Nook and Reflowing PDF's

pastorjamie · 02-23-2010, 12:00 AM

Hello:

I'm a completely fool and newbie to all this.

I just purchased a Nook tonight and one of the things that I must be able to do is get my scanned books into it.

I've downloaded Calibre for Mac and I've added a test PDF and sent it to the Nook. All good except that it is a full size of the page (originally 6in x 9in) squashed into a 6 in screen so it is hardly readable.

I thought that I saw someone use Calibre to REFLOW a pdf. How do I do this? What settings in Calibre do I need to set? How?

frabjous · 02-23-2010, 12:43 AM

Calibre does not reflow PDFs as far as I know, though if it were a text based PDF you could convert it to a reflowable format using calibre, though PDF conversion is seldom ideal.

But these are scanned books? I.e., the PDFs consist of images, not normal text? Nothing can reflow that. Try running them through OCR software and see what the results are like. The OCR software will likely output reflowable format, like HTML or DOC, which you can convert (with calibre, or with calibre along with a word processor) to a reflowable ebook format.

pastorjamie · 02-23-2010, 01:25 AM

They are text only, already OCR'ed.

frabjous · 02-23-2010, 01:27 AM

Do you only have them saved as PDFs? Seems like a funny file format to use to save text files.

Try converting them to ePub or another format the Nook can handle.

pastorjamie · 02-23-2010, 01:57 AM

I guess that's what I'm trying to figure out...how do I convert them to ePub in Calibre?

Do I simply add the book then click SEND TO DEVICE? or, if i click CONVERT E-BOOK what settings should be used for best results?

wallcraft · 02-23-2010, 05:11 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by pastorjamie

I guess that's what I'm trying to figure out...how do I convert them to ePub in Calibre?

Click CONVERT, select EPUB and under Page Setup select Nook as the output device. You may need to experiment with other settings, such as chapter detection.

Sabardeyn · 02-23-2010, 09:09 PM

PDFs are known for generating very poor output here at MobileRead when trying to convert. So don't be surprised if you have to try a few things to get the best possible output. Also, don't overlook the possibility of outputting as plain text. It saved my paragraphs at the expense of losing some formatting and italics. Which was a lot easier to fix then removing thousands of newlines.

bthoven · 02-25-2010, 05:30 AM

In Nook, when you set font size to Medium/Larger/Largest, it will reflow the text for you. For English PDF, especially text only, it reflows quite well. Some PDF with photos also reflows quite nice.

ctos · 02-25-2010, 11:55 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bthoven

In Nook, when you set font size to Medium/Larger/Largest, it will reflow the text for you. For English PDF, especially text only, it reflows quite well. Some PDF with photos also reflows quite nice.

agree.

02-23-2010, 12:00 AM	#1
pastorjamie Member Posts: 15 Karma: 12028 Join Date: Feb 2010 Device: Nook	Nook and Reflowing PDF's Hello: I'm a completely fool and newbie to all this. I just purchased a Nook tonight and one of the things that I must be able to do is get my scanned books into it. I've downloaded Calibre for Mac and I've added a test PDF and sent it to the Nook. All good except that it is a full size of the page (originally 6in x 9in) squashed into a 6 in screen so it is hardly readable. I thought that I saw someone use Calibre to REFLOW a pdf. How do I do this? What settings in Calibre do I need to set? How?

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02-23-2010, 12:43 AM	#2
frabjous Wizard Posts: 1,213 Karma: 12890 Join Date: Feb 2009 Location: Amherst, Massachusetts, USA Device: Sony PRS-505	Calibre does not reflow PDFs as far as I know, though if it were a text based PDF you could convert it to a reflowable format using calibre, though PDF conversion is seldom ideal. But these are scanned books? I.e., the PDFs consist of images, not normal text? Nothing can reflow that. Try running them through OCR software and see what the results are like. The OCR software will likely output reflowable format, like HTML or DOC, which you can convert (with calibre, or with calibre along with a word processor) to a reflowable ebook format.

02-23-2010, 01:25 AM	#3
pastorjamie Member Posts: 15 Karma: 12028 Join Date: Feb 2010 Device: Nook	They are text only, already OCR'ed.

02-23-2010, 01:27 AM	#4
frabjous Wizard Posts: 1,213 Karma: 12890 Join Date: Feb 2009 Location: Amherst, Massachusetts, USA Device: Sony PRS-505	Do you only have them saved as PDFs? Seems like a funny file format to use to save text files. Try converting them to ePub or another format the Nook can handle.

02-23-2010, 01:57 AM	#5
pastorjamie Member Posts: 15 Karma: 12028 Join Date: Feb 2010 Device: Nook	I guess that's what I'm trying to figure out...how do I convert them to ePub in Calibre? Do I simply add the book then click SEND TO DEVICE? or, if i click CONVERT E-BOOK what settings should be used for best results?

02-23-2010, 09:09 PM	#7
Sabardeyn Guru Posts: 644 Karma: 1242364 Join Date: May 2009 Location: The Right Coast Device: PC (Calibre), Nexus 7 2013 (Moon+ Pro), HTC HD2/Leo (Freda)	PDFs are known for generating very poor output here at MobileRead when trying to convert. So don't be surprised if you have to try a few things to get the best possible output. Also, don't overlook the possibility of outputting as plain text. It saved my paragraphs at the expense of losing some formatting and italics. Which was a lot easier to fix then removing thousands of newlines.

02-25-2010, 05:30 AM	#8
bthoven Evangelist Posts: 475 Karma: 590 Join Date: Aug 2009 Location: Bangkok, Thailand Device: Kindle Paperwhite	In Nook, when you set font size to Medium/Larger/Largest, it will reflow the text for you. For English PDF, especially text only, it reflows quite well. Some PDF with photos also reflows quite nice.

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