Document Size = Picture Size (in pixels)

[Jaime_Ramos@adobeforums.com]

I've been doing a lot of picture annotations for this muscle physiology lab I'm doing work for. Basically I take a picture of some muscle, place it into a layer of its own, and with another layer lay down lines, text, etc to annotate the picture. My question is how can I quickly make the document size I'm going to do these annotations in to be the same size as the image measured in pixels? I know I can do Alt Ctrl P to change the art board's size manually (which forces me to look at the picture's properties for its width and height in pixels) but is there some way Illustrator can open the file and size the art board around the pictures full size?

[BobHill@adobeforums.com]

Jaime,

If you Right click the Ruler (Control R) you'll have the option of making all ruler dimension in pixels. Have you tried that? That would include text.

Bob

[Jaime_Ramos@adobeforums.com]

I guess I'm trying to automate the task of placing a JPEG image into an AI document and get Illustrator to conform the artboard to the 100% size of the image (which would be its full w x h pixel dimensions). So far this manual alteration of the artboard's size has been the bottleneck in my operations. Thanks! :-)

Jaime

[Dion_G@adobeforums.com]

Could I ask why you actually want to do that Jaime? There may be an alternative to what you are trying to do depending on the reason.

[Mac_McDougald@adobeforums.com]

I don't get it.

Pixels can be any size at all.

600x800 pixels, for example, can fill 8x11 inches at 72ppi or 3.7 x 5
inches at 160 ppi, and etc.
Same 480,000 pixels, but their size determined by physical output
dimensions.

How can you "size" a page to pixels, when pixels are infinitely
adjustable?

Mac

[Jacob_Bugge@adobeforums.com]

Jaime,

If I understand you in the right way, this is actually not a question of units, but you wish to be able to start working right away with the artwork filling the screen.

Illy always opens the file showing it as you saved the it. This should be easy enough when you go on working on the same annotation.

If you want all new files to open in a specific place on the artboard (centred round 0,0 or something) and with a specific zoom (such as 600), at least there is a roundabout way or two:

Empty one of your files completely and save it under something easy to remember, best starting with 0 or A (to make it appear first with CtrlO).

Open this as your next file and save under the right name before you start working on it.

You can also use CtrlN to create a new file, make the view right, make something (a rectangle, a point with the pen tool, or whatever), close and save with CtrlW, reopen it, remove the whatever, and save it again.

[BobHill@adobeforums.com]

Mac,

Since you can use pixels to establish dimensions of an artboard, I've always considered that the pixel size has been set to a fixed resolution. My new document artboard set to 8½"x11" equals 612 pixels x 792 pixels, converting to 72ppi. This isn't a true ppi, of course, but is scaled and relative AND is for the artboard only. If I put a 72ppi image that is 10.667"x14.222" (768x1024 pixels from PhotoShop) onto that artboard it reads 768x1024 pixels (using Illustrator dimension tool or ruler). BUT, the dimensions of the artboard to the ruler don't change with resolution of any raster placed image that's not at 72ppi. That same image converted to 300ppi in PhotoShop becomes 2.56"x3.413" and when placed into that same pixel units artboard in Illustrator, it becomes proportional to the artboard, but measures 184.2 pixels x 244.7 pixels by artboard dimensions.

This is why you should always establish ppi of raster images in PhotoShop prior to placing into Illustrator. The Res will stay as set in PhotoShop relative to size of your artboard, but pixels of artboard are set to some abstract 72ppi number and sticks for reasons I've not seen anywhere. I'd guess it has something to do with making the artboard into a common WEB screen res and what you put on it, then would size proportionally to it if you save the whole thing to WEB and thus the raster images would also then get reset to total ppi, while if you print, you'll maintain image quality of 300ppi or whatever you bring in.

Maybe one of our resident engineers can put some light onto this.

Bob

[Mac_McDougald@adobeforums.com]

IC (sort of). Thanks for the elucidation.

M

[Jaime_Ramos@adobeforums.com]

I do know that our supervisor eventually wants the images to be printed at 300dpi to follow that standard print quality convention (since these images will likely go into a journal or something). The point about pixels being scaled to any size is true; and I realize my difficulty in communicating what I'm trying to do.

I guess I'll explain the steps I've been going through.
1) I start a new AI document, type in the art board size to 1600 X 1200 pixels, the resolution our digital camera is set to give us image sizes at.

2) In a layer of its own I place that one of those images of isolated muscle that we've photographed. AI places the image usually much smaller than the size of the entire art board, so I scale it across to the full width and adjust the height to match the cropped height of the image (cropped from the initial 1200 pixels).

3) Then in a layer set atop this now locked image layer I'll place lines and text and other annotations applied to the muscle.

4) When everything is positioned how I want it I'll then export my work as a JPEG to insert into our Lab Manual, which is a Word document, and to have available for our website in the future.

For some reason I've got the idea in my head that when I make the annotations and prep the image for export the overall AI document's artboard must be the same size as the image's, measured in pixels. I guess I think this condition is necessary for creating clear exported images that scale well, just as the source image would. Does this help?

[LenHewitt@adobeforums.com]

Jamie,

>>I start a new AI document, type in the art board size to 1600 X 1200

pixels, the resolution our digital camera is set to<<

When you create a New Document sized in Pixels, Illustrator assumes 72ppi.
Unless that ppi matches the ppi of the image from the camera, the image will
come in at a different size.

From what you say, it sounds as though the image from your camera is
'tagged' as being at 300ppi, in which case, when placed, it will only occupy
approximately one quarter of the area of your artboard. When you scale the
image, all you are doing is changing the ppi of that image.

Now (assuming I'm correct re the 300ppi) if you created your artboard at
5.33 x 4 INCHES, when you placed the image it would fill the artboard.

[Unregistered]

I've been doing a lot of picture annotations for this muscle physiology lab I'm doing work for. Basically I take a picture of some muscle, place it into a layer of its own, and with another layer lay down lines, text, etc to annotate the picture. My question is how can I quickly make the document size I'm going to do these annotations in to be the same size as the image measured in pixels? I know I can do Alt Ctrl P to change the art board's size manually (which forces me to look at the picture's properties for its width and height in pixels) but is there some way Illustrator can open the file and size the art board around the pictures full size?

wow!.. great.. thanks.. =D

[Unregistered]

Oh this was really easy and really useful to know:

Just go to menu and select

Object - Artboards - Fit to Artwork Bounds

[bharathi]

how can i set width 2.5 feet and height 6ft in illustator