I do this:
File/Print/PDF/Save as PDF

Kroy wrote:…There's no pdf option in the graphics export in Finale 2009 so I do this:
File/Print/PDF/Save as PDF

There is also this:
File/Print/PDF/Open PDF in Preview/File/Save
where the Save dialog gives the option of using various Quartz filters, e. g. “Create Generic PDFX-3 Document”.

I never thanked you guys! Exporting the graphic as PDF, then editing that in Gimp solved my problem! Now all of my staves are showing up thick enough.

THANK YOU!