Cannot determine size of graphic

Question

I'm trying to include graphics in my Latex-file, which I compiled with latex+dvipdf on OS X. Latex however returns this error: "Cannot determine size of graphic"

My graphic is exported from PowerPoint, so I have tried both .pdf and .png. I get the same errors for both.

Sample code that doesn't work:

\begin{figure}[htb]
\begin{center}
\leavevmode
\includegraphics[width=0.8\textwidth]{graph.png}
\end{center}
\end{figure}

If I have to manually set some measurements of the image, please tell me how I can find out those measurements. I need the image to take up about 80% of text width and be centered. Thanks.

Answer 1

The DVI producing latex doesn't support reading the size of PNG, JPG or PDF images. You need to use pdflatex for this. Actually latex is pdflatex in DVI mode in modern distributions, but it can read the sizes only in PDF mode for some reason. You are however able to state the natural size of the images using natwidth and natheight which will make latex compile without error. The produced DVI file will only link to the PDF and the DVI-to-PDF converter will need to include it in the final PDF. AFAIK dvpdf doesn't support this but dvipdfm does.

\documentclass{article}

\usepackage{graphicx}

\begin{document}
\begin{figure}
    \centering
    \includegraphics[width=0.8\textwidth,natwidth=610,natheight=642]{tiger.pdf}
\end{figure}
\end{document}

Compile with either

pdflatex <file base>

or

latex <file base>
dvipdfm <file base>

Answer 2

A non-Latex solution

A very fast solution is to convert the png file into eps format. It can be done easily using graphic software, for instance Inkscape.

So, you only need to open the file in Inkscape and then SaveAs and select eps format.

Now change the extension in the tex file from

\includegraphics[width=0.8\textwidth]{tiger.png}

to

\includegraphics[width=0.8\textwidth]{tiger.eps}

Answer 3

Fix the file name

I got this error with a pdf file which contained dots in the filename. Removing the dots (except the .pdf, of course) fixed the issue.

Fix file type detection

The LaTeX graphics/graphicx package uses the first dot to find the extension. Simply adding \usepackage{graphicx} \usepackage{grffile} fixed the issue without changing file names. Package grffile changes the algorithm to check for known extensions (option multidot, enabled by default).

Answer 4

Sometimes I get this errors when I compile using latexmk myfile.tex and include pdf pictures... It's because I forget to compile to pdf, the correct command must be:

latexmk -pdf myfile.tex

Answer 5

I saw this issue with a jpeg file. By changing its extension from .JPG to .jpg (yes, just capital to lower) the error went away.

$ pdflatex --version
This is pdfTeX, Version 3.1415926-2.5-1.40.14 (TeX Live 2013/Debian) restricted \write18 enabled.

Answer 6

remove the extension in the latex code, all will be fine. The file keep its extension (correct: jpg if jpg, png if png...).

\begin{figure}[htb]
    \begin{center}
       \leavevmode
       \includegraphics[width=0.8\textwidth]{graph}
    \end{center}
\end{figure}

With the latex compiler, the allowed file type are ps or eps, and with pdflatex, png, jpg (jpeg also is found as extension) or pdf. The file must have its extension, and its real extension. A png is the result of a particular encoding of an image, a jpg another. Latex does not recompile images, it looks for files with the right name, with the extensions it handles. You just have to give it the base of the name, then it manages.