When someone asks for a PDF as TIFF files
Hardly anyone picks TIFF for themselves. It is asked for, by a records office, a print shop, a document management system or a scanning workflow that keeps every page as a picture. So the useful question is not how to make a TIFF but whether the files this page writes match what was asked for, and in most cases they do.
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Which tool you need
An archive, a records office or a print shop
This page. Use 300 DPI unless they give you another figure; whatever you choose is written into each file, so their software reads the right size.
A system that insists on a single multi-page TIFF
That file cannot be made here. You get a separate TIFF for every page, so ask whether a set of single-page files will do, or whether the PDF itself is accepted.
A fax service that names a black-and-white TIFF format
These files are not in that format: they are full color, packed without loss. If the service will take the PDF instead, send that.
A page for a website, a chat or an email
PDF to JPG makes far smaller files that open everywhere. A TIFF is the wrong weight for anything that is only going to be looked at on a screen.
TIFF pages that have to become a PDF again
TIFF to PDF goes the other way, and keeps every page of a multi-page TIFF in order.
How resolution changes the files
The presets are 72, 150 and 300 DPI, and any whole number from 36 to 600 can be typed instead. Doubling the DPI makes four times as many pixels: an A4 page at 300 DPI is roughly 2,480 by 3,508 pixels, and at 600 roughly 4,960 by 7,016.
Because nothing is thrown away, those pixels add up, and a page of TIFF is many times the size of the same page as a JPG. A very large page at a high setting can be more than this device can draw, and it is refused before the conversion starts rather than failing halfway.
What is inside each TIFF
Each file is an ordinary 8-bit color TIFF, packed with lossless Deflate compression, with the DPI recorded in it. With the transparent background turned on it carries an alpha channel too, so the parts of the page nothing was drawn on stay clear rather than white.
The page is drawn as it appears, turned and cropped the way the PDF shows it, which makes every word part of the picture. The text can no longer be selected or searched, links and form fields stop working, and colors are kept as a screen shows them rather than in a printing press's CMYK.
What to know before you start
- No multi-page TIFF: one file per page, and a ZIP when there are several.
- Resolution is limited to the range from 36 to 600 DPI.
- No CMYK and no black-and-white fax compression in the output.
- A PDF behind a password has to be opened with Unlock PDF first.
- The pages are drawn in your browser, and the PDF never leaves this device.