THINGS TO AVOID
Today’s graphics applications are incredibly sophisticated. So much so, that many contain
features not compatible with the latest developments in printing technology. Through our
extensive experience, we’ve prepared a list of features that we know don’t work. So please,
don’t use any of the items listed below.
ITEM WHY NOT?
Hairlines Hairlines are ‘device dependent’. This means that they print at
different resolutions on different machines. They may print fine on
your 300dpi laser printer, but will disappear on our 2400dpi plate-
setter. Use 0.25pt instead.
Texture Fills These print erratically (or not at all). Best to convert it to a bitmap.
Make sure you choose 300dpi and CMYK though, and don’t make
the background transparent.
Postscript Fills These are erratic. They don’t look good anyway, use something else.
Compression You can happily use WinZIP or StuffIT to compress your files, but
never compress images using LZW compression or JPEG encoding.
Doing so will cause lots of problems and may result in your file not
printing at all.
Quark Picture Boxes A ‘feature’ of Quark Xpress is that if you don’t fill a picture box with
colour, the TIFF inside may print with a ragged edge. So, make sure
your picture box is filled with ‘white’ rather than ‘none’. Cut-out
EPSs are OK.
Overprint Be careful with overprint settings (especially in Quark). If you set
objects to overprint, they will not ‘knock-out’ the background, and
will look very different to what you see on screen or proof (see page
06). Black text is generally set as default to overprint. This is usually
OK. Please refer to your application manual for more details.
OLE objects Windows applications are happy to copy objects back and forth
between themselves. Unfortunately, they don’t print properly. Always
convert OLE objects to bitmaps before sending your file.
EPSs within EPSs Not a good idea. Postscript errors are at their greatest when this is
done. Certain Illustrator EPSs also cause problems in Quark.
Duotone/RGB images These will either print in black and white, or with very washed out
colours – always convert to CMYK.
Borders Avoid using borders (especially on Business Cards), since even a half
millimetre movement when guillotined will be noticeable.
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