Artwork guidelines - Creating print-ready artwork for Christmas Cards
At www.christmas-card-printing.co.uk we appreciate our online christmas card templates are not always suitable for every item of print you require. But why you shouldn't be able to take advantage of short or long run prices for full colour printing. So we have made it easy to use your own artwork too.
If you don't understand the following, don't worry - give us a call and one of our team of print experts will guide you through it - or save you the worry and design the artwork for you.
IMPORTANT - The online prices are for "print ready" supplied artwork only. If our graphic design studio have to amend the file (e.g. resize, adjust colour or make changes), there may be an additional charge, but don't worry, we will always tell you first, and many small issues can be sorted easily, quickly and without charge
To be certain your artwork is "print ready" use the check list below to ensure it meets the following requirements.
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FILE FORMAT - We accept artwork as "print ready" only if it is in PDF or JPEG format. PDF is the preferred format as it will keep you text nice and crisp - if you use JPEG then use the highest quality you can and make sure your artwork is at least 350dpi (ideally 600dpi).
There are many manipulation tools that allow you to save or print your artwork to PDF format.
PDF creation tools are also available that will allow you to make a PDF from the most commonly used commercial & home/office programmes. Adobe Distiller is the most commply used programme which comes packaged with Acrobat, however there are also many free or shareware applications that work to great effect, including Primo PDF, PDF995, AcroPDF and CutePDF.
Instructions on creating "print ready artwork" PDFs for commercial print can be found at www.pass4press.com. The site also has very useful guides on the best configuration for Quark, InDesign and Distiller.
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RESOLUTION - To ensure your files print clearly all artwork including images must be supplied at a resolution of at least 300dpi. Anything lower than this may result in blurry, bitmapped or pixelated print.
Note: images used from the web are 72dpi and although they look fine on screen they are not suitable for full colour printing.
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COLOURS - CMYK (Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Black) is an industry standard formula designed to give the most precise colour reproductions. Artwork received using Pantone, Spot or RGB (commonly Web colours) will be converted into CMYK format, this may cause some colours to change.
Our CMYK Print Workflow uses technology not commonly available to home/office printers or monitors and is calibrated and maintained to a recognised industry standard (ISO / FOGRA). As such your printer or screen should only be used as a guide and not to accurately proof a colour.
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FONTS - Due to the vast number of different fonts, all fonts used must be embedded or outilined before sending us the final artwork. Failure to do this could result in an alternative style being used automatically.
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BLEED - Bleed is used when any part of an image, background, colour or line is to print the very edges of the finished product. For example if you wanted the background of a business card to be red, the colour must bleed past all edges. If not due to minor variations in printing and trimming, white lines could be seen on some or all of the edges.
The bleed requirements are 3mm all round.
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TEXT - All text must be a safe distance from the edge, a minimum of 4mm is recommended.
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ARTWORK SIZE - Please refer to the sizes specified by the individual product specifications. Please remember to add 6mm to the finished artwork size to allow for 3mm bleed on all edges.
The table below highlights some of our most popular products.