Writing Sample PDF Size Forum

[Anonymous User]

Hey, so I am trying to post my writing sample to OSCAR but it says it is too large (just over 550kb, but it needs to be under 300). Since the writing sample is only 10 pages and is already saved as a PDF, I do not know how to reduce the size of the file so that I can upload it.

I am actually decently tech-savvy and I couldn't find anything online that would help, except for compressing the file, but I didn't think that would work for uploading.

[BVest]

There are online PDF size reducers. These don't compress (even when that's the word they use), but rather strip extraneous embedded fonts, Word garbage, and the like. There's no real reason a 10 page PDF of a Word document (assuming you didn't scan it) should be 550 kb [edited] to begin with, except for all the Word garbage that MS throws into files, so getting size down with those tools works pretty well. And if you did scan the pdf, then it just reduces the quality of the image slightly to get the file size down.

Just be sure you don't pick one of the shitty ones that then watermarks your PDF.

[A. Nony Mouse]

Actually, OP said 550 kb? 300 kb does seem awfully small.

[BVest]

Actually, OP said 550 kb? 300 kb does seem awfully small.

I meant kb. Late night posting hazards.

But as far as being small, my entire open brief (from which my first writing sample was excerpted) was <150kb as a word file, and the excerpt was only 1/3 of that. The word version of my seminar paper which I used for another sample was only 165 kb, from which I excerpted 1/4 of the paper.

After I used the default settings for PDF, both of my writing samples ended up exceeding the 300 kb, because of the junk that got in there between Word and the conversion algorithm (and possibly from inefficiencies in converting to PDF first and then deleting pages and adding a cover page later). The online compressors brought my samples back down to under 200kb.

[Anonymous User]

Figured it out guys, thank you. Appreciate the feedback.