Combine Multiple Images Into One PDF

use command-line tool to create a single PDF file from multiple screenshots

We nowadays take many screenshots. Sharing those images is a hassle. It would be easier to merge the images into a single PDF file. This can be done for free with a command-line tool ImageMagick on masOS, following this original guide from Stack Overflow¹.

Take screenshots

On macOS, there are a few ways to take a screenshot:

Command + Shift + 3 will take a snapshot in PNG format for the entire screen.

Command + Shift + 4 will turn the cursor into an “aim” sign that allows you to take a selected area of the window, rather than the entire screen.

These screenshot images are saved in the ~/Desktop folder.

Install ImageMagick

ImageMagick is a powerful image-processing tool for command-line use.

Install ImageMagick with macOS’s popular package manager brew.

$ brew install imagemagick

Create PDF

First, rename the images with serialized standard names:

Then move them into a separate folder. Enter that folder. Convert them into a single PDF file. Use * sign as a wild card to select all the images.

$ convert demo*.png demo.pdf

There you go. Hello, demo.pdf!

Now you can share this demo.pdf with your other devices or another friend. It’s much easier to deal with than a bunch of image files.

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1. https://stackoverflow.com/questions/8955425/how-can-i-convert-a-series-of-images-to-a-pdf-from-the-command-line-on-linux