Fit To Printable

[Mikey43]

When should 'Fit To Printable' be used?

[GarryP]

That’s an interesting question – I’m assuming that you are talking about the “Fit Type” setting in the Print Dialog.

My immediate response was to say that it would probably resize the thing being printed so that it fits the maximum print area of the selected printer.

However, I noticed that there is also a “Shrink To Printable” option, so it would be nice to know what the difference is between “Fit to Printable” and “Shrink to Printable” as they sound like the same thing to me.

I’ve had a look in the Help but I cannot find any information about these – the information about the Print Dialog seems very limited.

[walt.farrell]

3 hours ago, GarryP said:

so it would be nice to know what the difference is between “Fit to Printable” and “Shrink to Printable” as they sound like the same thing to me.

"Fit" could also mean expand, whereas "Shrink" is pretty definitely make smaller.

[GarryP]

With a single-page A3 portrait document:

• “Fit to Printable” - the document is shrunk to fit the A4 printer page.
• “Shrink to Printable” - the document is shrunk to fit the A4 printer page.

With a single-page A6 portrait document:

• “Fit to Printable” - the document is ‘expanded’ to fit the A4 printer page.
• “Shrink to Printable” - the document stays at A6 size on the A4 printer page.

So it looks like “Fit” means something like “always resize the document until it takes up the maximum space available on the physical page (while keeping the same aspect ratio)”, whereas “Shrink” means something like “only resize the document if the document is larger than the physical page”.

This is only by the small preview image, I’ve not actually printed anything.

[Mikey43]

Thanks for the replies. One of the reasons for asking is because I am having real problems printing 4pp A5 greeting cards. I try it first on paper to make sure of the positioning and it is OK but when trying to print on card the position moves. I have tried setting to matt photo paper and plain paper, one copy comes out OK and then the next has moved I am finding it very frustrating. Cannot see anything in the forums that covers this. I am using a PC with Affinity Designer and Windows 10. 

[Mikey43]

Forgot to say that I am using a Canon A3 Pixma 6850

[GarryP]

I rarely print anything and have never printed anything directly from the Affinity applications so I can’t help much further.

I would recommend that you start a new thread with a title relevant to your actual problem.
That way the printing experts who can help – and anyone else with the same problem – should be able to find it more easily.

In the new thread, you can add a link to this thread to show some 'history' of the issue.