PDF Studio
Assemble pages into a PDF, from Vectra, Inkwell and Composer, or from images, with A4 or Letter, orientation, compression and quality.
In one line#
The delivery step: collect artboards and images, put them in order, and export one PDF.
PDF Studio does not appear on aukimi's public module list. It is in the app, in the Design group of the module rail, and it is documented here because a studio you can see is a studio worth explaining.
| Header | the document name, the page count, and Export |
| Left | Modules, Vectra, Inkwell, Composer, then Add images and a drop zone |
| Centre | the page strip, or a drop zone while it is empty |
| Right | Settings: name, size, orientation, quality, compression |
What it is, and what it is not#
PDF Studio is an assembler, not a page editor. It takes pages that already exist and arranges them; it does not lay out text or draw. Design the pages in Composer, Vectra or Inkwell, then bring them here.
The document it saves is a list of pages: their sources, their order, the settings, not the PDF itself. The PDF is what you export, and it does not re-open in the studio.
What you do here#
Get pages in#
Two routes:
- Send from a studio. Vectra, Inkwell and Composer can hand their artboards straight to PDF Studio, one or several at a time.
- Add images. Drop or pick files: PNG, JPEG, WebP, GIF, BMP and AVIF.
An import that skips files says which ones. If you hand it twelve files and three become pages, the report names the other nine: "n file(s) skipped, only images can become pages", or "n file(s) could not be read". An import that silently drops most of its input is worse than one that fails.
Why a module button sometimes says the module is closed#
The three module buttons do not all work the same way, and the difference shows up the first time you use one:
| Module | How the page arrives |
|---|---|
| Vectra | PDF Studio pulls its composite |
| Inkwell | PDF Studio pulls its composite |
| Composer | Composer pushes the image across, the way it sends to every other studio |
All three need the module to have been opened at least once this session. A studio that has never been visited has published nothing to pull from, so the button reports that the module is closed rather than adding a blank page. Open the tab, then come back.
Pages are rendered at twice the target size, because the same preview is used for printing: a vector rendered at screen resolution and then printed is the one mistake this bridge exists to avoid.
Order them#
Drag the page cards by their handle. The order in the strip is the order in the PDF.
Set the document up#
| Name | the document's name |
| Size | A4 (595.28 × 841.89 pt) or Letter (612 × 792 pt) |
| Orientation | portrait or landscape |
| Quality | 72 DPI (screen), 150 DPI (draft) or 300 DPI (print); this is the resolution each page is rendered at |
| Compression | Small, Balanced or Maximum |
300 DPI and Balanced are the defaults, which is the right pair for something that will be printed. Drop to 72 DPI only for a document that will never leave a screen: the difference in file size is real, and so is the difference on paper.
Export#
Export builds the file and downloads it. Each page is placed inside the page box at its own aspect ratio, so a landscape image in a portrait document is fitted rather than stretched.
Files it reads and writes#
| Native format | .pdfdoc: the page list, not the PDF |
| Imports | .png, .jpg, .jpeg, .webp, .gif, .bmp, .avif, and artboards sent from Vectra, Inkwell and Composer |
| Exports | .pdf |
Limits and common snags#
- A PDF exported here does not re-open here. Keep the
.pdfdocif you want to change the document; the PDF is the output. - Only images become pages. A text file or a PDF dropped on the import will be skipped, and named in the report.
- A file with no MIME type is judged by its extension, so a PNG that arrives from a ZIP or a network drive is still accepted.
- Two page sizes, A4 and Letter. Anything else has to be composed at the size you want in Composer and exported as an image.