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Artwork Guidelines

The guidelines presented here are to help both us and you in making your job go smoother, and to make you aware of some of the potential problems. There are, of course, many details we cannot fully cover, and if you need any clarification, please ask us. It is always wise to call us first before spending time setting a job up. While some of the tips are essential, some are also there to advise you on how better to work.

File formats:

  • Quark XPress® (up to version 6.5)
  • Macromedia® Freehand (version 5 to v8)
  • Adobe® Illustrator (version 9, v10 or CS)
  • Adobe® Pagemaker (version 6.0)
  • Adobe® InDesign (CS)

To ensure the inclusion of all image files, we recommend you save your document to a new folder using the 'Collect for Output' (XPress) or 'Flight check' (InDesign) facility. Please also include all screen and printer fonts. For multi page leaflets or brochures, each page must be supplied in single page format with 3mm bleed.

PDF

PDF is by far the best way to supply us your files, but be aware that we will not be able to amend them. Whatever software you use, if you have Adobe Acrobat, you are able to create PDF files. PDF is an all in, very portable file format with excellent compression to keep your files small. We prefer PDF files over any other file format as they are very reliable and quick to work with. No extra fonts or images are needed to print from a PDF. If you intend to supply us many files over time then it is highly recommended that you invest in a copy of Acrobat.

Artwork files to be in single pages with all palette colours and images set to CMYK. All picture files must be in EPS or TIFF format. All white out text to be set for 'Knockout'. Each page must have 3mm bleed with offset set at 9mm. File must contain crop marks and must be saved at 100%.

PC Applications

We support some PC programs including Corel Draw, Microsoft Publisher and Microsoft Word. We recommend that you speak to our studio before submitting artwork in these formats.

Images

Images should be set for CMYK separations unless in Photoshop DCS format.

If you are using an application that does not embed pictures (i.e. QuarkXPress), then you must be sure that you supply all the images you have used. All images should be CMYK and not RGB, and should be scanned or created at the correct resolution:

  • Saving images at higher resolutions will make no difference to the printed quality and will take longer to process, slowing down the job. The main exception to the resolutions above is when you have a colour job, but with some clearly defined text (i.e. black on white). Here, a resolution of 300dpi may not be enough to stop the text looking 'fuzzy' so a higher resolution may be necessary.
  • Images from the internet are at approx. 72dpi and most are unsuitable for a high quality result. To keep document sizes manageable, make sure images are scanned at the correct resolution at the finished size e.g. don't scan an image in at 300dpi, then scale it down to 20% in your document as this is wasteful and increases processing time.
  • Bitmap/Lineart images (pure black and white): 600dpi
  • Greyscale images: 300dpi
  • Colour images: 300dpi

When supplying individual images, these are the standard image file formats in order of preference:

  • TIFF - A format that retains quality when compressed. Preferred.
  • EPS - A useful format for additional information such as cut-out paths.
  • JPEG - Great for small file sizes, but the quality of the image will degrade in proportion to compression.
  • PSD - Photoshop native format. We prefer you to flatten your image and use TIFF instead.
  • GIF - Internet standard. Uses a limited colour palette so it is not advisable to use this.
  • BMP - Windows standard. Retains image quality but file sizes can be large.

Full Colour Printing

Understanding colour - what you can and can't expect can be very important, particularly when setting up your own work to be printed.

There are two different types of colour generation that you should be aware of:

  • RGB is when all colours are made up from RED, GREEN and BLUE. This is how your monitor displays colour and is commonly found in many software packages.
  • CMYK is when all colours are made up from CYAN, MAGENTA, YELLOW and BLACK. This is how colour is physically printed, either through a litho press or digital printer.

Because RGB and CMYK colours do not match, you must set up your document in CMYK for the best results. When RGB images are printed on a CMYK device, they can often look very poor in comparison. Also, if you set your document in CMYK, it will give you a better idea of the finished result.

Colour Matching

Every device displays colour in a slightly different way. The colour on your monitor will not necessarily match the colour on ours. Also, the colour on an ink-jet print will most likely not match that of a laser print or a litho print. Pantone colours may show slight variations when printed as a digital proof.

Spot Colour Printing

When a job is to be litho printed in one or more spot colours (i.e. not a full colour job), there are important things to remember when setting it up. To ensure consistency we recommend that all spot colours are specified as PMS (Pantone Matching System) colours. Be aware that PMS swatch book colours may alter after a few years on the shelf so, if in doubt, check with us! These guidelines apply to litho printing only and not to digital.

Single Colour
Single colour jobs need to be set up as BLACK only. If, for example, you are setting a job that will be printed in blue, you do not need to set the job up in blue.

Two or more colours
If you have several spot colours and you are not familiar with setting up for spot colour printing, you should limit these colours ON SCREEN to cyan, magenta, yellow or black, REGARDLESS of what the final colour will be. When sent to print, each of these colours will produce a monochrome plate, and the printing ink will decide what the final colour will be. By setting up spot jobs in these colours, it will avoid any potential problems with colour separation. This method must be used with programs like Publisher. Microsoft Word is not suitable for creating spot colour jobs.

If you are familiar with setting up work for spot colour, then please make sure that colours are specified as 'spot' in the software you are using (i.e. Illustrator or QuarkXPress).

Bleed

Our standard page bleed to allow for variations in folding and trimming is 3mm all round. Trim marks should be included but must not intrude in to the bleed area. Please ensure that all elements of the page appear entirely within the trimmed page size.

Fonts

You MUST supply all fonts that you use when supplying a job, even if they seem like standard fonts that everyone would have:

Fonts are not necessary when supplying a job as an image (e.g. TIFF). Also, vector graphics software such as Illustrator, Freehand and Corel Draw allows you to convert text to outlines/curves so fonts are not an issue.

Digital Proofs

All quoted print work includes a proof produced on our Digital Press. Should you require PDF or litho wet proofs, please inform us.