PDF booklets, watermarking
Given some black-on-white art to use as a watermark (PNG with transparent background), we can desaturate and apply as a watermark as follows (it’s necessary to set the background of the text PDF to transparent rather than white so that the watermark is visible behind the text):
convert clipart.png -negate -modulate 4 -negate watermark.pdf convert -density 600 booklet.pdf -transparent white booklet.pdf pdftk booklet.pdf multibackground watermark.pdf output out.pdf
Booklet printing in Preview enforces a border; better to export an ordinarily laid-out PDF and convert. In Google Docs margins of 0.5″ all around, and setting paper size to A4, seems to work well.
pdf2ps booklet.pdf psbook booklet.ps booklet.sigs.ps psnup -Pa4 -2 booklet.sigs.ps booklet.2up.ps ps2pdf booklet.2up.ps