Commercial Printing For Newbies

By Author: Kaitlyn Miller
Total Articles: 90
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Being new to commercial printing is difficult but fun and exciting at the same time. It will be even easier if you are working with the best commercial printing company there is, so make sure you find the right one. Empower yourself with some knowledge on the commercial print process:

1) Start thinking about what you really need and make a list.
You probably want to do a lot of different prints, clear your mind first. Think about your general budget and list down what you want according to the most important to the least important. This way if you are way over your budget you can easily remove some from your list.

2) Think about the people who will be seeing/using the prints.
To have a general idea of your inspiration is important. You need something to help you pick out colors, pictures and other materials, and thinking about your target consumers and their preference will definitely keep you in track.

3) Start looking for printers.
Notice that the word is in plural form? It means you need to look for several printers before settling down with just one. It is important to have several ...
... choices to weigh out the pros and cons, the price quotes and the options given. You should also consider how they interact with their customers and how happy previous clients were of their prints.

4) Start Creating your artwork.
The easiest, cheapest and most convenient way to get this done is to use the design program your printer is using, this way you can easily holler for their help if its taking you forever to do it and you do not have to worry about producing the wrong file type.

A few reminders from your friendly printers before you submit your art files:

a. File types - Every printer has their own preference for file types since they have different design programs. Make sure your printers have clarified this with you if not, ask them. You need to save your art file according to their preference.

b. Font file - Font files are supposed to be imbedded in your main file to be sure that your designs will not be changed once your printers open your file and they do not have your particular font.

c. Colors - Colors are an integral part of your prints because it makes your prints livelier than usual. Keep in mind though that printers use CMYK colors to create those remarkable prints so if you are designing with RGB, you may want to convert it before you submit the file or have your colors match to get the same color results as you saw on your monitor.

d. Resolutions - If you want very clear prints especially if you have a lot of images in your design, consider using the highest resolution possible. This is very important for extraordinarily large prints like posters. Medium sized prints are okay with 300dpi or more.

e. Print marks - All your print marks must be clear. Print marks include your crop line, caution zone, your bleed etc. all pictures, images, text and other important designs must not go beyond this caution zone unless you want them to be cut.

If you having trouble creating your design, it is always best to seek the help of the commercial printing company you chose, although some may add a little fee to the service, your prints (if they could only talk) will thank you for it. Commercial printing is a good way to promote just about any company, if done well, so make sure yours is.

For more information, you can visit this page on commercial printing