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Asked: 2010-11-01 12:07:53 +0800 CST

How to exchange/remove/overwrite a PDF's background?

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as the title says I want to change background of a PDF. This are some slides, and to save toner I thought it would be good to change the background to white. I tried pdftk with its operations: background and stamp, but the don't work as expected:

pdftk old.pdf background white.pdf output out.pdf
pdftk old.pdf stamp white.pdf output out.pdf

I also tried convert (bloating my pdf upto 200MB) as done this way:

convert old.pdf -background white new.pdf

with no luck. Do you know a way I could perform this?

pdf convert

4 Answers

  1. To deal with these presentations, I used a few times Sun PDF Import Extension. When installed, you are able to import PDF presentations with OpenOffice.org Impress. Even though the conversion is not 100% smooth, you are able to edit the background and change the color. It may be a bit tedious if you are dealing with lots of slides, but it's the best solution I found for these cases. You should note that everything is converted into Impress' objects.

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  2. If you have openoffice.org installed, you can install the pdf-import plugin (I believe it is in the software center), and then open your pdf in openoffice.org writer, change the background, and save it again.

    You can even create a hybrid pdf file.

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  3. in ImageMagick:

    1. file -> open -> foo.pdf -> import
    2. select -> by color ->
    3. second item in toolbar (dutch: bewerken) -> fill with BG-color
    4. repeat 2 and 3 if necessary for other background colors
    5. file -> print
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  4. try to guess the background density and move all to white:

    convert -density 300 foo.pdf  -white-threshold 80% bar.pdf
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