Convert Title Page from LaTeX (or the resulting PDF) into a PNG thumbnail

Question

I have written a book in LaTeX using TeXStudio. My title page, which is the book cover, is created using LaTeX source (including images in it), rather than drawn in a graphical program, such as Illustrator.

I need to create several different sized PNG thumbnails of the book cover for my website.

The best result I was able to achieve was importing the PDF into Photoshop in 900 dpi and then exporting it as PNG. Howevever the text on the title page seems to be a little washed out.

Is there a better way such as using LaTeX source for the title page to compile it into EPS and then opening the EPS file in Illustrator and exporting it to PNG using "Type Optimise" (I've done this for one of my vector graphics with good results).

Or perhaps ImageMagic could be used for this? Any solution that would produce PDF -> PNG thumbnail with sharp text (and graphics) would be great!

Answer 1

As you mentioned in your question, good results can be achieved by opening an EPS-file in Illustrator for conversion to PNG. The best way to do this in my opinion is the following

1. open the eps file in Illustrator
2. if necessary, trim the "Artboard" size to the size of graphics
3. use the "Save for Wed & Devices"
4. choose settings for the PNG file
5. click on the "Image size" tab and set the target image width or height in pixels
6. click "Apply" to resize the image according to your settings
7. save the reulting image

This procedure generates very good PNG images of any illustratons and seems to scale all lines so that they are visible. I use this technique to generate excellent graphics for Beamer presentations and Beamerposters as well as for submission of LaTeX manuscripts.