Preparing Artwork for Print, Finished Artwork.
Frank@InkPrinting
Listen to the podcast or read the article and instructions in full below…
There are a lot of finished artists out there that can run rings around artwork for print so this podcast is not aimed at you … good listening, but you know your stuff.
Instead I’m addressing the people that haven’t much experience. The first timers and those of you that have been thrust into the job; pointed at the computer and told to make up a newsletter, whatever.
So, in these days of computer graphics all of the traditional steps to create art for print is usually done by the one person i.e. the one person is the Designer, Illustrator, Typesetter, Layout Artist and the Finished Artist. Just because Finished Art is the last step does not mean that it is left ‘till last.
During the whole process, thought should be given to ‘How is this going to print’, what allowances should I make to the design/ layout so that my Finished Art will be used to print a quality job.
OK, Setting Up Your Job.
1. Whatever program you’re using, make sure your page is the right size. Double check your specs.
2. When setting up your page allow for bleed area, 3mm all round is good. Most programs will allow you to specify a bleed margin; if not, make your page 6mm wider and 6mm higher, place guides at 3mm from edges so you know where your page edges lie. If your job doesn’t require bleed no need to include it.
When printing, your document will be printed on a larger sheet than finished size, bleed is printing that goes beyond the edge of where the document will be trimmed. In other words, the bleed is the area to be trimmed off. ... Artwork and background colours often extend into the bleed area. After trimming, the bleed ensures that no unprinted edges occur in the final trimmed document, i.e. white edges.
3. Save your document and get into the habit of saving regularly during working on it (this will become instinctive).
4. Save in a dedicated folder (directory) with subfolders for HiRes (High Resolution Images — Pics and Graphics), Fonts (if using fonts that are not normally installed on your system) and NonPrinting for associated files that have been used or may be used.
5. If you have the option set your document up for CMYK; and again, if you have the option, set the working space ‘Colour Profile’ to ‘Coated FOGRA39”. This is the industry standard and represents the colours of a typical print made by commercial offset litho on gloss or matte coated paper, according to the standard printing definition in ISO 12647-2.
Designing Your Job
We won’t get into design principals, ascetics etc. but rather a couple of considerations for the design with Finished Art in mind; and that is, how the Finished art should be to facilitate the best result for printing and finishing (finishing is after the job has been printed: guillotining, folding, binding etc.).
If you give your page a border around the edge make it a decent width. Tolerances In printing can vary, more so with digital printing ... and then the job has to be trimmed. 2mm is tight, 3mm is a little more tolerable, anything bigger is better;
Rules (hairlines) should be no thinner than 0.1pt for black lines, 0.25pt for colour. Personally I stick to 0.5pt for my thinest rules, remember a point is only about one third of one millimetre;
All body type, if black, should be solid black, (no Rich Black);
If you use a type font that is thin give some thought as to how faint the type will be printed, don’t go too small and don’t try to print it in a light colour and definitely give serious thought as to how it will print if reversed out of a solid colour;
‘But it looks good on the screen’. Images on the screen do not look 100% like the printed piece. Your screen is back lit and things will seem brighter than they will print, pictures especially; additionally your screen is RGB and they will print CMYK and there is always a slight colour shift.
If using a Rich Black stick to something like C-40%, M-35%, Y-30%, K-100%. Any more ink density than that may lead to ink drying issues and ‘set off’; apart from that you really can’t tell the difference;
If you’re unsure how to set up a job that you haven’t done before or is a little difficult give your printer a call - ME - Frank @ InkPrinting and I’d be happy to help.
Finished Art to Printer
Some programs in which you will be doing your work will Package the job for you. That is, the program will copy into a folder the document, all the fonts used and all the images and graphics that were used, as well as a report on the whole shebang.
That’s great but it is a lot simpler just to generate a PDF. The PDF will contain all those things in just one file, and it is a lot less prone to error and easier for the printer to process.
So, Generating a PDF
All the programs used for text, graphics and composition will be able to generate a PDF, though with some you have more control over the output than with others.
You will choose Export or Export to PDF or Save AS (the document and then choose PDF) ect.. In the simplest PDF generators you may not have any options other than WEB or PRINT, choose Print (of course), or High Quality Print.
These output options will become more plentiful the more sophisticated the program. If there is an output option for dpi (or quality or size) choose the largest (or 300dpi if available)… do not down size any images.
Below are Ink Printings preferences (mine) when generating a PDF from Adobe Indesign. If your program of choice does not have all these options just take from the explanation what is relevant.
InDesign
With document open:
Keyboard Shortcut, ‘Command + E’, or Pulldown Menu, ‘File/ Export...’
Export Window comes up, choose where you want to save the PDF and choose Format: ‘Adobe PDF (Print), Hit ‘Save’.
Export Adobe PDF window now comes up. “Adobe PDF Preset:” choose [PDF/ X-4:2008]
Most of the specs. here are good, we just have to change a couple. In the LHS Menu choose ‘Marks and Bleeds’;
In ‘Marks’ choose ‘Crop Marks’, ‘Offset’ type in 3 (assuming you set up document with 3mm bleed, if no bleed in document still type in ‘3’ mm);
In ‘Bleed and Slug’ choose ‘Use Document Bleed Settings’.
In the LHS Menu choose ‘Output’
In ‘PDF/X’ set ‘Output Intent Profile Name’ to “Coated FOGRA39....”
HIT ‘EXPORT’ ... but before you do that ‘Save Preset...’ (bottom LHS button) Call it ‘Ink Printing_PDF/X’ and it will be there for next time. THATS IT!
I hope something it all that may prove useful but please remember if you have a question, you’re a little unsure of how to prepare something for print, give me a call;
Call Frank at Ink Printing on 1300 514 118 (Australia)
