The ideal way to create the perfect posters, business cards, flyers or brochures, whether in a personal or corporate setup is to have minimal knowledge of how to process your design. It is important for the designer and the printing company to work hand in hand to procure best results for a desired print.

Here is a checklist of items that we recommend paying attention to while you design your print–

1.Proofreading

Do not overlook typos, grammatical errors and punctuations while inserting text to your design. Putting yourself in the reader’s shoes, would you go ahead and continue reading a document that has grammatical errors and typos ? Unless deliberate, pun-intended, do not make space for typing errors!

Detection and rectification of errors during the designing stage will save you a ton of headache and cost. Because once your design has been printed and in the hands of your consumer, there is no looking back. A good user experience goes a long way for your company’s image and in turn hikes up your company sales.

There are two types of proofreading you need to address before sending it off to the printing press— Linguistic proofreading and Graphic proofreading.

Linguistic proofreading will cover text editing– checking for any typos, grammatical error, spellings, paragraphing and misuse of complex sentences, etc. This will give you an opportunity to tune up or tune down the overall language of your text.

Graphic proofreading will cover all the visual aspects of the design as well as the appeal of your text inserts. Look for any misalignments in texts, images or the company logo. Maintain consistent line spacings in between sentences. Keep eyes on the overall uniformity of your graphics.

2.Font Size and Text Spacing

 Even though most font designs come with some degree of optimization, it is always best to test it out with your own visual judgement. Not adjusting the font size, and spaces between letters or sentences will leave them looking a little off.

There are three efficient ways by which a layman can exercise classic proofreading (like a typograph), just by using the Font-Dialogue Box–

Leading– Check if the height of all the letters- in caps or in lower case- are aligned and and look uniform.

Eg. Printing service Company vs Printing Service Company

Tracking– Track the space between the characters or words

Eg. Printing Service__ Company vs Printing Service Company

 Kerning– Check for definite spacing in between adjacent alphabets.

Errors are distractions for the viewer. You may take creative liberties while designing your artwork, but make sure deliberate mistakes do not look like careless ones. You must think of the entire design as a composition of ingredients like– punctuation marks, letters, negative spacing, excessive spacing, paragraphs– that must work in artistic cohesion with all the other components to create a simple and seamless visual experience for your readers.

3.Image size and Resolution

Make sure to double check the resolution of images before printing. Before uploading the image in your print design space, check the resolution of the image file draft that you might have finalized.

We often tend to be confused between the meanings of image size and file size. The image size refers to the dimensions of the image whereas the file size depends on the space in megabytes or gigabytes that is used up by the file on your system disc. In case you have multiple images within your design, make sure each of it has high resolution. This will guarantee an overall high resolution output in your design.

Commercial print images are generally saved at 300 DPI or more. For canvas printing, 100 DPI is sufficient. DPI stands for dots (or pixels) per inch– higher pixels give more sharpness to the image.

It is in fact recommended to always save your design files at the highest resolution possible. Later on, according to the requirements you can always scale down the resolution of the image, but increasing pixels after is almost impossible.

When you upload an image (say, your company logo) it may appear blurred. This may happen if you upload a raster image instead of a vector image. Be sure to check your file type before uploading an image for printing.

In general, it is best to never increase dimensions of the image more than 20 percent of its original size. This especially applies  for large sized flyers and brochures that have high value for imagery.

4.Check color accuracy (CMYK vs RGB)

 Computer screens and digital cameras speak a different language when it comes to light and colour when compared to a printer. Cameras and electronics that use a light sensor to produce visual light use an RGB (Red, Green, Blue) spectrum for easy and smooth mixing of lights. Printers however use the CMYK process that will overlay different light intensities to match every colour tone and create a fuller range of colors. Hence printers are capable of imparting a range of colors as opposed to the RGB system that subtracts colors to give a more deeper appeal. Most design software’s use RGB color modes in their programming.

 

The basic takeaway is that– set your color program to CMYK while designing for a print.  So as to ensure that the colors you see on your screen match up to colors that the printer will produce.

Another way to ensure color accuracy is by calibrating your monitor. You can simply go to your Windows control panel and select ” Calibrate display color”

5.Bleed and Crop marks

 Bleed indicates the parts of the design where your text or other elements extend past the boundary. The crop mark indicates the line along which your design will be trimmed for appropriation. The slug is a region outside the bleed that will contain print instructions and other helpful features. If you ignore the bleed, your design may have a  white border along one side, where the physical printed paper will not fit your design entirely.

Your design should extend all the way to the edge of the paper– hence, make sure the file’s bleed, crop and trims are lined properly.

All designs should be at least 5 mm away from all edges. This safe area should be maintained so that the design itself doesn’t risk getting trimmed. Also to make sure that there is enough space to work with while printing the design.

6.Create high resolution PDFs for your file

 PDFs are the ideal file saving format that does not incur any losses in pixels or size. Once you’ve saved your file safely in a PDF, name it and you’re ready to go!

7.Choosing the right kind of paper

 There are a variety of papers available in the market, such as– bond paper, gloss coated paper, matte paper, laminated and unlaminated paper– each of which create a different and unique look and feel. According to your product, budget and need you can choose the paper you want to print your design on. Choosing a less expensive semi- glossy paper can often give the same results as a premium matte finished paper. You can save a lot of time by visualising what effect your product is expected to create.

Going through your design at the prepress stage and specifically looking for errors can save a ton of time and money and result in a glowing final print. Oftentimes clients mistaken that the printing company is solely responsible for the designing and modifications of a print. In fact, as a designer you too should and must get involved in the creative process to ensure a foolproof output that lives up to your standards in the end.